I think it’s safe to say that 2012 will go down as one of the more bipolar, crazy-inducing years I’ve experienced. I started the year with, effectively, four jobs, two of which made me actively miserable, one which I liked a whole lot, one which I find satisfying, one of which paid, one of which was actively costing me money, and all of which wanted slightly more time than I actually had. I knew I was being crazy, but the things I wanted to get rid of to make it work weren’t things I could get rid of, and, well, I didn’t want to get rid of the other things.
June brought the deeply uncomfortable realization that I am, apparently, the sorest, most taking-it-personal loser on the planet. I still haven’t blogged follow-up thoughts about the Recall, because I still can’t do it without descending into a frothy rage that’ll get the FBI sent after me. I can, at least, be near people talking about politics without needing to flee the room or start eviscerating people. That’s progress.
I sold five stories, joined SFWA, developed a reputation in the office for properties selling after I host Open Houses there, went to four conventions, met a ton of people, almost sold a novel, and invented the coolest job on the planet just in time to take it over. Also, learned a ton of Spanish, started more seriously dabbling in CS, cooked a lot, cuddled my cat a ton, and got my book-to-shelf ratio balanced.
My sister got married. What the hell, guys? My baby sister got married.
I’ve been to New Hampshire, D.C., Richmond (and several other bits of Virginia), Chicago, Oakland, San Francisco, Toronto, and vast swaths of Argentina. I took pictures of a lot of it. I got much better at taking pictures. I also ate lots of fantastic things.
But this was also the year I kinda noticed that my grandparents are not still the immortal fifty-something’s they are in my head, and they haven’t been for a long time. Even Grannie, who has never struck me as young, seems to have leveled-up, and watching her watching her sisters deteriorate is rather existentially terrifying. This rather culminated when Christmas waged it’s ugly head, again, and I got the news that my favorite uncle was in the hospital. It took three people to convince me that just because I was rational enough to know I was panicking didn’t mean that my decision to give in to said panic was, in fact, rational. He’s fine, and I get the sense most people are confused about why I freaked out. It was all in the context.
In the end, I can’t really say I liked 2012. I didn’t. I hated whole swaths of it a lot. There are bits of 2012 I would gladly burn to the ground, and cackle while doing it. But there was plenty of good mixed in, so the year wasn’t a loss or a waste. Just a transition. An ugly, graceless transition, but a necessary one. The prognosis for 2013 is favorable. Probably not awesome, but that’s okay. ‘Pleasant’ sounds really good.
Anaea Lay 