It’s been a great year! Thanks for being part of it!

It’s the end of the year. How do I know that?

No, it’s not the fact that it’s looking like midnight at 4:42pm as I currently write this, or the newscasters reminding me that yesterday was the solstice (I forgot; I was far too busy unapologetically wearing my PJs & horrifically unattractive Uggs all day), but instead: Facebook. I know it is the end of the year because every single one of you is posting it as a photo retrospective of 2014.

Every. Single. One. Of. You.

You’re either hitting auto-publish, or barely modifying the template. It looks something like this.

So you all had a great year? You’re glad I’m a part of it? Aww, thanks boo. You too.

Except…really? A great year? And I was a part of it by…how? By reading your Facebook posts? For Liking that thing about the thing where that guy did that thing and you had things to say about it? Cool. I mean, ok, fine, I get it. Hell, I worked for Facebook; this new feature checked all of the boxes (easy to build? Check. Features photos? Check. Gets people to click out of the voyeuristic tendency that keeps companies like this alive? C-H-motherfucking-Eck. You win the internet.) It’s friendly, it’s innocuous, and people like to look back on their year, Auld Lang Syne-y, and with its (buggy, at least to me) mobile interface, this is the perfect product timing for you to upload this intead of talking to your family. Happy Holidays, y’all!

Sure, I’m acting like a curmudgeon…if I was on this team, I’d be high-fiving my coworkers and proud of what we built. (Hey, Facebook team. I’m proud of what you built.) Except…it’s lacking one thing. Authenticity. Perhaps that’s the innate challenge of creating a mass consumer offering. The very feature that makes it good for the masses inherently strips away the personalization component (which, to be fair, they did allow) or at least demotes personal authenticity for ease of posting. Hell, I’d probably be over-ruled, this thirty seven year-old Calligrapher who still gets grouchy when the camera store doesn’t have their class schedule on actual paper, when arguing for mandated customization vs. AI mass consumerism. Shit…reading that even makes me want to over-rule myself. But we’re kind of losing something in the process, and what we’re losing is what we really feel about the year.

For me? I had a shitty year. SHITTTTTAAAYYYY. I lost my sweet puppy Lila Belle, unexpectedly, and while I have my Labradoodle pup Langley to thank for helping my heart finally mend, let me not underestimate how absolutely devastated I was for months on end. (And some days, I still am.) I took a risk on something new, hoping for creative inspiration, and instead found myself down a black hole of creative barrenness that I’m just now starting to come out of. Relationships? Let’s just not even start. 2014 was excruciatingly challenging, personally and professionally, and yet, here I am, still standing, and about to posit about a silver lining. (You ready?)

In the midst of All Of The Shittiness(tm), I learned to prioritize what — and who! — was important. Basically, I had no choice…I couldn’t stop crying, and as someone who is guarded and private in my emotions, I surrounded myself with a very small group of friends, and ventured outside of work only sporadically. And in doing so, I realized quality over quantity applies to many situations in life.

So I cut ties. I sent things and people and experiences and relationships and yes, even some of my favorite — yet incredibly painful — shoes away with love. I cleaned house, literally…moving into a space 1/4 the size of my (impossibly large for NYC) previous apartment. My new home has everything I actually need, and I eliminated the mental and physical clutter that was unnecessary. My LIFE now has everything I actually need, and while I’d never wish anyone the experiences that it took to get me here, where I am is ok. In fact, it’s pretty good. Perhaps…great?

No, 2014 was NOT a great year. And many of you weren’t a part of it. But for those of you who were: THANK YOU. And for the parts that got me to where I am today? I’M GRATEFUL.

2015: A Great Year…I feel it. Wanna be a part of it?