I made a major improvement in my ability to not give a fuck about my job.

I work in American retail.

i made a person

I made the decision to go back to school. There were various life reasons why I was unable to make that decision in my 20's, but I am happy to have the opportunity to learn again with a renewed sense of drive and direction.

I met a wonderful woman. We are dating now

For complicated reasons over which we have had very little control, we have had to move house 3 times in the last 5 years.

In April of this year, thoigh, we finally found somewhere that we both really love and which should be pretty much permanent. I am very happy about that.

I got an invitation from someone I had been talking to online to come and have dinner with their family. It. Was. Awesome. I got a tour of their gardens, talked pest management, chicken composting, and propagation strategies, got a ukulele concert from their usually shy daughter with some special medical needs (and got to play something for her on the instrument she never shares), and had a lovely meal from their garden. Oh, and we traded plants and cuttings with each other to help diversify our gardens (and who they support)!

I got hella teeth pulled.

I know it sounds terrible, but it really needed to happen. I'm waiting on my bone grafts to set before starting on my first set of implants. Even with my plastic partials, it's a whole new world. I don't think I had cracked a genuine smile since highschool. Now I can't stop.

Bought a house and started my dream job

My car was totaled and I walked away.

Finally sold that damn boat!!

Everything sucked. 2023 was a calamity for me. I lost my best friend, I had a burnout, I got sick a lot, and it forced me to take 2 full weeks off to take care of myself in early December.

Those 2 weeks for myself are arguably the best thing I had this year however. I'll try to repeat this every year.

Are we thinking in the short or long term here?

Short term (enjoyment for this year): I bought a motorcycle, something I've wanted to do for years but finally had the money and independence to do so this year

Long term (this will affect my future life in a good way): I got a summer research internship as a college student, which gives me valuable experience for later in life

My daughter (born 3 months early in mid-2022) was discharged from needing oxygen 24/7. After months of having to lug her tank and pulse oximeter around everywhere, even across a room, a wireless baby was a game-changer.

She's made huge progress in so many other ways, but this was the big one for us

I bought a house after saving for 6 long years.

I actually followed through on my "lose weight" resolution and dropped about 50lbs and put on some muscle.

Well... there's not much. I have 2 nominations. They're not much, but it's something.

Discovering https://free-mp3-download.net/
I used to download low quality music from YouTube. Now I get FLACs.

2
I got to ride an old ZSSK 012 carriage. It's not comfortable, and it's also quite loud inside, but there's passenger seats in the back. The view makes it really worth it.

Video I took from the back

https://imgur.com/a/ClDOlaZ

There's also possibly another one, but I'll just keep that one in my head. It's a bit weird.

I started therapy again and it's really helped me put the work in and learn to forgive the weird shit in my childhood. Feels good, mayn!

I got engaged!

I got a job that doubled my income and gave me the free time to do things like start a garden, learn macrame and spend a lot more uninterrupted time with my family. It was really life changing.

If I could undo this year I might though. I had 5 family members die including my grandma who raised me, my wife and I had a devastating miscarriage, my causing got hit by a car and may not be able to walk, I was diagnosed with a heart condition and put on lifelong medication and still might need open heart surgery, my deadbeat dad got out of jail and has been harrasing my mom and sister, and the icing on the cake, last week our best cat died.

I started volunteering at a children’s theatre. Just finished the third of three production runs, seeing kids from 8 to 18 astound audiences with performances that surpass professional productions I’ve seen. It’s renewed my belief in the power of the arts to change lives, when my whole training and professional life has been in the sciences.

My eldest daughter is doing so well in violin that her school had to create a special level just for her and is busing her around to other string groups in the district for performances so they sound better.

So proud of that kid.

Got to see the northern lights together with my so!

Get fired and the hired with a boss that challenges me and trust me.

I made the first step in starting my own company. 2024 I’ll be working on getting more clients so that I can quit my 9-5

I went fishing.

I started running this year and it has literally changed my life

This year has been a bit mundane. Good has been a steady stream with no particular highlights. Not complaining. I like stability.

I got accepted for my master's degree abroad, it's been a blast so far

Quit my corporate job for a small place with a mission to do good. Never going back to bigtech.

This was my covid makeup year. I sold the house I bought in 2020 and got one that suited me instead of whatever I could afford (my old apt was intentionally too small to spend time in so I could save for a house), I had a proper wedding ceremony to make up for the courthouse one in 2020 (which I attended on crutches). We went to some music festivals. Even at work I got to lead a project after the one i was meant to lead in 2020 got canceled by the pandemic.

I keep killin' it in my easy af graduate program.

Brother's family moved to my city, leading to lots of time with the niblings

I survived and managed to find a job that helps me help a few other humans survive.

Got a job that I really like and is very lenient when I come in. I have some medical condition that makes a job and life nearly impossible, some days I feel debilitatingly horrible at complete random. It feels like there's 200 pounds strapped to my back, and I have done that before so I know it really feels like that. Thankfully my boss is very lenient when I come in so if I feel like crap I can take the day off. If I suddenly feel like crap 2 hours into the day, no biggie I can go home early.

Granted it's minimum wage and I'm arguably being underpaid for my level of expertise but the flexibility of my workplace is priceless.

i think i took about 500 shits