Last post of the year.

Forgive the sappiness that follows. And also the length. I know everyone’s dash will be so filled with these reminiscences, but I couldn’t resist.

This is the first year’s end in a while where I’m quite accustomed to the idea of it being a new year. The last half of this year has been the fastest few months of my life, but still, so full. So much has happened. I’m still quite stunned by that.

The past 12 months have changed me — a year changes anyone. Still, I’m an entirely different girl than the one I knew last December. She was, to capitalize on my url, naiive. Unhappy after a semester in a new town at a new school she despised. Jaded with the world. Unsure of her place in it.

January
I visited and fell in love with a new university in NYC, but returned to Fort Collins for a final semester at state school.

February
I threw myself relentlessly into journalism and never looked back. It was, and is, the most invigorating passion I have ever found. One of the best things that has ever happened to me.

March / April
Slipped into the rogue phase that I’m told I always had the potential for. Discovered my slight penchant for alcohol. Rebel, rebel. Living the true college life, living high and wild. Lost some inhibitions. Gained a will and a power to live life unfettered. Road-tripped to Santa-Fe and had a blast.

May
Farewell, CSU. Hello, summer.

June
A month of mistakes. Lots of drama. Too much.

July
I made the final decision for New York. Turned 19. Enjoyed the thrill of the thought of moving across the country. Housesitting, hottubs, and summertime.

August
Relocating nearly 2000 miles away to a new school in the heart of the most powerful city in the world was and is one of the best decisions I have ever made. I amassed a new collection of skirts, leggings, high heels, and textbooks. Fell in love with a new school.

September/October
I spent the months away discovering and re-discovered myself — my faith, my freedom, my opinions, my confidence, my cooking skills. My fashion sense.  
Visited the New Jersey shore and Washington D.C. Slowly seeing more and more of the east coast.
Somewhere along the line, I found a new best friend in a big city, and we bonded over Starbucks and sarcasm and, of all things, Robert Frost.

November
Enough late-night coffee shop ventures and eggnog lattes to last a lifetime, but they still never get old. My first Thanksgiving away from my family, and I cooked a feast for my friends as we watched the Macy’s parade from over my 6th avenue balcony. Colorado BFF came to visit, and I showed off my city.

December
A tumultuous month. But Christmas in New York. There is nothing more beautiful.

I am established, now. My world is ever changing, but I’ve learned better how to change with it. I’ve become more sound of heart and mind, and I trust my judgment now more than I ever did. I’ve become more observant. More cold. More slender. More daring.

I’ve found friends, people unlike anyone else I have ever met. Some I found in class, others by the Atlantic beaches. Or in the elevators, on the subways, or just out along the loud streets. It’s true, it takes a certain kind of crazy to move to New York City — but you’d be crazy not to live there, really. Incredible and undeserved, and I cherish these relationships more than anything.

When was the last time you did something for the first time? Maybe that’s what I love best about New York. That, while it’s become more and more my home and I adore that familiarity, it’s always new. Always changing. Ever-morphing. Not a day passes when I don’t do something for the first time. That’s a fantastic feeling, the novelty.

Now I’m off Tumblr to go hail in the New Year in style. It’s how we do.

I hope 2011 blesses you. I hope it changes you - but not too much. I hope it’s a year to remember.

Oh, and I’ll be relocating to http://sinnernotasaint.tumblr.com after tonight. New blog for a new year.

Nice try, snow, but I’m still going out to have fun tonight.

Can’t snow out New Year’s Eve. It’s practically illegal.

The second day is worse.

The second day brings a dawn that is not welcome. How can time move on? Yesterday was a sleepless night, an aching heart, a throbbing skull. Today there is the weak winter sun, defiance to this sharp heartbreak.

But there is nothing in me left to care. There’s not even a fight left. Nothing in this soul.

Only the quiet, dull remnants of a once vibrant girl.

Only the pain.

I’ve never known agony like this. The tears are a constant flow. They run unhindered down my cheeks and fall from my jaw to my collarbones, leaving a delicate stream of sorrow down my face.

