(I forgot to publish this on December 31, 2010…so just pretend).

Being the last day of the year and all, it’s the time of year when many of us bloggers reminisce on what we did (or did not do) over the last twelve months. So here is my official Top Ten of TwentyTen for your enjoyment. A departure of typical musings, yes; but fun (for me) nonetheless.

10. Visited Paris and Versailles, France with the Husband in June…one part congratulatory trip for Husband’s book publishing, one part European getaway, and one part wedding for friends, this was an incredible trip for the both of us! I’m still trying to rid my body of all the cheese and wine I consumed.

9. Went on an epic ski trip with good friends to the far away Crested Butte (or, as I like to call it – because of how it looks – Mount Crumpit). There’s really nothing like fresh, groomed powder and stopping halfway down a run for an ice cold beer at a bar made out of ice. I’m very much looking forward to our next trip in a couple weeks.

8. Got an iPhone 4! Blah blah blah to all the AT&T / Apple haters. This thing is fricking awesome! The organizational crazy head in me loves this handy little device. It went all Jerry MacGuire on me. It completes me.

7. Turned the ripe old age of thirty and celebrated in style! Todd threw me fancy schmancy affair and with the help of my family and dear friends, it was the most perfect party I could have imagined. So far, 30 is a pretty stellar age!

6. Stupidly took 12 credit hours during the summer semester and managed, miraculously, to only have one meltdown. While the meltdown resulted in a complete failure of my pink laptop, Todd was able to fix it (though not before the damn thing lost ALL of my data and schoolwork) and I pulled off a 4.0 that semester. It helped me prove to myself that I could do pretty much anything I set my head to.

5. Bought a house!! In January, we started looking earnestly for a house of our own and with some amount of dumb luck and a fantastic realtor, we found the perfect house in the perfect location. By April, we closed and on May 1, we moved in a started making it our own. It’s a bit of a work in progress right now, but we love every bit of it and the dogs totally love the backyard (as do we)…I’m looking forward to spring and summer to start working on making the yard a lovely litte haven for us.

4. Made prime rib for the first time. Okay, so it’s not an overwhelming accomplishment, but it leads somewhere. And hey, prime rib is a bit of an undertaking. And an expensive one, at that!

3. Threw my very first formal dinner party! I needed to do this to test out making a prime rib as it was going to be the main course for Christmas dinner, something I REALLY didn’t want to screw up. The party, as far as I could tell, was a success and the June Cleaver in me can’t wait to host more and more parties!

2. Hosted Christmas and Christmas dinner at our house! I’ve been wanting to hose a killer Christmas since I was about 12 years old. I love my family’s traditions and the ones that Husband and I have created over the last five years, so it was nice to get the chance to do that at last! My plum pudding turned out amazingly and the prime rib (which I did a practice run on in #4) was too big but that just means left overs for us. Oh darn.

1. Probably the most epic thing that has happened to me in recent years (outside of getting married), I finally graduated from a university! Eleven long years and plenty of screwing around with my education, I finally finished and did it with some amount of success. Made the Dean’s List a couple of times, impressed my advisor with my gumption, and created some of my best writing to date…I can’t complain! It feels good to be done.

Maybe this is a common feeling for people, but finishing school – completely finishing – is about the most underwhelming thing I have ever experienced. I just don’t know what to do with myself right now.

I no longer have papers to write or research to do. I don’t need to log on to my online classes and get discussions posted. I’ll never have another spring or Christmas break which means I’ll never need to cram as much as I can into a week or two, for fear of missing out on something while I’m doing homework. I won’t ever utter those three little words so many people have heard from me the last few years: “I have homework.”

I woke up last night from a medicated stupor, sure that there was something I needed to be concerned about (other than my puppy who ate a couple chicken bones yesterday). And there was nothing. Really. Just…nothing. So I went back to sleep and that was that.

