Monday, June 29, 2009

Year Twenty Three

Let me start by apologizing to all my readers for being unfashionably absent from the blogosphere for the past two months. My life has been turned upside down on itself, leaving me a little out of my element and with so many thoughts, I don’t know if anyone out there could make any sense of it.

But with a recently past birthday, I thought what better time for new beginnings.

Twenty three is not one of those years that you hear people say, “That’s a great year.” In fact, after twenty one, you hardly hear that. But twenty three was a good year for me, and because much of the goodness happened away from my blog, I’ve decided to share some of the highlights:

May-June 2008: This is a little before my birthday … but I’m counting it. I officially graduated from undergrad. I had actually finished classes the previous December but couldn’t walk with my fellow graduates (Who schedules graduation 4 days before Christmas … UNLV). Had a huge party at Mat’s parent’s house. This was the first meeting of our families. And the first time I was tipsy in front of my family … yes that is a highlight!

July 2008: Mat and I traveled to Indiana to attend the two-day Dave Matthews Band festival with many of his back-home friends. We camped, got inebriated and watched and listened to great music.

September 2008: I met my new bff Liz.

October 2008: Pumpkin carving party at the house. Many of our friends came. We ate pizza, drank spiked apple cider, and carved some amazing pumpkins. I love my friends. Some of them have moved away, and I miss them!

November 2008: Mat and I went to New York together. I went for work; Mat tagged along. Maybe the greatest three days of my life. It was a much needed trip for our relationship. I loved New York. It was the first time I had ever been to the city, and I hope not my last.

November 2008: I started my blog: JustMeInMyTwenties

December 2008: I truly feared for my job.

February 2008: Mat and I both got acute pneumonia. Quite possibly the most pathetic days of our lives.

February – May 2009: Mat and I decide to look for a house to buy together. This was a long, frustrating, tearful process, but is soon to end with a very positive outcome – we hope.

April 2009: Mat and I celebrated our 4th anniversary. We lived it up at the Stratosphere!

April 2009: I traveled to Montreal, Canada and Dusseldorf, Germany for work. Had a great time. Experienced new places. And even though I had to leave Mat and my animals at home, I got to see them every night, thanks to Skype.

May 2009: Mat and I go from an almost 2,000 square-foot house to a 10x10 room. We moved out of our subleased rental house that we spent the last year in together and into his parent’s house. Things are not bad. But I miss my animals so much and all my stuff and space.

June 2009: Mat and I find a house. Closing date is July 20th. Cross your fingers that everything works out.

June 2009: I start training for a half marathon with my sisters. I have run over 50 miles this month. That is probably more than all the miles I have run/walked, up till this point, in my life combined.

June 25th 2009: I turned 24. Looking forward to another great year!

I know there are so many other events that happened in my twenty-third year, but these are main ones that come to mind. I feel really lucky that this past year was full of good friends, good music, good goals and good times in general.

I don’t want to jinx anything but I feel like the years keep getting better and better. I make better and closer friends who have become my family. I learn from my mistakes and try to be a more complete Katie. One of the most important goals for me is to constantly evolve. To have a good idea what my likes are; dislikes are; what my style is and what makes me happy. It doesn’t matter if the list is cohesive or not. I just want to be content, strong and secure, emotional, physically and mentally. I would be lying if I said that aging does not scare me a little. It does. But the solace in aging is that I like what I see.

Here's to a great twenty-fourth year.