so long 2006!

another year has passed…. passed quite quickly in fact. a year ago i was recovering from too much partying at the new year’s eve party at avalon night club in new york with jen and bruce. this year i am on the complete opposite site of the country to the west of seattle in sequim, washington, and we got to celebrate the new year four times last night… starting with the live countdown on the east coast in new york and then repeating it each hour afterward until midnight finally arrived here.

So now is the time when i look back at the events of last year that have helped to shape my life and led to where i am at now…

so what all happened last year? well, let’s just go through my multiple moves as that’s probably what defined last year the most. at the beginning of january, i moved from nyc to wilmington, delaware with my sister for about a week or so (1). then, right before the spring semester started back home in austin, i moved from wilmington to la grange with my parents for a little under a week until i found a place in austin (2). when i finally found a place in austin a couple of days before classes resumed, i moved from la grange to austin (3). this is when i roomed with eric which was definitely a great time that semester. so i remained settled there until our lease was up at the end of may, only a couple of days after graduation. at this point, i was trying to decide if i wanted to move from texas then or wait a little longer. going with the latter, i had to find a summer sublease…expecting to have things nailed down in nyc as to what i was going to do. so i had to move in austin again (4). so i remained there through the summer, during which i had several interviews with companies for an interactive developer position in nyc and thought things were getting closer to being finalized. i was wrong! since things were not figured out by the end of that summer sublease, i stayed in a spare room at a friend’s house there in austin, which was another move (5). i was there for about 3 weeks, and as the job prospects in nyc were looking grim (i don’t settle for just any job), i decided to move to atlanta with lee and todd just to escape texas finally and permanently (6). this was meant to be a stepping stone to nyc, but after thinking about things more seattle has become a strong possibility as well as well as alternative job prospects. so this is where the year has ended…living in seattle and having moved a total of six times last year. yuk!

in addition to moving, i also traveled more than normal. early in the year i visited phoenix (jan) and seattle (feb) as part of my architecture studio’s research project. in june i visited friends in atlanta. at the end of july, i flew to nyc twice within a week for interviews. then in september on my move to atlanta, i met up with friends in new orleans for the night.

many events and friends along the way also had positive effects throughout the year, but the most major event was graduation from college at the end of may. that was six and a half long years in the making and it finally happened! reflecting upon these last six years while in college, it’s truly amazing to realize how much i have really changed and grown as a person since then… all my friends and experiences having their own effect on that. last year probably had the greatest effect on me, and is probably the first time i had felt the most comfortable with who i am and life as a whole, which indeed has not been the case for a while.

so in essence, 2006 was simply an extension of my college years… the intermediate, winding down period and the last hoorah before i enter the real world. 2007 has arrived and college is officially over… it’s time to choose a path to follow and finally make things happen. time to begin realizing my goals and setting new ones. it’s finally time to be decisive for once and more forward.