Happy New Year Open Thread

Hey, we survived another year — congratulations, everyone! For me and my family, 2015 will be one we will remember forever. It was the year we welcomed our daughter, said good-bye to Drew’s father, ushered Jackson into “big-boy school,” and Drew even won an Emmy! And years from now, we’ll say, “Remember Christmas, 2015, when it was so hot we had the air conditioners going full blast and we dined al fresco at the Chinese restaurant?” It was a strange, sad, beautiful, wonderful, and exhausting year, and I’m hoping for fewer milestones and a little more sleep in 2016.

For the tenth year in a row, I’ll be ringing in the new year with my favorite new year’s date, my old man, Drew. The other night, we recounted all of our New Year’s Eves past. There was our very first NYE together, in 2006, about eight months after we met, when we went out for Ethiopian and saw a band I liked and I spent a whole week visiting him, trying to decide if I could see myself living in New York. There were the next three NYEs when we threw parties at our apartment in Hell’s Kitchen, just a few blocks from Times Square. There was NYE 2010, after we moved to Brooklyn, when we dressed in our fancy finery and our friends, Neil and Kirstin, came over and we cooked jambalaya together and sang karaoke and yelled at the moon from our terrace at midnight. (I woke up the next morning, the first day of 2011, and said I was ready to have a baby, and our Jackson was born nine months and eight days later). There was a home-cooked lobster dinner in 2012 with Mary and Steve and Bill and Rachel. There was 2013 when we saw Willie Nelson with Chad and Michael in Austin. And there was last year, in Missouri, with my sister and her boyfriend, and I danced with Drew at a swing band concert, Joanie May the size of a grape between us, a happy secret still to most everyone else.

This year, we’ll wear fancy finery again and cook dinner and eat caviar with our friends, Jeramy and Josh, at their house while their daughter and Jackson have a sleepover at our place with a sitter who was, luckily, still available when we asked just a few days out.

Looking back, I feel so lucky to have marked the passing of time with an array of dear friends and family, and I hope I continue to be rich in friendship and love for many, many years to come. It’s what makes the happy milestones more fun to celebrate and the sad moments more bearable to get through.

As 2015 closes out, I want to thank you all for being part of the DW community. Whether you check in once or twice a week or several times an hour — whether you’re a lurker or an active commenter, your presence is appreciated and valued. I get emails every week from people who are kind enough to express what this site has meant for them, and I always feel that these notes of thanks are meant for all of us. I keep the lights on, but it’s all of you who keep the party going, so thank you. I am thrilled to say that this was a big year for DW. We’re ending the year with traffic nearly 40% higher than it was last December, and finally, after nearly five years of pretty much breaking even (if I was lucky), I’m reaching income goals I set for myself when I started this site back in January 2011. While things can certainly change at any time, I’m enjoying this moment of seeing hard work pay off, and I hope that DW will continue being a place where you want to spend some of your time in 2016.

Have a wonderful, safe, and happy New Year (anxiety, aside), and I’ll see you back here on Monday!