Looking back and looking forward

I know it’s corny but I do take part in the obligatory looking back on my year and looking ahead to the next, as I round the corner into a calendar year change. I can’t help it. I like it.

I don’t so much make resolutions as declare my hopes for the year ahead. And for those who might say Why? Research shows everyone gives up on any resolutions by the second week in January? I don’t. I come back to the promises I made to myself on December 31 and continue to try to make good on them. I may fail. But I try. And that counts for something. And it always results in some degree of progress.

As far as looking back . . . I think it’s helpful to take a moment to take stock, reflect on what you enjoyed about your year, what you find yourself proud of . . . it helps when I’m trying to figure out how to do more of the good stuff and less of the other stuff (e.g. doom-scrolling on Twitter, losing my temper with my kids, eating too many potato chips).

Overall, I’m pretty darned proud of myself. It’s been close to two years since I left/was ushered out of my place of employ of 23 years. Since then, I’ve written and published a book, filmed an entire documentary (and it is in the process of being edited now), consulted/helped with about 10 different businesses across a broad range of sectors and now I’m launching my own clothing brand in March of this coming year.

I’ve also written pretty regularly on this thing — 120 posts to date which is probably about 240,000 words since I tend to be long-winded; I published a bunch of pieces in The New York Post, Spectator World, Brownstone and The NY Sun.

I’ve had the opportunity to speak at a bunch of events/conferences/fundraisers for a bunch of pretty cool organizations: FreedomFest, the Independent National Convention (Inc23), ICONs annual conference, Ace Scholarships Women’s Luncheon, UC Boulder Benson Center, Scott Atlas’ Liberty Institute, the Liberty Forum of Silicon Valley, Ladies For Liberty in Denver (notice a Liberty theme?), JeffCo Kids and a few corporate gigs mixed in (Western Growers’ annual conference in Las Vegas and Madison Industries leader conference in Chicago). I’m sure I’m forgetting some.

I met some awesome folks in my travels. People I’ve long admired.

Despite my broke-down body and decrepit joints, I managed to keep moving. 1.8k miles,16k minutes and 4.4M steps. Or 5 miles/day, 45 minutes/day and 12k steps/day. Less than my usual but I’ll take it. I’m on a 4 year streak of not missing a week of exercise. I’m all about consistency over intensity for a healthy heart — my resting heart rate as of yesterday is about ~53bpm. Not bad for 54.

I visited Moscow (Idaho), Memphis, Birmingham, Chicago, New York, Palm Beach FL, Palo Alto CA, Jacksonville, and I can’t remember where else. And I took the trip of a lifetime to Israel thanks to my mother-in-law. What a blessing to have gone on such an amazing trip before this war that wages on. I feel connected to this place and the people in a way I never would have if I hadn’t had the chance to visit.

I dropped my 2nd oldest at college (take 2) in New York (Cooper Union) and visited with my oldest who also lives there, attending NYU as an MFA grad student. And got to see my parents (who are both 80+ and going strong) while I was there.

I went to Oklahoma City for my 9-year-old’s futsal tournament and had the chance to see one of my oldest and dearest friends there — we met on my first day of college and we’ve been friends ever since.

I consumed some amazing content.

I’m still not back to pre-covid reading levels but I’m trying.

I read Night by Elie Wiesel. And Mattias Desmet’s Psychology of Totalitarianism pretty much sums up what I think about covid hysteria. I laughed out loud reading David Sedaris’ Happy-Go-Lucky (I don’t usually love him but this one hit right) and Meghan Daum’s The Problem With Everything.

I watched all seven seasons of West Wing (oldie but goodie), and enjoyed several dumb reality shows including Selling Sunset season who-knows-what.

My favorite shows of the year: toss up between Slow Horses (Gary Oldman’s Jackson Lamb is one of the best characters on television in forever), Succession and Severance. All S’s. But I’ll give Ramy an honorable mention.

My vote for best documentary: The Pigeon Tunnel, the new Errol Morris film about John le Carré. Though I thoroughly enjoyed Big Vape about the rise and fall of Juul and not only because Taylor Lorenz is in it as some kind of “expert.”

My favorite movie of the year: The Holdovers. I cried the whole time. Something about director Alexander Payne and lonely characters gets me every time. And the whole 70s vibe is top notch. It takes place in 1970 but everything about it is 70s — the lighting, the camera jumps and pushes and angles all around, the music (Cat Stevens!) . . . even the credits have a 70s aesthetic. What a joy! I’ll give a close second to May December which I find myself still thinking about. If you watch it you should watch this interview right after. Mind blown.

My least favorite, highly rated movie: Passages. The guy is a jerk, wholly unlikable. I don’t care if he’s gay. He’s not interesting, just an asshole.

My favorite podcasts: The Witch Trials of JK Rowling, Scamanda and Megyn Kelly’s series on the Moscow, Idaho murders. In addition to my standard news and politics stuff.

I also went to tons of soccer games and one Cinco De Mayo celebration at my kids Spanish immersion elementary school and gymnastics exhibitions (my daughter) and talent shows (my daughter) and basketball games (my 9-year-old son). I went to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science probably 20 times, and the zoo another 15 and took every visiting guest to the Denver Art Museum which is way better than you might imagine. And I cooked some pretty amazing meals with my 20 year old, the chef of the house. He does the heavy lifting.

The highlight: getting to spend almost the whole year with said 20-year-old. He took a year off from college and spent it with us in Colorado. What a blessing.

Second highlight: my directing partner and friend, Andrew James. I couldn’t ask for a better collaborator. Yet another friend I met on Twitter/X. Who says that place is a hellhole!?

Third highlight: my new team — partners, investors, employees — all working hard and believing in the vision for this new brand.

Bestest highlight: my husband. I got it right. That’s all there is to say about that.

The low (but with a silver lining): I think I’ve finally let go of the friends who decided I was just too evil to be friends with anymore. I had held out hope that maybe things could be repaired. But now, I don’t want to reconnect. I just don’t feel very forgiving. Or I should say, I don’t need it. What kind of person writes a friend of 30 years off because they have different political views? Not someone I need to be friends with anymore. If I’d murdered someone while drunk driving they’d have come to support me. But because I thought public schools should open during covid and because I think gender ideology is toxic, not grounded in reality, dangerous, misogynist and harmful to young people and because I once talked to Tucker Carlson they think I’m beyond the pale — I’m a downright fascist Nazi genocider, according to their cultish worldview.

I’m ready. I can just move on.

Ok . . . That’s a lot! What next?

For next year, I’m hoping to read more books, go to more movies (at the theater), visit my kids (the bigs) in New York, celebrate my oldest graduating from his MFA program, take a vacation (where?), launch my clothing brand and exceed my own expectations in doing so, finish the documentary — Generation Covid — and sell it, make more plans with friends and wear more color — it brightens my mood.

It is lovely to have you all here to talk to. I might try to mix it up on here — podcast/audio/videos? . . . of what? Not sure. But I’ll keep writing and I’ll keep reading your comments and DMs and sharing my random thoughts.

I hope you had a good year. Or one you learned from. There’s a lot of bad shit going down so enjoy what you have when you have it. It’s all we got.

I hope you’re looking forward to 2024. I am.

Shabbat shalom.