I’m likening this feeling to the 4th of July. It’s sort of the same thing. Everything starts out a little slowly, then ramps up until CRASH! BOOM! The giant finale we’ve all been waiting for! The pinnacle of the show…they break out the big guns and give us the best they’ve got! And it’s all very exciting for a few minutes and then….it just ends. There’s no winding down. It’s just over.

So now I’m struggling with the idea of what to do with myself. I need to clean and rearrange much of the house. I have a ton of recipes that I’m dying to try out (though with Christmas only 2 weeks away and me hosting dinner, I don’t know that many new recipes will get tested in the near future). I want to start consulting brides again. I definitely want to start writing in earnest. There are plenty of things that I want and need to get done, but for now? I think I’ll just revel in the fact that, while it took me waaaaay too long to complete, I’ve just finished my degree. I’m just going to be okay with that and get the massage I’ve been (quite literally) aching for, for so long.

Thanksgiving, much like the dreaded Valentines Day, is a day when the retail industry seems to prey on our overly-consumerist brains. We spend tons of cash on food, to say the very least, and Black Friday…well, let’s not even go there.

People tend to rag on Valentines Day quite a bit for being a consumer driven man-made holiday designed to guilt us into buying expensive chocolates, flowers, and jewelry to prove to that we love someone. I, for one, used to be adamantly opposed to Valentines Day. Unfortunately, I did not have a good reason. I just was. But then, after finding someone who could make me like Valentines Day for all the traditional hullabaloo (yes, I get flowers every year), I began to think differently about the day.

We all lead very busy lives. None of us seem to have enough time in the day to manage all the things we need to do and people we need to see. I have three calendars for three different parts of my life and I still can’t seem to keep everything straight (though I do manage to keep a good portion of it under control). So isn’t it kind of nice to have that automatic reminder every year on February 14th to tell the people in our lives that we love them?

Sure, sure. We should tell people we love them every day. But honestly, the only person who gets a daily “I love you” from me is my husband. That leaves a substantial portion of the people in my life to whom I definitely do not say that to often enough. While Valentines Day has taken a romantic tone, there’s no reason that we shouldn’t be reminded to say “I love you” to everyone that day.

The same is true of Thanksgiving. A holiday that’s riddled with tradition, at least in my family, is also a good excuse to take stock of the things for which we are thankful. I was challenged by a friend to try to find something to be thankful for each day this month. Some days were easier than others, that’s for certain. But I have a hard time believing that any of us could go a single day without finding something to be thankful for. Even on the hardest, darkest days of this year, there has been a glimmer of thankfulness (even if it was hard to find and I really had to hunt it down).

We should be thankful for many things every single day. Thanksgiving is just a good reminder of that…even if you spend the entire day drugged up on tryptophan, watching football (which is what I usually end up doing).

I have Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). Winter is, without question, the worst time of year for me. This is not surprising or new information for anyone who knows me. I survive the first half of winter through the knowledge that Christmas is coming which means baking and parties and music and general excitement are well on their way. I survive the latter half of the season through the knowledge that spring and summer are mere weeks away.

When I first found out I had SAD, I muddled my way through it by going to a tanning salon every day at lunch for a few minutes of my ever-needed UV rays. For many years of my life, I was a bronzed goddess not in the dead heat of July, but in the blizzards of January. The humor in that is another thing that helped me get through the winter season.

For a long time, I never told anyone why I was a) so damn depressed for four to five months out of the year or b) why I was so incredibly tan (thereby leaving myself open to the scrutiny of vanity). Anytime someone asked how I was doing, I would typically respond with, “I’m okay…just ready for winter to be over.” The reaction was (and remains, to this day), “What?! I love winter! Winter is great! How can you hate winter? You’re from Colorado!”

I hated that reaction. I hated it because no one knew why I hated winter so much and I really had no interest in telling anyone WHY I hated winter. I still hate that reaction. The first big snow of the season is rough on me. The time change makes it worse (though, mercifully, this year both happened pretty close to each other so it’s been a little easier).

