My friends and I have always had this tradition of bringing with us one thing that represented something so awful we went through the past year. Something material, preferably breakable, that was the manifestation of some stupid guy who made you cry or some habit that got the better of you. We would climb up stairs to a rooftop or balcony, or the highest place we could access wherever we wound up partying. And we would toss that item into the night, letting it crash along the pavement or flutter off into the wind.

As the clock ticks off minutes, bringing me closer to the kiss-less midnight of New Years Eve, I wonder what it is I will be taking with me into the new year.

And more importantly, What am I going to leave behind?

What will wind up smashed to bits on the cold city streets of Chicago.

I have spent all day trying to sort everything that has happened this past year into these two separate categories. But I find myself getting lost in the gray areas.

I try to find the perfect thing to toss off a roof but certain things I know I should let go of, well I just can’t.

This past year waxed and waned like the moon.

It was at once a spiritual reawaking and bottoming out.

It was figuring out what I really wanted only to realize the cold truth of why I don’t have it.

It felt at times that for every step I took forward with my own sexual identity and my place in society, the whole world took two giant steps back in their attitudes towards people like me.

And the person I cared for the most wound up being the one I pushed away the farthest.

The year wasn’t easy, especially the whole turning 30 thing and I certainly wasn’t always on my best behavior. (ASK ANYONE)

It was a year of severing ties with my father’s family but healing the rift between my mother and I.

It was people dying and my new nephew coming into this world.

Getting lost in a dead end job but then finding my creative passion again.

It was the year of falling in love but getting my heart broken.

Euphoric highs and suicidal lows.

It was the year I found myself. And you know, I am sort of proud of it.

Despite all the tantrums and breakdowns.

Because I made it. Kicking and screaming at times but still

I’M HERE.

So I don’t know what to leave behind and I am not sure I will have it figured out in time to throw it off some balcony at midnight.

Any ideas?