I freaking love watching my kids, they teach me so much. My favorite thing to watch is when they are discovering something new and amazing. This happens at lot at the Science Center or the Aquarium. They are face to face with something so new and wild that their brains have never imagined before. Their eyes move over their new discovery a million times as they compute what it is they are seeing. Their faces are a combination of peace and amazement. They are unthreatened by the fact that their smallness has never anticipated such a thing, they are grateful to be there discovering this new thing in that moment. Their wonder is often followed up with "Mommy, look at this!" an invitation into the wonder they are experiencing. And I always join. I LOVE IT. This year, I'm joining my kids in the hunt for awe-filled wonder and I hope to invite them into my own discoveries, too.

2022 was a good year for me. It also held a new kind of difficult. The "ands" of 2022 feel very strong, really.

In 2022, I got to spend a whole year living into my values in a new way. I got to step into a full year of doing this new thing and establishing the rhythm of life for my family I spent so long craving.

This new working pace destroyed my expectations of what good productivity should look like. In fact, this year I got the wild wake up call that productivity has been quite the idol in my life and so I spent a lot of time dethroning it. And the work of dethroning productivity, and de-commodifying my very self has resulted in a wildly different list of things I'm proud of this year than I would have anticipated or imagined in January 2022…

I start out every new year with a birthday. Just 5 days into a new year, the number that defines my time here on earth goes up. Honestly, it doesn't really feel like the new year begins until after my birthday. I don't like to go back to work before then. I don't tend to try to start resolutions before then. I just give myself the birthday gift of an extra 5 days of rest and celebration.

I also tend to do a lot of reflecting on those days. Reflection - in a more honest sense, often ruminating, comes pretty naturally to me. I love the movie Inside Out because I can remember, in my own maturing, when my islands of personality fell and were rebuilt. And I take notice of my islands of personality crashing within me even today.

My 33rd year held a lot of crashing and rebuilding.