stephen.news

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Birthday

  • 35

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    2 min read

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    Today is my birthday. It’s only a day after Matt Mullenweg’s. As a little gift to myself and to him, I’m publishing a little post to reflect upon turning 35.

    This past year was especially busy and special. I travelled quite a bit. Visited the family in Texas a lot. Spent some quality time with my aging grandparents. We roadtripped to Maine, Montauk, and traveled to Cancun for a lovely beach wedding. 2023 was full of plenty of ups and plenty of downs. We even roadtripped from NYC to Texas for Christmas and rang in the New Year from Washington DC.

    I’m a little tired. Ready for much needed rest as winter begins to rev its arctic engines 😅

    Initially, I had planned to plan a big birthday party for turning 35. Instead, this birthday weekend consists of a low-key weekend staycation at a mystery hotel in the city (planned by my partner)! Tomorrow evening, a few friends and I will get together for drinks, but nothing huge is really planned other than the standard social meetups.

    I’m really looking forward to focusing on my health (yes, this includes my mental health as well) this year. I want to do more hiking and more exploring this year. If you too want to do more hiking and live in the tristate area, lemme know if you’re looking for a hiking buddy! I’m also beginning to feel the pains of growing older ever so slightly. So, I’m eager to stay in shape so I can continue doing what I love doing most.

    Now, that I’m halfway through my 30’s, it’s time to organize my time and resources to spend a good deal of time with loved ones, re-connect with old friends and maintaining my current relationships. I hear it gets harder to make friends as you age, so I’m taking stock of who’s in my orbit now and trimming the fat so to speak.

    In other news, this blog itself got a facelift. I was thinking, a new year calls for a new theme. Frankly, every time this blog gets a new theme, I get a renewed sense of urgency to blog more myself. Last year, I published about every other day. My big goal for 2024, it to double that.

  • 34

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    2 min read

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    Yesterday, I turned 34.

    I grew a lot this year. Ticked a lot of boxes. I wrote a little bit about some positive things that happened in the past year. One of the benefits of having your birthday in January is it’s a nice little bookend. You can kick the year off and reflect in the same breath.

    I skipped a birthday post last year. Wasn’t feeling very positive about turning 33. This year around the sun, I’m feeling quite gracious and fortunate. It’s been a big year of growth for me personally and I feel like I have some more room to grow further still.

    Although, as I’ve begun to accept that I’m entering my middle-age, the idea of throwing a party becomes more and more distant. It’s really difficult to celebrate my birthday with friends strewn across multiple state lines, multiple boroughs and timezones 😢 I think when July rolls around, I’ll start planning something special for turning 35.

    To celebrate turning 34, I’m going to go see Mike Birbiglia’s, The Old Man and the Pool at the Vivian Beaumont Theater. With any luck, Mike will guide me into the warm embrace of the next stage of my life with his comedy show:

    Award-winning comedian and storyteller Mike Birbiglia takes the stage at the esteemed Vivian Beaumont Theater through January 15 only. His coming-of-middle-age story asks the big questions: Why are we here? What’s next? What happens when the items at the doctor’s office that you thought were decorative become functional?

  • 30

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    1 min read

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    Today, I’ll be turning 30. 

    I’ll spare you the cliche painful words from an aging youth, and the expected drone of middle-age melancholia. I’ll even spare you the expected pessimism for squandered or lost youth. 

    Instead, I’d like to remind everyone that the carrot isn’t important, chasing it is. I’m not dead yet, and like any mortal that came before you or I — I certainly pondered my mortality today. It’s perhaps something I do daily.

    I feel confident of my achievements and I’m thankful to have lived to the age of 30. Many thanks to my parents (but specifically my mother who laboriously raised 3 boys), my friends, co-workers, mentors, teachers and of course, my family. The next 30 years (I’m sure), will fly by in an instant. 

    Yesterday I had jury duty for the first time. Today I’m 30. I think I’ll have a beer and celebrate.