I’ve been travelling the past few weeks out west to spend time with my friends and family for the holidays. I have only one feeling coming back home: refreshed.

Seeing my family is always chaotic; countless, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc… I don’t even know who I am related to some of the time. But it is always a chance to center myself, chill out, and have a few real conversations. Hiking in Marin, wandering through San Francisco, and taking the younger cousins to see Christmas lights and play games was pure.

Over the new year, I met up with my college friends for a music festival and skiing in Lake Tahoe. As usual with these trips, the details are full of absurdities; it was beautiful. The recipe started with some earthquakes and Red Bull. We mixed in some epic snowfall, thrift shopping, beer, a magic show and electronic nonsense to then finish with some tire chains and more Red Bull. It was a fantastic adventure.

Now I’m home, replenished and excited for what this year will offer and what I will make of it. I think about the past couple weeks, recounting the moments, worried that some detail or story will be filtered from my mind. In the midst of the festering culture of ignorance and a complete loss of empathy, I am clinging to these positive thoughts and injured by this pathetic anxiety.

So as I’m editing the photos and recalling those exact moments of the shutter clicking and I think of how fresh the new year felt. I may wax poetic, but that moment was bright, clean, and comprised of nothing but love. Here is just a taste of how it felt:

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