Reflections & Resolutions & Revelry
I am, right now, living out the closing hours of January 2nd, 2024. January 2nd is a strange day, no? January 1st carries so much weight: the first day to execute resolutions, but also the first day that many of us, myself included, spend hungover and rotting and contemplating what food to order at our doorsteps that will inevitably be slightly cold and a bit disappointing by the time it arrives. So January 2nd feels like the real first day of the year to me, but it carries that twinge of failure already because it feels like a true beginning moment has passed.
Blogs are played out, right? Everyone had a blog, then no one had a blog, now I can’t tell who has a blog. I never had a blog because I never thought I had much to say. But since I was young I have been described, often derogatorily, as talkative. I have so much to say. And though I stopped putting much weight in New Year’s Resolutions a few years ago, I told myself that this would be the year I stopped inhibiting myself in any way, and the year I would try new things no matter how much fear it put in my heart. Here I will put my thoughts, consequential or not, just because I can. Tonight I went to drink several martinis, which are not my usual drink order (I usually bounce around between gin and tonics, Moscow mules, and whiskey sours) because I wanted to take the above photograph of my brand new, meticulous martini nails. I already feel a twinge of shame: a mid-year resolution I made in the backyard of a Brooklyn dispensary was to not live for social media anymore. But it’s only the 2nd day of the new year, I still have time. Actually, I have and will have so much more time to do the things I say I will do.
2023 was, possibly, the most transformative year I’ve had to date. And I’ve had years where I moved continents! This year was, in a physical sense, relatively stagnant. Or so I tell myself when I try to diminish my growth and accomplishments, which is also something I should stop doing. So, in no particular order (certainly not chronologically) here is a summary of my past year.
I fell out of love. With another person, and with myself. The former makes me feel fantastic still, the second was a lot harder.
I got smaller, and I got bigger. I pinched and prodded myself into a shape that I thought would solve all my problems and then I found that it didn’t. So I stopped taking care of myself completely. And then I started again. And absolutely none of it seems to matter now.
In a city rife with cliches about the parties and the afterparties, I really did find myself on my adventures through Berlin’s nightlife. I pushed my boundaries and then set new ones. I cried on train rides home but received free french fries from sympathetic kebab shop workers. I took so many pictures of the sky on my street as the sun started rising. I woke up with so many knots in my upper back because it turns out that passing out drunk at 27 is not what it was at 19 (I am the first person to ever note this.)
I swam in the sunset waters in Greece and blew bubbles off balconies in Croatia. And there I was embraced not only by friends but their families as well, and I realized that despite being as loquacious as I am, I need to learn more words to be able to express my gratitude for that.
I celebrated a year of having the sweetest kitten in my house, who I got to see grow into the most beautiful cat. For every day that I could barely get out of bed to feed myself an unholy array of snacks, he was nourished.
I didn’t write as much as I wanted. I had a lot of ideas I did not execute. I wish I could say I have forgiven myself for that but I am still in the process.
I let go of needing another’s touch to be validated. I didn’t necessarily find the beauty in myself on my own, but baby steps are still steps. I stopped feeling desirable but I also stopped needing to feel desirable to feel worthy of my life. I found beauty in my anger towards those who hurt me, and held on to it as a glorious tool to guide me forward.
I didn’t do a lot of things that were good for me. That isn’t to say I did things that were bad for me (I mean, I did that too) but I just didn’t listen or trust myself enough, or just couldn’t find the energy, to do what I actually wanted to do.
I hosted parties and dinners. I cooked my grandparents’ recipes with all the love in my heart, and I told their stories when I served them. Holidays became such an important time for me to look around and realize that even if I am not always proud of myself, they probably are.
I lost so much. I said goodbye to two pets, one of whom had been my biggest comfort since I was 9 years old. My previous ideas of everlasting love and security were shattered. My sense of home, already shaky and precarious, crumbled entirely. Though this year marked a decade since I moved out of my parents’ house, it is only now that my childhood feels well and truly over. It was only in this wreckage that I committed myself to an idea I had had but never took seriously enough: my home is where I make it. And so I made a new one.
I sang a lot of songs off-key and thanks to my job at a karaoke bar, actually got paid for that. I got to revel in the wildness of that statement often, and feel so damn cool that my life actually looks like this.
I somehow cried less than ever before, which truly is saying something.
And lastly, I fell in love. With myself, through the eyes and in the arms of so many people who love me. To everyone whose couch I’ve crashed on, whose arms I have crumpled into, whose kitchens I have sipped tea and spilled the gossip, I am so deeply in love with you for everything you are and everything you have been to me. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
So here we are in 2024. I am moving apartments soon, which is sure to be as traumatic a process as always for me but this road has the brightest light ahead of it. I am as unsure about just as many things right now that I was on January 31st, I am more excited than ever. I wish I could say there are only good things coming, but I am unfortunately not that much of an optimist. More than ever, though, I find the things to look forward to. If I could pull all of this out of a year that so often left me feeling broken, I can’t imagine what a year going forward with the feelings I feel right now could bring. Abundance or bust, 2024. Let’s do this.
Bonus Content: 8-track
I started a ritual with my therapist where I give her a short playlist full of the songs that are emotionally affecting me at that moment a week prior to our session, and she listens to it so she can better understand me. This is not necessarily the one I am giving her (Hippocratic oath?) but it is a summary of me, right now.
Hold On - Alabama Shakes
CANDY - Rosalia
What a Shame! - girli
Thunder Road - Bruce Springsteen
Nine Months - Annie DiRusso
Abstract (Psychopomp) - Hozier
Therapy - Kara Jackson
Still Alive - grouptherapy
