2011, Thanks for the Memories

I love New Year’s Eve. Always have. When I was little, I’d spend hours making homemade confetti in every color of the rainbow and would repeatedly promise my mother that I’d clean up every speck of cubed construction paper after my moment of midnight glory. Fast forward a few years and you’d find me banging pots and pans on the balcony of our Floridian condo synchronized to the beat of fireworks on the Gulf. I always wanted to learn how to play the drums. New Year’s resolution perhaps?

High school and college NYE celebrations have been a blur of cocktail dresses, champagne toasts, text-enhanced wishes for health, happiness, and prosperity, but most prominently, family. Just a year ago I sat alongside my grandmother, pretty in pink (she always liked pink), on her infamously comfy couch. It was my first New Year’s Eve “of age,” my first chance to take on home sweet Chicago as a legal, cocktail-worthy adult. My friends urged me to join in on their festivities. My heart said otherwise. This will be your last New Year’s Eve with her, just think about what the doctor said. She has three to six months. That’s it.

I’m glad I listened to my heart for once.

So, here I sit on the last day of 2011, and I find myself in a cliché state of reflection. I’m buried in stacks of New Year-related magazines, all titled with some derivative of “New Year, New You!” (I might gag if I read that headline one more time.) I guess I have myself to blame for buying them in the first place. Did I really expect US Weekly to have some life-changing advice for my year ahead? Well…maybe. The photos are entertaining at the very least.

The truth is, I don’t need a five-dollar People Magazine or a two-minute spot on the Today Show to tell me what defines the last 12 months of my life. Sure, there were “winning” moments and a “tiger mother” that made me appreciate my super-cool mum even more than I already do, but the more we try to define 2011 collectively, the more I realize how individual our past year’s journey has been.

For me, 2011 has truly been a coming-of-age year. It’s been a year of unbreakable friendships, a year of self-respect, and a year of paralyzing goodbyes—some that came like a thief in the night. But above all, 2011 has been a building year (and I’m not talking about Irish football), one that bridges the gap between surreal endings and hopeful beginnings.

So I ask you this: what does 2011 mean to you? What do you hope tomorrow will bring? No cheating now—the answer lies within you, and only you.

love.adele.

Love. L-O-V-E. Read it. Spell it. Say it. Easy enough, right?

Now feel it. C’mon, feel it. What emotions come to mind?

Passion.

Fulfillment.

Happiness.

Pain.

Better yet, who comes to mind?

A significant other.

A maternal figure.

A platonic friend.

A past lover.

Now define it. Plato spent his whole life trying to comprehend the meaning of agape. Chances are, we will too. But for now, this complex four-letter word unifies us, blankets us in a cloak of vulnerability. One minute we think we have it, and the next moment, it’s gone. Poof. Just like that. The loss leaves us disillusioned. Confused. Shattered. But time is on our side. It heals us, leads us back to square one. And so the search resumes. We’re stronger each time, more settled, more ourselves.

But this post isn’t really about love. Not really, anyway. It’s about acknowledging a young vocalist who’s managed to cross cultures with her raw talent—a talent that has earned her six Grammy nominations and unwavering cross-generational appeal. She sings about love, yes. And loss, yes, that too. But somehow, her tracks are anything but cliché. More accurately, they’ve left us spellbound and hungry for more. We feel the pain of every verse, the power of every refrain, and the gut-wrenching realization that her reality is our déjà vu.

Regrets and mistakes

They are memories made

Who would have known

How bittersweet

This would taste?

ADELE. A-D-E-L-E. Read it. Spell it. Say it.

Now feel it. Have the chills yet? If not, you haven’t listened hard enough.

Hello, Goodbye.

Ah, the game of life.  It's been pondered by many, figured out by few.  How quickly we abandon our carefree days of infantile innocence, only to move quickly toward a cognitive minefield of philosophical questions and identity crises.  All too often, we crumble under the pressure to find ourselves, paralyzed by a daunting mission to define our purpose, our "raison d'etre".  We feel obligated to know who we are and where we're going, to plan for tomorrow before we've begun to live today. Life's small moments drown beneath a sea of bigger aspirations; we're always hoping that something better will come tomorrow, after all.

But one day tomorrow will not come.

I was reminded of this fact on Monday morning when I was woken up out of a sound sleep to learn of my grandmother's passing. At 5:34 a.m., my rude awakening did not come with a snooze button. I was forced to face reality in a way I'd never imagined. The irony is, the reality of touching my sweet Nana's lifeless shoulder in her bed down the hall from me was nothing short of surreal. For a split second, I had thought she'd wake up, that she hadn't really taken her last breaths. It couldn't be. But it was. I blinked and she was gone.

I never believed the nurse when she said the cancer would win the battle. My grandma was too strong, too stubborn. No, she said. She's good now, but wait. The cancer will come like a thief in the night.

And so it did. Just like a thief in the night. But while it stole my grandmother's corporeal existence, it didn't manage to rob me of the memories. When I think about dear Margaret, I realize that her reason for being was simple: family. With my bittersweet memories of her laugh, her singing, and her love for food, I take with me the realization that life's purpose doesn't have to be so complicated. For her, it was the simple things that meant the most. And oftentimes, it is the simplest of things that make the most profound impact.

Connect. Love. Laugh. 

Repeat.