I will apologize in advance to my boss, coworkers, or anyone bored enough on the Monday after holiday vacation who happens to read this. I am not feeling it today, and by ‘it’ I mean ‘working’, and I am kind of sorry. Not sorry enough to stop this nonsense, but it’s the Monday after holiday vacation and I can’t focus on anything.

Now that I have apologized, HI.

I truly hope that everyone enjoyed this last week of festive fun, with family or friends or yourself, because I really didn’t. I did not enjoy myself, and that has more to do with me and less to do with the people I surround myself with. I do not enjoy the holidays, but I usually pretend and “fake it ’til I make it” and things usually turn out okay. This year, I have not been able to pull myself out of the December Slump and it has lasted (nearly) the entire month. Going to the gym and drinking more water helps for about twenty minutes during the day, but then I am back to loathing everything this month stands for and everyone who acts like they enjoy all this merriment. You know what has really helped, though? BUYING STUFF. It makes me smile, usually ironically, that I enjoy spending money this time of year more than any other time of year. I like buying things for people, and I went for a “Quality over Quantity” theme this time, trying to find thoughtful gifts and not worrying about how much I spent (or didn’t spend). I hope people weren’t disappointed, but then, I don’t really care if they are. Fuck all, and guess what? I don’t think Jesus was a real person, and I don’t want to celebrate his damn birthday. I want to celebrate YOU, and the things I hope will make you smile and appreciate that I love you back, but let’s not pretend we are celebrating some made up character and his ‘birth’.

That was a tangent I did not see coming until it came.

Moving on.

I most likely won’t get around to posting anything tomorrow, so here is my annual Year in Review post. If you’re really bored, here are the recaps of 2010, 2011, and 2012.

2013 in Review

January

“I am looking at plane tickets today, and I just might suck it up and pull the trigger on one. It’s weird feeling, going from talking to actually doing, but ‘making things happen’ has always been where I shine. I have no idea what this adventure will hold, but I might as well find out right? I just want to be somewhere different, feeling a different energy, speaking a different language. I have to make that happen for myself.

Everything’s not lost.”

February

“Aside from that though, I left France feeling whole again. There is something so personal about being totally alone, and I don’t just mean that in the literal sense. The first day I woke up feeling quite depressed, the “did I really do this to myself?” question circulating in my brain for a solid twenty four hours. I am a strong woman, but I was five thousand miles away from home in a country that I could barely understand what was spoken to me, and for a good day and a half, I was terrified.

Luckily that feeling wore off, and my usual personality kicked in. The “I don’t really care what happens, let’s figure this out and make the most of everything” side, which I usually embrace one hundred percent. I climbed the Eiffel Tower, I stood on Point Zero at Notre Dame, and I found the bookstore I have always wanted to see. I climbed the steps in Montmartre to see Sacre Coeur, and I bought an old purse in an old shop for five euro. I discovered (again) that I truly enjoy my own company..”

March

“I am going to Boston next week for PAX East. In case anyone forgot, I really and truly love my job. I love it when it’s awesome, I love it when it’s stressful, and I love it when it really really sucks. I found my calling, I found my space, and even when these people annoy me with their antics and attitudes, I love it. I am finally getting the chance to travel, for work, and I am really excited to see all the hard work on display. I am excited to meet more people in this crazy industry, feel the energy of another new city, and work my ass off for a company that I really believe in. I get to travel again in June, and I am just…really really happy.”

April

“Spring is here, bringing with it the familiar ‘Spring Cleaning’ thoughts. We don’t give renewal the credit it deserves, but this is one of my favorite times of year. When the seasons are changing, the between stages of the old and new, and I think I love this more than the actual seasons themselves. There is something to be said for change.

Something.”

May

“But what about the rest of us? The dreamers? The possibility of more just sounds too delicious to pass up, the idea that another level of happiness is out there just waiting to be snatched up and enjoyed is the worst kind of tease. The chance to become/experience/embody more is the best kind of promise there is, and we want it, we hunger for it, and we will pay whatever the cost to taste it just once. We will risk relationships to feel human again, to feel new in our own skin, and to let our deepest thoughts become reality. Ambitious, always. Foolish, maybe. Ungrateful, never.

If anything, the dreamers are the most grateful people I will ever know. Thrilled to the tips of their toes about possibility, compassionate, thoughtful, adventurous seekers on a neverending quest to find what their hearts tell them exists.”

June

“I wish I had realized how much he liked feeling tortured. I wish I had known that, for some people, being broken is their ‘thing’ and it’s never going to change. I could have saved myself three and a half years of pain.

