At the end of last year, I composed a list of twenty-one things I had never done but wanted to in the year ahead of me. They ranged from watching movies to smoking illegal substances - a wide array of possibilities for me to complete over the course of twelve months. I didn't think about the list much, not until I remembered it this past week and wanted to see how far I had actually come in ticking off the boxes. And I'll admit, my results were pretty lame.
Some simple things I'd been able to try and accomplish. I finally subscribed to Netflix and purchased a pair of heels. I voted in the election and rang in the New Year in London. I even finally tried Indian food since I do live in the Curry Hill neighborhood. But there was a lot more that I hadn't done, including the last item on the list: try to keep a New Year's resolution.
I, at first, felt pretty bummed out about this. Why hadn't I taken a few minutes out of my day to finally get that Henna tattoo I'm always talking about, or found a video online to show me how to knit? Most importantly, why hadn't I spent more time finding someone to kiss on a baseball mound in the most cinematic and adorable way possible, à la Drew Barrymore? The overwhelming disappointment swirled around me as I laid on my bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to remember how I had been spending my time.
And that's when I realized something: just because I hadn't accomplished the list of "firsts" that I'd composed back in December didn't mean that I hadn't done a lot of other things that were new and exciting. In fact, I'd done a lot of them.
I was able to travel to Cannes and attend a world renowned film festival, interview people who work in the field and seeing some of the best pictures of the year before they were released. I had the opportunity to sit down with Marc Brown, the author whose characters influenced my interest in being a writer as a child, as well as other huge names such as Joyce Carol Oates, Amy Hempel, and Jessie Klein. My writing was accepted to journals for the first time, allowing me to give readings of it and actually feel like an accomplished "writer" in some sense. And beyond all of these experiences, I developed some pretty wonderful connections with some great people, which made all of these things even better because I had people to share them with.
None of this was on my list of "nevers," probably because it was all stuff I had never expected. Not to quote Taylor Swift, but it was sort of beyond even my wildest dreams. That might be what makes it so incredible in the first place.
So this year, I'm not going to focus on what I've yet to do, or what I feel I need to be doing. All that matters is taking everything at it comes. It's inevitable new experiences will fall in between the events, and chances are they'll be even better than the ones you're telling yourself you need to accomplish.
