Happy New Year!

It's a slow day at work (shockingly) so I've been cleaning off my desk and thinking about -- you guessed it -- the new year.

It's crazy. New Year's Eve through the years ...
2002 -- Went to my high school best friend's place for a reunion bonfire. Much fun was had by all.
2003 -- Went to the house of a good friend from college with my boyfriend at the time. It was couples plus Barb (which couldn't have been much fun for her, although she put her best face forward) and altogether a very quiet, nice night.

2004 -- Went to a party in Mitchell (one of the best house parties I've been to) with my (different) boyfriend. It was the first time I had met most of his friends ... They were pretty psyched to meet me, too. I was his first serious girlfriend in quite awhile, and a transplant to his crowd. Let me tell you -- an engineer is a bit of a mystery to thespians, and vice versa. A lot of fun, and a lot of really random stories came out of it.

2005 -- Rang in the New Year in the living room of the house of the camp cook from Storm, with several Storm friends and the same boyfriend. Another quiet night with great people and lots of fun (of course). [There are an incredible number of prepositional phrases in this paragraph.]

2006 -- At midnight, I was standing in the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis as Urbana ended. Lots of fun leading up to it, but it was rather anticlimactic: they shuffled us out to the buses at about 12:05.

2007 -- Tonight's plans are to hang out with the work crowd at Moonie's apartment. I anticipate a great deal of fun, with that odd awkward moment at midnight when I realize just how single I actually am.

I have to say, my life has gotten altogether more exciting since college. That's six different locations in three different states. Now I just need to work in a New Year's in New York and I'll be set.

Normally I don't like to follow holiday trends, but a new year is actually a great time for reflection and consideration of where you are and where you're going.

A year ago, I was a recent graduate living in my parents' basement with a couple job interviews ahead of me but no real idea of what would be available to me for the coming year.

Two months later, I was living in Wisconsin, a little disoriented and confused but hopeful. Thankfully, things have only improved since then and I'm learning to really enjoy where I am and what I'm doing.

A part of me wants 2008 to be just as exciting -- balanced by a part of me that says, "Exciting, sure, but let's stay put."

Like a lot of people, I have my goals. I know what I'd like to see next December 31st when I look back on the year. I don't think I'm going to share that here, but everything can be summed up fairly easily in one word: focus.

I lack it. I need to find it again.
Generally speaking, I have a shotgun approach to life. Just throw myself out there and hope that I land somewhere ... Sometimes it's more fun (like when I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing for a weekend) but sometimes it just plain doesn't work.

Have to be careful, though. When I focus too hard, I get scary. (Or so I'm told, given my "zeroed-in" look while playing soccer.) And there are some things that don't really require focus so much as a general openness to just let things happen.

Like moving to Wisconsin.
Anyway, I should get going. 2007, it's been grand -- but I think I'm ready for 2008.
Happy New Year, everybody!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

?

The confusion continues. Tuesdays seem to be the days for odd discoveries. Hmmm ... Much stress. Big presentation for work tomorrow. I'm downright scared right now, but that's probably mostly due to the fact that I have NO IDEA what to expect. On the bright side, in 24 hours, it'll all be over. Thank goodness. Then there are just papers left, but papers I can handle. And a presentation for senior design, but that's a group thing. Ten days and it's just finals week. I like finals week. Things are oddly easier during finals week.
Read more

The Ashley Files: The Gerbil Story

I'm not totally sure what spurred this memory, but this is a story that needs to be told. Over the years, I've had a lot of random jobs. It started when I was young and glued pictures for bridge reports (my family's version of "working with the family business). I had a job at Subway one summer (easily my least-favorite job), was a bridge inspection field technician with the family business, worked in a church camp kitchen, and was a lab assistant. The summer I started this blog, I was working at the school's day care. It was my second summer there. The job was certainly not what I was hoping to do the rest of my life -- but for a nineteen-year-old it was decent money and okay hours. And hey, a couple times a week I got to hang out at the pool and get paid for it. Not a bad gig. [My dad also referred to it as the "world's best birth control" and he may have been right.] I don't remember a lot of the ins and outs of that summer -- most
Read more

2019 Year In Review

It was awful. Fine. It wasn’t all bad. I have a niece now. My job is pretty awesome. I like my residence fine. I … avoided all parking tickets? But wow, was there a lot of garbage in the meantime. An unexpected funeral for a friend who died decidedly too young. Family members in and out of (and back into) the hospital. And throughout the last third, the specter of cancer hanging over everything. While a part of me keeps saying, “There is no need to dwell on all the crap, Ashley,” the rest of me is almost too exhausted for optimism. 2020 has potential, yes. Buckets of potential. Oodles of it. 2020 is chaotic neutral staring us in the face. Switzerland with anger issues. Taunting us with its possibilities. RIP 2019. 2020... Please don't be a jerk.
Read more