Some years seem to pass by without much to commemorate them. I’d be hard pressed for example to recall anything specific about 2003 (that’s sort of embarrassing actually, but literally true). This year flew by for me, and while it wasn’t filled with any monumental realizations, it was abound with changes and things that happened – I thought I’d make a few notes in case I find myself looking back in 5 years…
Early this year I felt like I closed a chapter, tying up loose ends and wrapping up at Yahoo! and by extension (and with more finality), Upcoming. I left for my 9th SXSW in March a free man – and for the first time with both the inclination and the time to stick around for SXSW Music. I’ve booked my two weeks for next year.
I had a couple months to play (thanks Brady) before getting wrapped up in presidential politics. Enough has been written about how a bunch of geeks helped make a new type of campaign possible. For now I’ll just say that I’m proud (and rather humbled) to have been able to spend a big chunk of 2008 helping to elect a better President. It was worth doing.
There were a lot of things that I didn’t get to this year, and I’ve made a list of the things I want to make an effort to do better for next year, not least of which is emerging from semi-hermitude — at some point over the past couple years, “hanging out” seems to have become a much harder thing to do; not a novel observation I know, but true nonetheless. Still, this year I think was a great boon in terms of tempering, in the best way, both my expectations and ambitions. Rather than being dulled, I feel rather my resolve and focus being made more durable. And while I’m stilling processing it all, I emerge not feeling old, but rather older, and maybe a bit wiser.
I’ve been up for the past 2 days working on a brand new project that I’m incredibly excited about, and I’m thinking that 2009 might see a return to regular blogging – sharing the news lessons I’m learning, and maybe telling some old war stories as well.
Happy New Year everyone.