About five years ago, I finally started telling people why I was so depressed during the winter and why I hate the season so much. All my friends know that I live for Christmas, so I’m sure it was a bit of a relief to finally understand why I was so schizophrenic about winter. I’ll never forget where I was or who I was with the first time I really opened up about what is “wrong” with me. See, all of my friends (my husband included) really love winter, cold, snow, all that jazz. I’m pretty much the only one that would rather have it be 85F and blazing hot than have to deal with layers of clothing and scraping my car, blah blah blah.

I remember getting a card from some of my girl friends shortly after letting everyone in on my SAD secret, reminding me that they’d be on my case to get me out of the house and that it was going to be their mission to make me enjoy winter (one friend actually got me to enjoy small-ish roadtrips recently so I have faith that she can work the winter idea).

Winter is still torture for me. I still hate it. Looking out my window right now, there’s nothing but hazy fog and cold. And wind. Gross.

I need my friends and my community every day of every year. But when I need them the MOST, they are ever present, ever ready. They know that I just need a little nudge (and a cute pair of winter boots) to get me out the door, into the cold to be with them when they are at their best and I, at my absolute worst.

That is the essence, I believe, of true community and true friendship. Knowing that where one of us ends, another can pick us up and keep us going…it’s a perfectly lovely way to live life. We fill in each others gaps. We are wonderfully broken individuals for whom togetherness has provided a safe place to be put back together, in whatever tiny ways we can do that.

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I just looked at my desk calendar and realized that 2010 is much closer to ending than I thought. Frankly, I’m looking forward to it ending. The universe can have this year back, for all I care.

2010 has been a year of unimaginable pain, heartache, stress, and general disappointment. It’s also been a year of strength, joy, and celebration. Neither outweighs the other; all of the emotions I’ve experienced this year come and go. I’m a veritable karate kid of emotion…they all wax on and wax off from time to time.

I’ve put myself and been put through an extraordinary amount of insanity in the last 10 months. The next three are almost guaranteed to be the least stressful months I’ve had in recent history. 2010 has increased the amount of snark that comes out of me. It’s also made me more aware of the person that I am, the behaviors I exhibit, the people I allow in my life. As a general rule, I’m just more aware of my life and myself. It would be silly if I had gone through all of this year without learning at least something from all of it. What a waste that would have been.

The last time there was this much stress in my life, I was surrounded on all sides by my very best friends. I had a community of people that loved me, believed in me, and wanted the best for me. I came to a breaking point and just sort of fell apart and fell on my friends. I was strengthened by their passions and visions in their own lives. It was a surreal, sort of “Let go and let God” kind of experience.

This time around, I still have the same friends, but our sense of community is much different than it was five years ago. We have all gone slightly different directions; we don’t even live all that close to each other anymore (thought, mercifully, we’re all still in the same city). Three of us got married (which means that our little group got a brand new member in the form of someone’s wife…and she is, well, a perfect fit in every way) and that changed the dynamic drastically. Some of our concerns remain ever the same and some are quite different.

Because of all of that, and because of my own insecurities, I fell apart not on my friends, but into myself. I nearly refused to talk about my life because I hate sounding whiny and I hate not being in control of myself and my life. Thus, I found myself raging internally, never really letting any of my friends see just how deeply hurt I was. Some of my friends knew, just because of how well they know me. Some were even expecting me to go all Mount Vesuvius on them… and they were ready and willing to be there when I did. I just never ended up doing that.

But maybe because of, or in spite of, my stubbornness, I learned that I am capable of much more than I’d ever thought. I can manage my stress in ways I’ve never been able to before. I can plan the hell out of events, vacations, my calendar. I can think and wish the most hateful things. I think it’s in some of those moments that I’m able to (sort of) come to a comfortable place of letting go, knowing that karma can be a real bitch. I desperately hope that it is. I also know that I can’t control that and that the only things I can control are my reactions.

