I spent most of today baking holiday goodies to give away, which made me think about the last time I sent Christmas cards: the summer of 2009.

You read that correctly.

Back in 2009, I had it together enough before M had surgery number 2, to “make” cards via iPhoto and send them out in the summer, because I thought I would be in no condition to mail anything later in the year. (I was right; it was a hellish few months.) Because I was so self-conscious about sending them when I did, I only sent them to a couple of dozen people who knew what we were going through that year, anyway. It was mostly an excuse to put a bunch of cute pictures of Pea together.

(I hadn’t sent many cards for a couple of years before then, because, looking backward, I had a crazy job, a newborn, had graduated from law school, and was generally not a good correspondent during law school. So it wasn’t like I’ve been letting a lot of people down; we were getting few cards ourselves by 2009.)

Last year I just…couldn’t. I was feeling pretty defeated, and there was the whole nightmare scenario where we were about to move across the country, then didn’t. They weren’t happy holidays.

This year, I could have done cards. I debated. I had enough mental energy and time. But I realized two things: first, the few close friends that I would tell what’s going on in my life already know what’s going on in my life.  And most people I’d like to send cards to aren’t in my extended “real life” acquaintance network, but the people I know from my blog and Twitter. And I don’t know your addresses!

Ah, well. Maybe next year.