Yes, my birthday is exactly one week before Christmas, and two weeks before New Year’s Day. As you can imagine, this sets quite a tone for my personal rolling over of a new year, situated as my birthday is amid society’s yearly celebratory singing, glittering red and green, positioning itself toward fresh intentions and sparkling NEW!’ness.

A lot of December-born people bemoan their birthdays being ever-forgotten in the hustle and bustle of world holidays, but I’ve always found it to be quite the opposite. The world is happier, busier, and more dazzling. It’s as if the entire month of December is this shining beacon of hope and promise for my own coming New Year.

Of course, we all know the crap-fest that has been 2020 and even (in large part) 2021. We’ve seen the memes urging us to simmer down and not claim 2022 as “My Year!” — and I won’t lie, I’m kinda with ‘em on this. If we all tip-toe carefully and quietly, maybe none of us will get hurt. Let us embrace the folk saying, “in like a lion, out like a lamb.”

Still, I can’t help but look back at 2021 with a good deal of surprise and awe. After 2020, with it’s solemnity, unrest, and unease …. this past year (for me) has been a rather astonishing time of growth and joy. At the start of 2021, I began a sort of “selfie challenge” on Instagram, in which I embarked on the task of loving myself a little more by documenting my life (and not my makeup) via one selfie a day. It was a project I kept mostly to myself (and the scant 32 individuals who followed along — all of which I know and trust). What surprised me, over the passing days, with each posted selfie, was a life unfolding with unexpected blessings and experiences.

My 45th year was amazing, y’all.

I’ve done a lot of thinking about what it means to settle into one’s truest, most authentic self, and I’ve realized 2021 was exactly that for me. I’d love to share with you, here, all the wonderful people I encountered over the last 365(ish) days, and all of the experiences the last year afforded me.

First things first: I spent exactly 38 of those days on Disney property — four of which were at Disneyland in California, where I crossed off a major bucket list item and walked where Walt walked. My husband and I rode new (to us) rides, ate new things (that Matterhorn macaron, y’all …), and even enjoyed a scrummy lunch with a friend who smuggled us into Club 33. (And for anyone out there who is a true Disnerd, you know what that means to a girl!)

I spent a lot of my days too busy to pause for a selfie — so instead I captured a screenshot of myself via the Marco Polo app, chatting with my good friend, fine art photographer Ashley Kirkland — and what’s even more incredible about that is I actually got to meet Ashley, for the first time ever, face-to-face, in June. We spent a few days walking the streets of Charleston, South Carolina, eating good food, laughing way too much, and generally having a jolly good time.

Speaking of Charleston, I visited there twice in 2021! It was actually on my trip in April, eating my weight in grits, walking cobble-stone streets, and exploring botanical gardens (ALL THE PLANTS!) which brought me back from a very dark place.

And yeah, 2021 was not all sunshine and rainbows. Per my usual, the year started with a heavy bout of textbook Seasonal Affective Disorder, resulting in a lot of moody-broody and black and white selfies, amid the other days I took the “fake it ‘til you make it” selfie route.

I spent seven months wondering if I had breast cancer, learning a lot about myself in the meantime — about the true meaning of “friendship”, understanding the importance of deeply loving yourself, concentrating on just how fleeting time really is, and just how precious my family is to me.

I gained about 15 lbs in 2021. We could call them “covid pounds” but I’m pretty sure it had way more to do with eating too much and not exercising enough. I have photographic proof of my eating generous quantities of cupcakes, mountains of Olive Garden breadsticks, plates of Mexican food, and salads (because balance!) — all amid drinking copious amounts of coffee and hot tea, vodka slushes, and butterbeer in various forms (hot, cold, frozen, and boozed).

But I spent significant amounts of nourishing time with 13 of my favorite sister-friends and travel agency peeps, appeared in 95 selfies with my BFF-husband, and made a concentrated effort to appear in 47 photos with my daughters.

I watched the world (slowly) open back up. I spent time in movie theaters (masked and unmasked — thank you, makers of the Covid Vaccine!), flew on 14 airplanes, watched a live performance of Hamilton, went blueberry picking (at least three times), took a joyride in a Mustang convertible, almost won a game of miniature golf, celebrated 30 years with my partner-husband at the local Subway, saw Magic Kingdom fireworks again, went thrifting, sang with several thousand people at a Jimmy Buffet concert, officiated a wedding at Epcot’s Morocco pavilion, visited the beach (several times), watched my daughter perform a solo in her last ever Nutcracker performance, and started learning conversational French in preparation for visiting Europe next year.

image courtesy of Randy Chapman Photography

I made the big decision to shelve my photography business and go back to school — to Seminary — for my Masters in Theological Studies.

I colored my hair blonde, brown, auburn, purple, magenta, burgandy red, and brown again before trying out a couple of wigs (one of them very, very pink).

I cleaned my bathroom, washed (and sometimes put away) multiple loads of laundry, and knitted almost daily (but didn’t finish one single project).

I wore a two-piece for the first time in my life — in my home swimming pool and on a public beach. Why? Just to prove to myself that every body is a beach body.

I spent time in six states: my home state of Tennessee (several times!), a drive-through Georgia into South Carolina (twice), a weekend in Alabama to visit friends, California (Disneyland!), and Florida (obviously). But I also visited Mexico, for the first time ever — swimming in an infinity pool for the first time, eating authentic tamales for the first time, witnessing the ethereal shade of blue unique to the Caribbean sea for the first time, and tasting Mezcal for the first time!

I also enjoyed three trips to Universal Resort, Orlando: once in March, solo; another in June with my husband, to ride their newly opened (and incredibly INCREDIBLE) Velocicoaster; and again in October with my travel agency peeps for the Travel Leaders Edge Conference. (For those of you who didn’t already know, my day job is as a professional travel agent.)

I don’t know about 2022 being “my year” or “the year of Lauren” — because 2021 was already more incredible than I ever could have imagined, and quite frankly, I’m feeling so grateful I embarked on that little selfie challenge of mine — because recording the highs and lows, the mountains and valleys, and all of it blessing after sweet, rich blessing … it’s shown me just how mind-blowing and beautiful life really is, and proven to me how I never want to take one second for granted.

On The Eve of My 45th Birthday