Hello, 2014, Let's Be Friends!

Taken in Chicago in March of 2013... Aside from a shot of me sleeping and another of me playing flute with a really sloppy pony-tail wearing my hat backwards, this was the earliest 2013 pic I could find of myself :P

Taken December 30th in Nebraska... While burning materials pertaining to my Women in Islam class :D

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Reflection is probably the biggest thing about New Years that makes it my favorite holiday.  It's a chance to stop, look back over the year, celebrate the good moments and move away from the bad ones, take stock of what I've learned and how I've grown.

A year ago from this moment, I was sitting in a drafty, cock-eyed living room a few blocks over with my family, reflecting on 2012.  Now, I'm hanging out in my bedroom--my level bedroom, with right angles and reliable heat--reflecting on 2013.

I'm not going to lie, it's been a long one.  I took a pretty awesome poetry class the first half of 2013.  I went to Chicago for the first time, and hopefully not the last.  As it turns out, I have a tiny hint of wanderlust after all.

Just a tiny one.

I moved over the summer, and it's amazing what a difference those few blocks made!  There's something to be said about living without bats and cockroaches!  I've been blessed with a new friend in my roommate, and even our cats get along!  (As I type this, my roommate's cat is hanging out in my doorway and Gracie is planning an ambush from the bathroom.)

2013 also held what has become known as The Semester from the Underworld.  After a brilliant plan to take a class over the summer went horribly wrong and I blatantly refused to drop a class against my better judgement, I spent a semester working full time, taking 9 credit hours, and not sleeping.  I will never do that again, but it did teach me a lot.  Probably one of the most important things it taught me was that Philippians 4:13 does not really mean "I can do whatever I want to because I'm a Christian and that makes me super-human with no limits."  Actually, that passage of scripture is Paul talking about being content with his circumstances, wherever God placed him.  Philippians 4:13 doesn't mean I can work full-time and take a full-class load and still be operating at peak efficiency and be a wonderful human being all at the same time because God's on my side.  (Actually, it turns out that running on coffee until it makes you throw up kind of makes you a worthless human being in some ways.)  Philippians 4:13 means I can be content living here in Iowa City doing what God's called me to do, no matter how long this degree takes.

Copy and paste that last sentence and hang on to it for me, I'm probably going to need it more than once in 2014.

In 2013, the second Hobbit movie came out.  I will bear the scar of its betrayal for the rest of my life, but it was awesome seeing it in theaters with friends!  Speaking of which, yes, I have friends!  Granted, one of them is moving away in a couple of weeks since this is a college town and that's what people around here do, and maintaining my social life still requires significantly more effort than it did in High School, but I have friends who stayed beside me and prayed for me and cared for me in 2013, friends who were Jesus with skin on to me in my darkest and most stubborn moments, friends who were still there when the wreckage that was left of me slid across that finish line after the Semester from the Underworld.  I love my friends!

I became an aunt in 2013!  If you count my Rent-A-Nephew back home, I became an aunt twice in 2013!  Aren't they cute?!

Another year has gone by and my novel is still incomplete, but I did write three short stories in 2013.  I took two writing classes at the University of Iowa.  They were entry level classes, so nothing really fancy shmancy, and the only things I "learned" were the ideas that I contemplated and formed for myself about how I personally handle writing, but I did have some valuable experiences in class (one of the three workshops all semester was valuable at least).  Progress is progress, and I'm one year closer to being a published author!  (Not that I know when that is or anything, I just know I'm closer is all!)

Also very important to my writing career: On November 5, 2013, I MET TED DEKKER!!!

Not only did I get a hug and an autographed copy of Outlaw, but I also touched his chest!  AND he told me I was beautiful!  *squeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!*

Ahem.  Anyway...

I have three friends who are now engaged, and beyond my inauguration into aunt-hood I have two more friends who are pregnant, and this of course isn't counting all of those acquaintances and old friends and friends of friends and such whose life events somehow show up on my Facebook news feed all the time.  2013 has come and gone, leaving nothing of the sort for me, not even any interests.

