2011: Believe

I like to think that as the clock struck midnight and Friday became Saturday and 2010 turned into 2011, the sky opened up and covered the entire city in fluffy, white flakes. After all, can you imagine a more beautiful greeting to the New Year, a new decade?

Of course, in truth , the best New York could offer was leftover gray slush and instead of the soft patter of snow falling, the New Year sounded a lot more like strangers, angry neighbors, and music with too much bass.

Yet hours and days later, my memory is less true and more wishful and so I can tell myself that flakes really were falling as I left the party, jumped into a cab, and headed back to Stacey and Sarah’s apartment that night.

My second December trip to New York came and went too fast, and so did my trip to Florida. Both trips were reminders that there are people in my life who love me, unconditionally. Family count as most of those people, but so do Sarah and Stacey. I’ve known Stacey and Sarah for what seems like forever and it goes without saying that these girls are more like sisters than friends; we try on each other’s clothes, we set each other up on blind dates, we tell each other when there’s food stuck in our teeth (sometimes), and when we’re together we laugh so much our chests hurt and eyes begin to tear. But most of all, we’re there for each other, to hold each other up even when we feel like falling.

For me, the New Year, a year which seems more and more like a year of possibilities, didn't begin when the ball dropped or champagne bottles were opened, but rather, it began the next morning with hugs and words meant with love and understanding, while sitting in the living room with my two very best friends.

And so, later that morning, as I left that city to return to my own, the streets were still empty and quiet and the sky still gray and the slush still muddy. But because of that huge grin across my face and that warm, grateful feeling in my heart, I’d still like to believe it was snowing as my train pulled away from Penn Station.