Even breathing has become an effort. I have to remember to drag the air through my ragged throat. And out again. And back in.

And then my thoughts wander back, and I can’t control the screams. My mouth opens, my lungs protest. and I wrap my arms tighter, fighting the chills, keeping the screams locked inside.

But I can’t hold them in forever. They rip from my throat, the sound of pure pain torn from a place so deep inside me that the hurt becomes physical, my body shaking so hard, threatening to explode.

Agony.

I feel myself falling. The high was so high, and I know this low, if unchecked, will be lower than anything I’ve ever experienced.

I’m frightened, but there’s nothing left in me to feel the fear.
I’m alone, and the pain accentuates the loneliness.

Agony.

And just like that, my world falls apart.

Anguish. Is that the word for these never-ending tears, these animal screams ripping from my raw throat, the shaking sobs that are ravaging my body?

Is this what it feels like, the terror that if I unclasp my arms from around my ribs, they’ll shatter in a million pieces and illuminate my brightly bleeding heart?

I can’t stop the tears. I can’t stop shaking. I can’t breathe. I don’t want to, anymore.

Anguish.

I’m falling apart.

I won’t recover from this.

Save me.

“Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.”

I haven’t cried out of anger in a long time. It’s been a while since I cried from anything except sadness or PMS, really. I’d forgotten what it felt like.

The cold tears that stream down my cheeks when he can no longer see me. The hatred that stiffens my body and the blood that furiously burns through my veins. The pain, the anger, the frustration.

I hate the tears. They make me feel weak. And to him, they are weakness.

But father, I hate you. With every fiber of my being.

And I promise, when I am done using you, when you are done financing me and I can support myself, I will NEVER darken your doorstep again. I won’t touch your food, your house, your money, your cars… Not any of it. Maybe then, you’ll have a daughter you could be proud of. The invisible daughter.

Good luck staying in my life. You’ve never earned your place in it.

my family makes me feel like

This, THIS is why I don’t appreciate my old group from highschool. We smile and hug and laugh, talk about how long it’s been. What’s going on in our lives. How’s Colorado? How’s Arkansas? How’s New York?

But we always come back to the same things.

I miss my friends in New York. It’s true what they told us in the beginning: there is something extraordinary about the people who chose to move there. No matter how much I dislike some of them — many of them, even. There is something extraordinary about choosing to live in the greatest city in the world; to thrive among the throngs of people, to feel the energy that runs through those streets.

It’s a kind of maturity, I guess, a worldliness that the people I know here have never tasted. My New Yorkers judge less, because they’ve seen more of the world.

It’s easy to judge what you don’t know, what you don’t understand. It’s easier to judge than to try to understand, sometimes. But that doesn’t excuse it, and I will never forget that. I’m not okay with that.

The usual, naive topics: homophobic about the GLBT society. want to save their first kiss until they’re married. won’t befriend nonChristians. It reminded me of why, exactly, I hate Colorado: It’s closedminded. Closedminded beyond belief.

Through judgment, they will lose out on so many treasured relationships, and miss their chance to know some incredible people.

Nothing’s changed. These “good girls” haven’t changed.

I have.

I’m vowing to be more positive. I’m not always so cynical, but when I talk to certain people, I can’t seem to do anything but complain. I don’t like that about myself, or that I do that to those certain people. Some of the most cherished relationships in my life, and this is how I waste them?

After another day of borderline misery, I had a long talk with myself. Joy is the order of the day. Or, at least, contentedness.

No, I was never content with just content.

Everyone has a darkness to them, the unseen sides that never see the light of day and never wish to be revealed. The dark secrets, the hidden past - the hardness, the bitter strength that has made us who we are.

But there is a light to everyone, as well. The hidden talents, the passions, the loves, the desires, the wishes, the hopes, the life and strength and personality.

It’s not the things we’re given, but the things we do with what we’ve got. What we make of where we are. What we bring to the table, the brightness we can add, that defines who we are.