Looking back, I think that *Ken loved and hated me. He saw how much I cared, saw how much I did (and would have done) for him, and he utterly resented me for it. I was determined to make him happy, and he was just as determined to continue being depressed, dangerous, angry, spiteful, and just plain mean to me. I believe he liked the idea of me, but not the reality of me, and somewhere in those years I became broken too. That is probably the worst part of this game we play, because eventually the other person wears you down to the point where you feel like they do, and the cycle goes on for a long longer than it should. I honestly believed that nobody could understand me like him, and it took me years to figure out how wrong that was.”

July

“This quote, this quote forever:

“We’re all seeking that special person who is right for us. But if you’ve been through enough relationships, you begin to suspect there’s no right person, just different flavors of wrong. Why is this? Because you yourself are wrong in some way, and you seek out partners who are wrong in some complementary way. But it takes a lot of living to grow fully into your own wrongness. And it isn’t until you finally run up against your deepest demons, your unsolvable problems, the ones that make you truly who you are, that we’re ready to find a lifelong mate. Only then do you finally know what you’€™re looking for. You’re looking for the wrong person. But not just any wrong person: the right wrong person, someone you lovingly gaze upon and think, “This is the problem I want to have.” ”

August

“Running just feels so good. My muscles tired and sore after the fact, but so brutally intact, and I feel alive again. Human again. God, what a feeling. There is nothing quite like the knowledge that someone understands, because isn’t that what we all want anyway? Someone who gets us, who sees deep down into that secret place and is like “Yeah, I totally see your point”, and you feel like you can breathe again. Someone fucking gets it. Except for me that someone isn’t actually a ‘someone’, but it’s how I see the universe as a whole, as my dearest friend who gets me regardless of the stupid shit I say and do. That someone sees me for exactly who I am and what I want to become, and steps aside when needed to say “Do it. Do it all“.

September

“Four years ago, I was coming off the worst breakup I have ever had. It was bad in so many ways, but mostly because I was so unsure of who I was without him. My whole identity was wrapped up in his problems, and what I could do to fix them for him. He is the reason why I view a lot of things like I do, from music, to alcohol and drugs. He is why I understand people who like to “live in the fast lane”, why I can tolerate them, and why I feel like I should know them. Breaking up with him was a very freeing experience, powerful and liberating in every single way. Four years later, I am standing here wondering about those lasting effects. I took a lot away from that experience, but the biggest thing was to not waste ‘relationship’ time on people who don’t love themselves. The energy it takes to show someone how ‘worth it’ they are isn’t worth it anymore, not at my age, because if they haven’t learned it by now they never will. I guess I have moved past the point in life where I wonder about how ‘worth it’ I am, and I just know. I just know that I am worth something, even if it only ends of mattering to me.

I recently discovered that you don’t have to fight with someone constantly to realize that you’re not right together. Relationships are not black and white, and people actually do grow apart without being forced apart. What seems so right in the beginning can so often change, because people change, and you can transition from lovers into best friends without even realizing it. Or maybe you do realize it, see it as it’s happening, and believe that it’s the natural progression of things.”

October

“I work in a company with 83 people, and about eight of them are women, myself included. I actually like people, actually enjoy being around other human beings, and if I want to make friends then some of them will have to be men. Does this mean I want to date all of those men? Not. Even. Close. It just means that I enjoy socializing, enjoy the jokes and laughter. I also work in an industry that is very male dominated, so nearly all the people I come in contact with, do business with, or see at events, are men. A lot of them are incredibly smart, hilarious, and share common interests with me. Does this mean I want to date all of those men? Not. Even. Close. It’s a hard line to walk, because I really like my job and making friends, but do I need to check every smile I give you? Do I need to make sure I do not laugh at all your jokes? Do I need to be bitchy so you don’t think I want to date you? Because I don’t want to date you, and the quicker we establish that, the better.”

November

“I feel like that’s what becoming a real adult should feel like. Transitioning into someone you’d like to be friends with, instead of feeling uncomfortable in your own skin.

Tennessee is the last place I lived where I actively hated who I was. It was probably my age and life circumstances, but getting away from that person is the best decision I’ve ever made. People like to say “wherever you go, there you are”, and that’s not really true, because it’s amazing what a fresh environment will do for the soul. That’s why I love to travel so much, because experiencing new places and people is what makes my own life worth living, knowing there is so much more to this world is what makes everything worth it.”

December

“I’ve been noticing an extreme stubbornness starting to take root in me this last year. I speak with a stronger conviction, I stand a little straighter, and I get quickly irritated when people attempt to direct my path. I am not speaking in professional terms, just my personal life, and I generally feel no remorse telling people no. “It’s really liberating to say no to shit you hate.” ”

—

I hope your 2014 burns brightly Friends, because you set it on fire or because it set you on fire. Both are okay.