Well, except for this guy:

But he cheated on me with an elf that Tolkien didn't even write and therefore doesn't exist, so I'm just back to wishing this guy wasn't already taken:

So I'll keep working on figuring out some positive points of being single.  I can't really think of very many right now, but I'm pretty sure they're out there.  Besides, the one that I do usually remember is a powerful one: this is what God wants for me right now.  So I'll keep truckin'.  I'll keep learning how to draw closer and closer to my First Love, my true Knight in Shining Armour, my Prince of Peace who's so much more than charming.  I'll keep letting Him teach me who I am, and keep learning how to be content where He's placed me, and how to enjoy being the me that He created.  All that sounds a whole lot fluffier than it feels, but that's the lesson that 2013 has taught me, and it's what I will carry with me into 2014.

A year ago, I wrote that 2013 was looking a lot like 2012: more work, more school, more time in Iowa City.  And sitting where I am now, 2014 looks painfully similar to 2013: more work, more school, more time in Iowa City.  While I was picking out classes for this upcoming semester, I calculated out how long this was going to take me at the current rate.  Depending upon whether or not I find a way to pull off studying abroad for six weeks at some point, I will be here, doing this, for 3-4 more years.  But there was a song I once loved by Avalon that went something to the effect of: "I don't wanna go somewhere / If I know that You're not there ... 'Cuz my heart needs to be where You are."

I could make a whole bunch of resolutions to try to make it feel like I'm gonna be a better person and come a long way in 2014.  I could say I'm going to study the Bible more, I'm going to read more, I'm going to write more, I could even set quantifiable goals because who doesn't like concrete thresholds with which to rub your own failure in your face with?  But I don't think I'm going to.  Instead, 2014: God's put us together, and I know He has plans for both of us that are better than any of my own ideas.  What do you say we just be friends?

Pleased to meet you, 2013!

Another year has come and gone, as has a visit from my family!  I'm always especially more aware of how quiet my place is right after the Pancakes leave it, so I shall take this moment to commemorate the old year and welcome the new one with Lord of the Rings playing in the background!  (I'll be watching that a lot in the weeks to come to tide me over until The Hobbit comes out on DVD... the movie theater has been making a lot of money off of me!)

Anyway, in all seriousness...

2012 held my first semester at the University of Iowa... Which I thoroughly enjoyed despite the challenges that came with it!  It was also a great year getting to know my friends here in Iowa City, a journey that I am looking forward to continuing in 2013.  I also got to watch my family grow in so many more ways than one this year as each of them have been entering new seasons of life including (but not limited to) caring for grandparents, going through high school, buying houses, and being pregnant!  I seriously can't wait for the little one to arrive so I can be Crazy Aunt Kaycee!

My little brother asked each of us to list our top five memorable moments of 2012, and I'm pretty sure that my top one was pushing the EMT out of my way to go hug my Daddy the night of my car accident on I-80.  Speaking of which, I had my last chiropractor appointment, so aside from the formal signing off of papers, I can officially and with painful eagerness leave all things car accident in 2012 where they belong!

And now, I stand on the brink of 2013.  Honestly, from here, it sure does look an awful lot like 2012, which in some ways kind of saps the New Years nostalgia that I usually love oh so very much about this holiday.  I'll be working in the same place, just new kiddos from time to time.  More school, though probably still one class at a time.  Weekend trips (hopefully NOT involving Ryder trucks on the interstate!), making friends, quiet apartment with my fur baby, most likely a move in the summer, but that part's pretty scary to think about because--as much help as this place needs--I really and truly DON'T want to move... But I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Really, I'll cross every bridge when I come to it.  I mean, I have thus far, right?

Maybe there will be some special boy involved somehow in 2013, but maybe there won't.  There probably will be tough, lonely times like the ones that seem to enjoy visiting every time school goes on break.  But there will also be fun times.  There will be writing and reading, there will be laughter and tears.  It's gonna be a tough year, and it's gonna drive me nuts at times.

But it'll be okay, because God and I have got this!

And who knows?  Maybe twelve months from now, 2013 and I will be friends :)