So 2010, thanks for all the fun times, exciting moments, and exotic vacations, but if you could hurry through the next 90 days and get the hell out of my life, I’d greatly appreciate it.

At some point in every life, there is a moment of inferiority. Whether it’s real or not is beside the point. Every person, at one time or another (or multiple times for some), will feel inferior to someone or something.

I struggle with my own inferiority complex on a fairly regular basis. We’re talking nearly daily. I’m not as thin as that person, not as athletic as another, not as smart at this person, not as successful as that one, not as valued (professionally) as that person, not as talented as the next one.

And in fairness, I’m thinner, smarter, and more successful than someone else out there in the world. So what’s the point of feeling inferior?

Sometimes, I think it’s okay, even healthy, to have an inferiority complex. It gives me something to push toward, another goal to achieve. It certainly has pushed me to do some things with my life that I probably wouldn’t have done otherwise. I also think that we all need to feel inferior at some point in order to maintain a sense of humility.

From time to time, it’s okay to get a simple reminder that I’m not as amazing as I might think I am. Don’t get me wrong. I think it’s fine to be proud of one’s accomplishments. It’s more than okay to toot your own horn every now and again. We all need to feel like we’re great at SOMETHING. In fact, I firmly believe that all of us are really great at at least one thing. In our own circle of friends and peers, there’s probably at least one thing that we really, truly are better at than anyone else.

From personal experience, I can assure you that failure is not the worst thing that will ever happen. Feeling like a loser is not going to end your world. I failed an entire college course once. It was a horribly sinking feeling…mostly because I knew I’d have to take the class again and paying for it (again) was going to be no easy task (this was before I started taking out loans en masse and was paying out of pocket). I don’t like to lose and I don’t like to fail. But learning that I can bounce back from a pretty spectacular tumble was one of the more important lessons I’ve ever learned. I sulked and licked my educational wounds for a while. I felt stunned when I saw that failing grade on my transcript. I never really told anyone about failing that class.

Failure is embarrassing, there’s no questioning that. Copping to it, admitting your own inferiority, is never easy. It is, however, necessary. I feel like, the sooner you fail, the sooner you can learn to deal with it, move on, and learn how not to fail the next time.

So here’s my way of encouraging you to cop to your failures, however hard it may be. And as another tiny bit of encouragement, remember that while there will always be someone out there who is better than me at something, anything, I likely guaranteed to be better at something, anything, than someone else…same goes for you.

I have yet to meet someone who doesn’t have a fear of at least one thing. Most people seem to have fear of heights or spiders or snakes or something like that. My list of fears is pretty strange, to say the least. I’m afraid of wet paper, depths, and mushrooms.

Wet paper makes my gag reflex kick in immediately and with a vengeance.

Depths stems from an incident in South Carolina when I was 15. I haven’t felt the same about the ocean since. Watching Finding Nemo even makes me have minor anxiety attacks.

Mushrooms, well, they’re just weird and gross. Why would someone eat a fungus? I don’t get it.

But the other night, a new fear was introduced to me. The fear of completion.

I have a few friends who are writers, two of whom (one being my husband) who are actually, legitimately published. Todd has a contract with a small publishing house in Colorado and Ben recently won a pretty BFD award for Writer’s Digest. Both have been pursuing writing for a looooooong time and I know absolutely for certain that Todd would like his writing career to be his ONLY career.

So when he completed his first novel, he immediately began sending the manuscript to agents, publishers, anyone who might want to take a look at it. Because if you’re going to work that hard to complete a novel, the intention (probably) is to get it out into the world.

Ben brought up this whole fear of completion as it relates to writers. He suggested that a lot of writers simply don’t finish a piece because once they’ve completed it, one of two things generally happens:

1. There’s nothing left to work on; and/or

2. They have to DO something with the piece.

I don’t understand #1, just because there’s always something else that I want to write (granted, I write more article-style and not novels, though my husband is trying to pursuade me to write one). The second fear, however, I kind of get.

