well. still. pretty good year.

[helikedmyshoes]

Even though it's now 2010, I know I'm going to write '09 for the next month. I am slow on the uptake sometimes.

So. New Year. New Decade. Lots of newness all around. I've been thinking about my end of the year post for the last few days and it finally came to me at work today.

I don't really have anything flowery to say about this year. It was a year. There were good times and bad. Mostly nothing changed. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Probably a little of both.

But since I'm older now, and can actually think in terms of decades, that's what I'm going to do. Things That Have Happened To Me in the Last Decade.

Ready?

+ graduated high school
+ graduated college
+ took my first vacations without my parents
+ lived in, and traveled through, Europe
+ moved across the country all by myself
+ lived in LA for a year
+ moved halfway back across the country
+ made amazing friends in college whom I love and adore
+ fell in love
+ paid my own bills
+ lived by myself in my own apartment with my own things
+ got a tattoo
+ started poledancing!
+ grew the fuck up

I've learned so much about myself. There are things that I love and things that I hate and I'm trying to balance them in my personality. I think everything in my life comes back to balance. I am constantly striving for it in my life. It's a work in progress.

I don't really believe in resolutions. Well that's not entirely true: I don't believe in tangible resolutions. I don't buy the "I'm going to go to the gym 3 times a week!" and "I'm going to stop eating so badly" etc resolutions. I do, however, believe in more - spiritual? I guess that's as good a work as I'll find - spiritual resolutions. I made one once to slow down, my thoughts, my motions, everything. I carried that with me, and I still carry it to this day. I have to step back, take a breath, and let the moment wash over me for a minute. It's hard because I am always so go go go, but it's something that I am conscious of and am trying to work on changing.

This past year, I think it was grace. I have such a hard time with grace. Graceful, gracious. It's not something I'm good at, but I'm trying. My uncle said last year his was clarity. I like that, though I'm still trying to figure out exactly what it means. Maybe being able to look at things objectively? Taking a step back and surveying before plunging in? I'll get back to you, I guess.

So. I'm kinda disappointed with this post, in my head it was much more eloquent. I blame fatigue. I guess I just wanted something to commemorate this day, this year, this decade. This year...close friends started getting married. This is a trend that picks up steam next year. / I was severely anemic and had to get a blood transfusion. / I got my heart broken a few times. / I started poledancing, fulfilling a dream I've had since I was a little girl (yep I'm weird, whatever) and getting a chance to morph my years of dance training into something that is really me. / I'm still lost and it's still okay. / I made it over the hill of my early twenties and landed on the plateau that is 26. I feel like there are decisions that have to be made somewhere off the horizon, but I'm not there yet so I'm not going to worry about them. At least not tonight.

I don't know what tomorrow brings, let alone this coming year, especially not this coming decade. All I know is tonight, I'm in a good place, in my heart and in my mind.

I guess that's all anyone can really ask for: being okay in this moment.

Grace. Clarity.

My feet smell like feet.

+

drove up to hillside manor
sometime after 2am
and talked a little while about the year
i guess the winter makes you laugh a little slower
makes you talk a little lower
about the things you could not show her

it's been alongdecember and there's reasontobelieve
maybe this year will. be. better. than. the last.