I've always been a little weird about birthdays. I am generally very happy with my job and my friends and my life and yet, without fail, I wake up every birthday with the feeling that a few dozen boxes of Duncan Hines Yellow Cake Mix have fallen on my little toe, pointy corner first.

So when I woke up last Friday, I was unsurprised by the anxiety. But this year was a little different. 24, for whatever reason, was always going to be a particular beast of a birthday for me. Growing up, I pinned a lot of hopes and dreams and goals on 24. Here are all the ones I remember. 

By 24 I would have:

1. A husband. Most likely a dashing man I met in college, probably in a literature class, probably after making a complex observation about how Thoreau would have been a lot happier if he'd installed a water slide on Walden Pond.
2. Twins. I desperately wanted a twin as a child, and when it became apparent that I (most likely) was not going to have a twin sister, I decided that I would settle for mothering a pair or two. Oh, the hijinks my identical blonde daughters, Mary Kate and Ashley, and I would get into together! Nothing in my genetics indicates that I will give birth to twins, let alone blonde twins. But hey. Anything can happen at 24.
3. A PhD in something. Whatever is easiest to get. I've never been interested in working very hard, and I didn't think that would change by 24. It hasn't!
4. A job editing the New Yorker.  Ask me if I've ever read the New Yorker. I haven't! Literally not even once.
5. My standing back tuck, even without the aide of the spring floor. 
6. A savings account I could access without my mom's permission. I nailed this one.
7. 3,000,000 twitter followers. I'm so close!
8. Fans, just in general. In 2nd grade we wrote a little book called "The Story Of My Life," and mine ended with this exact quote: "Everyone will clap for me. I will be beautiful and everyone will love me. I will be magnificent."
9. I would be beautiful
10. I would be magnificent
11.  And finally, I would have a closet full of beige bras with thick, supportive straps. I've always been a realist about lingerie. 

Here I am at 24, with almost none of those things. But I'm doing alright. I guess 25 is when the real fun starts.

I’m about to start this blog post off with a humble brag because I really like to put my best foot forward on these things.

Recently, friends and family have pointed out that I haven’t blogged in a while. On the one hand, I’m pretty pumped that y’all check back regularly enough to miss me. On the other hand, you’re playing right into one of my darkest insecurities— that I don’t have enough to say to consider myself a “writer.” Or rather, that I was born with a finite number of things to say and I’ve already said them all.

But here’s the thing. I write every single day. It’s my job. And I love it! However, it tends to send me into an endless loop of procrastination in which I use my copywriting as an excuse not to blog, and then I get depressed about how long it’s been since I’ve blogged, and then I use all my leftover energy wallowing rather than, you know, actually coming up with ideas for blogs. It’s vicious.

Also, sometimes my hand just hurts! Here’s a fun fact about me: I handwrite everything. Every first draft for anything I’ve ever written, professionally or otherwise, has been scrawled in a college-ruled notebook. Here’s some proof:

2015 was the year I got a tattoo of a pencil on my right forearm to remind me to write for myself. In an ironic twist, I’ve still written less in 2015 than ever in my life. Your move, Alanis.  

I’m a woman of many resolutions. I don’t limit myself to new year’s resolutions, either. I make and forget resolutions at least once a week every week for the whole year long. But let this long-overdue blog post stand as my One True New Year’s Resolution. I am Title Case Serious about this one, I promise. 

Whelp, see y'all in another 8 months I guess!