See, in my dream world, I’m a contributor to Vanity Fair. I love reading that magazine, I respect the talent of many of the writers (even if I don’t always agree with their POV), and I want to be part of something bigger than me, professionally. I figure, the only way that I’ll ever get to be a contributor is to actually submit a piece for review. I always seem to say, “Someday, I’ll be brave enough to submit to Vanity Fair. Someday.” Why not today?

I don’t know what my senior writing project will entail, if it’s a solo or group project, if it’s supposed to be a singular piece or a compilation. No idea. But I think I’d like to create something that’s worth submission to some credible magazines. But I do worry about the day that I actually complete a piece like that. I worry about holding the paper or staring at my computer, all the while thinking, “Oh crap. It’s finished. Now I have to DO something with it.” I worry that I’ll pore over and over and edit the hell out it and basically torture the piece; edit it into submission, if you will. I worry that, even though I know it will be rejected, I’ll consider that rejection the Simon Cowell of my writing career, however brief and fledgling it may be. I worry that I’ll give up before I give myself another shot. I worry that I’ll find it easier to sit on the piece, never submit it to anyone, and carry on with my meager existence, just so that I don’t have to feel the sting of rejection.

It was suggested that I also mention the fear of success in concert with the fear of completion. I just don’t really have a fear of success. I desperately want to taste success in my life. I want to be a successful career person, I want to succeed in the kitchen, I want my marriage and family to be wildly successful. Fear of success? Not me.

But I need to get over the fear of completion in order to even get a chance at success.

I went to an indoor trampoline center the other week for a friend’s birthday. I have an unconditional love of trampolines. I grew up with one (okay, my neighbor had one, but we were always over there jumping) and can’t wait to get one of my own in the backyard. But at 30 years old, I’m not sure my body was well-equipped to deal with the aftermath of two solid hours of jumping, flipping, and general madness. I felt like I’d had the crap beat out of me and I felt like that for nigh on a week. Will that stop me from trampolining again? Absolutely not.

But what about when you take an emotional or psychological beating?

Normally, when I feel like that physically, I just go to bed early, take some pain meds, and drink a couple glasses of wine. If I’m feeling especially crummy, I’ll throw in a salt bath for good measure.

Sadly, there are no salt baths for the emotional beatings, are there?

It’s frustrating to feel taken for granted or (probably worse) totally disregarded. The last several weeks have brought a number of those situations my way. School was strange, twice not having anyone in my peer review group choose my work to review. I mean, I’m nearly fundamentally opposed to peer review groups as it is because I’m totally unsure of their purpose, but since it’s an assigned task, I deal with it.

I’ve had my opinions, beliefs, politics, and reasons come under heavy fire this summer for reasons that I don’t understand. At one point, I really just threw my hands up and said, “I’m going to be a Communist for Halloween; they practically think I am anyway!” I had someone question why I keep fighting for the “same old thing.” Why do any of us fight for something we believe in? There are hills I’m willing to die on, and that particular topic happens to be one of them. But I won’t get into it right now.

Some really insulting statements have been hurled at me with no regard for how the hell it might sound, much less how it might hit me.

This isn’t a cry for sympathy. Not even in the slightest. I don’t need anyone to feel sorry for me.

It’s more about trying to find a way to be less affected by the stupid things people say and do.

There are times when I know know KNOW that what was said wasn’t intended to be hurtful; it just came out wrong or I was in a vulnerable place and I took it wrong. Lord knows, I’ve been on the giving end of those statements.

But other times, it’s painfully evident when a statement was made with intention. And those are the ones that I can’t wrap my head around. Those are the ones that I can’t seem to reconcile or “get over.”

So what does one do with THOSE MacTrucks? Certainly wine can help, but that wears off far sooner than the shock.