new year’s resolution to write something of value
december/2024 notes + i'm 25 now + 2024 vlog
december / end of 2024 wrap-up
December is a month that usually ends up escaping from me. I sold some zines, I got a parking ticket, I tried my very best to play Mario Kart and still ended up in 11th place. Grad school applications (I cannot talk about this) and stomach pains took up most of the real estate. Some notes:
I went to New York and experienced the coldest weekend of my life, which isn’t saying much. I was on the train to meet my friend in Williamsburg for dinner and noticed in my periphery that a teenager was running through the car. I didn’t really think much of it, until a woman who had been minding her business sitting across from me stood and ran after the kid, who was now standing between the cars. I then understood that these teenagers were attempting to climb on top of the train and subway surf. The woman chased them down and screamed, Oh no, Get down, Not today, Get down.
She came back to her seat and muttered: When they fall, somebody’s mother will be crying. Maybe I should just mind my own business, but I can’t stand that. He couldn’t even look me in the eye.
I don’t know why, but I can’t stop thinking about this. I felt so moved that this woman would inconvenience herself to scold teenage strangers for their own good, that her care for them could bring her to action and anger. I didn’t say anything, and I didn’t stop anyone.
A list of every movie I saw when I was 24: Anatomy of a Fall, Poor Things, Ghost Mansion, Saltburn, Marcel the Shell, Dune II, Problemista, Meg 2: The Trench, Challengers, The Fall Guy, Tiny Furniture, Dream Scenario, La Chimera, Anyone But You, Birth, Zola, Twisters, Paprika, Lisa Frankenstein, Babes, Alien: Romulus, I Used to Be Funny, Uglies, I Saw the TV Glow, It’s What’s Inside, Anora, The Sweet East, Hit Man, Wicked, Janet Planet, Nosferatu
I saw Janet Planet on the plane ride back from the aforementioned trip to New York. There were parts of it that felt like a slog, and the five episodes of House Hunters International I watched immediately after sort of eclipsed it on an entertainment level, but there were details of this movie, certain lines and silences, that I can’t stop thinking about. Annie Baker (whose play The Aliens I love) captures the expansive boredom and terror of being a weird little girl. “I thought nobody liked me, but I was wrong,” 11-year-old Lacy says in one of the opening scenes. It’s a period piece — set in 1991 — which made me feel an ache for all the weird little girls who no longer have the luxury of an internet-free childhood.
2024 was my year of watching basketball. Although I’ve played basketball since I was five, I always lacked a sense of object permanence when it came to following professional sports. I was able to unlock this part of myself this year by tapping into what made K-pop fandom so appealing to me as a teenager. Having a favorite player is kind of like having a favorite One Direction member. Wanting the Minnesota Lynx to win the WNBA championship (they were robbed, btw) is like wanting an artist’s single to chart or wanting Saoirse Ronan to win an Oscar. In that: it’s all a little silly, but at least it’s something to talk about. My boyfriend says it’s a bummer I decided to be a Warriors fan after they stopped being good, but when I was in eighth grade I played for a basketball team that lost every single game for a year, and still I woke up rooting for myself each morning.
2024 was the year of making my own matcha latte, the year of my electric piano, the year of taking the ferry, my parents’ puppy Maggie, incidental sobriety, Alanis Morisette karaoke, stabilizing iron levels, my perfect baby niece Charlie, finding a new appreciation for season 6 of Girls, bing homepage doomscrolling, and, of course, the friends we made along the way <3
new year new age
New Year’s is my favorite holiday. I know that calendars are kind of arbitrary and stressful, and that the idea of a New Year’s resolution can put people into a bit of an all-or-nothing bind, but the cyclical reminder that I can change my life at any time always has a renewing effect on me. Because I need to systematize everything, even something as fake as a resolution, I like to set an increasing number of goals for each year of my life (26 this year) on which I hope to make meaningful progress over the next twelve months. I write these down on the front page of my journal so I can remind myself of them every day. Can you tell I am a Capricorn? Last year I checked off entries including Go to the dentist (this was a gimme), Play tennis, and Visit a friend in another city. For the fourth year in a row, I did not go camping.
New Year’s Day is also my favorite holiday because it’s the best day of the year to be Japanese American. There is nothing quite like eating ozoni soup with freshly toasted mochi and being the only person in my entire family to never win a round of bingo.
The beginning of the year also brings my birthday. I recently found out that I share mine with Waxahatchee, which made me feel undeservedly proud. I’m 25 now, which I am trying not to be freaked out about. When I was about to turn 24, someone told me that 25 was when it all started to make sense. This was an odd thing to tell someone turning 24, but it’s bringing me comfort now.
My parents had me in their forties, which I think sets me up to be a little less afraid of aging. My mom and dad had full and complete lives that preceded me. I feel lucky to be part of an intergenerational family. My grandfather is 97 and still likes to watch sports and gamble for snacks at his retirement home. Lunch at my uncle’s house contains an age range spanning 90 years.
At my great aunt’s funeral in November 2023, I was confronted with an idea contradictory to all that’s been told to me: life is long. I knew my auntie as an ozoni and osechi connoisseur who loved her work, enough to delay her retirement from Toyota until a few years ago, well into her eighties. I learned during my mother’s speech that my Auntie didn’t start working at Toyota until she was forty. I learned that she moved in next to my mother around the same time, when my mother was the age I am now. I learned that on one of my parents’ first dates they took Auntie with them to the movies. For some reason, this made me feel so sweet toward all of them.
2024 vlog
For the last five(ish) years, I’ve had a tradition of compiling my iphone videos from the year for a vlog. Each year it gets shorter and shorter, which I think is a good thing. As I get older, I am less pressed to try to capture every moment. The music is a live recording of “Wanna Quit All the Time” by Faye Webster.
Recommended reading
My boyfriend and I went to see Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams the other night. The 2-hour runtime ended up tiring me out, but there was a short (The Peach Orchard) toward the beginning that has really lingered in my mind. I found a link on a random youtube channel. It’s unfortunately pretty blurry.
Title of this post comes from New Year’s Resolution by Camera Obscura, which I think about this time every year
Brief note from late Wednesday before I post this, which feels wrong to tack onto the end like this. My heart is breaking over the fires in LA. Many of those working to fight them are incarcerated, earning just $5.80-$10 a day. Funding went to the police instead of the fire department. So many personal histories lost, so much grief. I don’t know what to say. We must take care of each other, always.
happy birthday & new year sarena!! <3
this was so beautiful! happy new year sarena! may your increasingly long list of resolutions lead you to wonderful and strange and unexpected places this year!