Goodbye, 2016!

This year has been absolutely crazy. It’s gone by very slowly for me, as anticipating something you just can’t wait for often does. You know how slowly December seems to creep by when you’re a kid waiting for Santa to come? That’s exactly how a deployment feels; there is just more worrying and waiting attached.

Every year I write a letter to myself about how the past year has been, and what some of the biggest moments were. I actually had a hard time thinking about this year. Some of the negatives were definitely being in even more pain than normal with my chronic illness, doing a long distance relationship again, and seeing another year go by where I don’t end up meeting my goal of having my sickness cured.

2016 was rough and most of it would not make it in a book of my “favorite life moments,” but the moments that would absolutely made this year worth it. The way I see it, too, is that I am so lucky to be able to live through a rotten year and look forward to a new one. I’m lucky to be alive!

Instead of continuing this as a negative post, I want to share with you twelve of my favorite memories from 2016; one for each month.

January: I am going to get this list off to a bad start and cheat already. I have 2 favorite memories; first, I loved celebrating New Year’s Eve at a house party with some of my favorite people in the world. NYE is a fun holiday, but my main thing is that I love being surrounded by people I care about.

My other favorite memory was pranking Robert at the Japanese steakhouse by telling them it was his birthday (Which is actually in March) and getting this huge celebration going. If you missed this blog post, you might take the time to go back and read it, haha!

February: Definitely doing Valentine’s Day at L’auberge with Robert. I didn’t realize how many times I tried to tease him until I started this countdown, but this was a pretty funny story too I think.

March: I love New York. So much!! My mom and I took a trip there last March, and I am hoping to be able to go back before the one year mark comes up again.

April: Robert and I had a very impromptu date after not seeing each other for over a month. He was supposed to have been gone for good (Oh, and I’ll add his departure ceremony in Richmond as another favorite moment!), but we ended up getting a wonderful 2 days together when his flight overseas kept getting delayed.

May: May was a weird month. I was struggling to adjust to doing a deployment with someone, as I hadn’t really been preparing ahead of time for it, and I had a lot of kind of big life changes. One thing I really remember making my day, though, was when my friend Elizabeth shared one of the posts I wrote for SITS. I feel like anyone can kind of relate with the warm feeling you get when someone supports something that means a lot to you, but as a writer when people share your innermost thoughts it means the world.

June: A beach trip with Audrey was definitely the highlight of June! I need to take little trips more often, it’s just fairly hard to travel with POTS. I am crazy high maintenance, so I really can’t go with most people (I’m still not good at feeling OK with being a big inconvenience), but exploring and spending time with loved ones is really good for my heart. Even if most of the time is spent recovering from little dizzy spells!

July: POKEMON GO CAME OUT. Need I say more? (Hahaha…)

August: I went on a second beach trip with friends. This one I actually spent most of the time feeling very ill in the beach house, but the moments I did get to spend out were really refreshing.

September: This is hard to find a good moment, as it held some of the days that were literally the most pain I’ve ever been in, but a pro was the cool, crisp fall weather.

October: This was also one of my hardest months to date, but a favorite moment was hanging out with Audrey in DC and having this happen. I loved re-reading this and reliving my awkwardness, hahaha.

November: I loved this Thanksgiving and spending it with so many loved ones. I also felt very sick for much of this time (Big surprise, right?!) but enjoyed being able to catch up with relatives I hadn’t seen in awhile.

December: Christmas was my favorite day of December! I spent it with my immediate family and had the most beautiful day exchanging presents, eating wonderful food, and watching a documentary about Banksy.

2016, you were difficult, but I made it. We’re done, and I’m really excited to see what 2017 has to offer. (Liiiiiiike maybe something with the Patriots?! One more week to really get this a lot of views before I have to have everything planned!)