34: Fresh as Ever.

Islanders, let me tell you.  33 was HARD on me.

I know what you're going to say and I don't care.  Things were NOT all peaches and cream or unicorns and rainbows; it was hard.  Like, not that 'adulting' has ever been easy but this?!  The life I was living?!  It was hard.

My core circle who knew, knew.  People who thought they knew probably talked.  Then, there were people who thought they knew 'everything there was to know' and didn't even have the tip of the iceberg... Islanders, have you ever been in a position to have people you call friends know you're in a storm and never even call to offer you an umbrella?

That was me.

I was so glad to say goodbye to 2016 and to the events that transpired along the journey through the 33rd year of my life.  Now, you know me.  I'll share my own story in my own way and on my own time.  For now...

The chapter of 2016 - my whirlwind year of a monsoon and drought, a blizzard and heat wave, a roller coaster ride that got stuck hundreds of feet above ground on the inside of an upside-down loop - had ended.  It was as if God took the mess of 2016 in the final weeks of the year and placed it in a box.  Yea, that's it.  It was like that... as if he wrapped it in beautiful paper and tied it with an awesome bow before he placed it on the shelf of my years and whispered, "child, you survived it just like I knew you would."

Things were on the up-and-up.  It had been a full year of continual crazy but things started to look up.  This birthday was going to be a good one.  I had plans to stay home and clean on my birthday, to hang with the family for a short while that night and to get ready for weekend time with my boo, Sheena.  Turns out, friends and family had a different plan.  A plan that would make this birthday one to remember.

Stay tuned for the wrap-up.  Oh, and thanks for the birthday love and for being so awesome to me, Islanders.  You put up with all my antics, all my absences, all my-- well, all of me.  I recognize that's no easy feat and I just want to say thanks!

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Big fat squishy hearts to you!