Things that went well

Lately I’ve been feeling pretty grumpy about my 40th year; there’s been a lot of challenges and frustrating experiences.

But this morning, I realized there’s actually been some pretty great stuff in the last year. So I wanted to list out some of them, in the spirit of looking at “what went well”.

My birthday party — really my first significant party since I was 16 — was a lovely time, with great people from different parts of my life and fantastic weather.

Professionally, outside of my job, I started writing for The Pastry Box, spoke at AlterConf Seattle (video of my talk), and was accepted to speak at Confab Higher Ed. (That’s in November.) For work, I’m actually getting to convert to Drupal, which is exciting and fun and I’m learning so much.

I ran a Dungeon World game, had a ton of fun with it, and developed some great friendships. More recently, we reformed our D&D group, which means I’ve been able to hang out more with Justin, Bobby, and Acey!

Acey and Ashley asked me to preside at their wedding, which means I finally got to use that Universal Life Church ministership I got waaaaaay back in the late 90s. I even wrote in “Cleric” on the form. 🙂

I went back to southern California for the longest trip since I was in college, enjoyed it immensely, and reconnected with old friends. I also spent some time with my favorite aunt. And I had time alone for walking and thinking. (Ended up writing three and a half blog posts, and I still feel like I haven’t totally processed it.)

I made my first sweater.

We bought an electric car, which I like a LOT. And the car prompted me to try some new things with code, which was just fun.

People in my life — on Twitter and in person — have been pretty great. Thank you all for being you.