2016, Good Things Edition

A number of positive things about my year, in no particular order. 

Going to pick up a book from the reserve shelf at the library and thinking of all the joy that will be felt by my fellow book nerds picking up their little gifts

Some songs I listened to on repeat this year:

• Creeks, Bon Iver.
• Eugene and The Only Thing, Sufjan Stevens.
• Supermoon, Case/Lang/Veirs.
• Also, according to Spotify, Love Yourself by Justin Bieber, which I refuse to be embarrassed about, it’s a good song.

I read over 50 books this year so I need to categorize my favorites here.

• Most important: Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates.
• Most fun/enjoyable: Carry On, Rainbow Rowell.
• Best overall, gotta call a tie between Lila, Marilynne Robinson and To the Bright Edge of the World, Eowyn Ivey.

I had some memorable long walks this year: from the Whitney Museum to Midtown Manhattan on a cold bright February day. A long quiet turn around the marsh on the day after the election. All the trips with the kids through the pond park to the grocery store (that walk is probably the thing I miss most about our old house).

I started working lunch & recess duty at the kids’ school’s this year.  That means I opened approximately two hundred Go-Gurts, cleaned up many dozens of milk spills, and told the same kids to “sit on your bottom, stop shouting please” at least a thousand times. Or at least it felt like a thousand times. I also got a lot of hugs, pushed swings every day, and once helped some kids build a contraption out of sticks to get a ball out of a tree. Happy memories!

Zine fest!

My Studio Calico class was obviously a HUGE highlight. I still sometimes scroll through the #sccutandpaste hashtag when I’m feeling bummed about myself, art-wise, and it's always a little lift. I love what all the students made, and honestly, it really pushed me forward in my own work too.

And, of course, these weirdos, always:

I'm trying to keep my expectations for the new year low and empty so I can fill it up with good things without too much pressure, you know? However, I do have a few resolutions that I feel I should share here for accountability's sake:

• Take a shower & make my bed before 8 am everyday (very basic but would change the tenor of our mornings tremendously)
• Send birthday cards to my family ON TIME. 
• Don't wait until the last minute to do everything, (for example, writing my year end review less than 12 hours before the year ends.)

Happy New Year!

Comments

[Tricia]

Sounds like it was a great year! Birthday cards is on my list too. I am so terrible about that. Hope you have a good evening!

[Robyn Wells]

When I read this post originally I tried to leave a comment but it kept disappearing and not posting, but I keep hearing Love Yourself and thinking about that, so I'm back again to leave a comment, dagnabbit! Anyway, I LOVE that song too and last fall it came up on spotify and I thought "I love this song, who sings it anyway?" and then I almost fell out of my chair. I am pretty sure the first time I ever heard it was when we went to see Pentatonix and they performed it and said "sing along if you know this one" and all the teen girls (which there were a lot of them) all started screaming bloody murder and I was all "I've never heard this song in my life". In all honesty, I've always wondered how Justin Bieber is even a thing, (other than apparently his teen heart throb-ness) I NEVER hear him on the top 40 radio stations, so where is his music being played? This is the first song of his that I would be able to recognize and it's a good one, no need to be embarrassed.