I’ve gotten lazy and not done any Thanksgiving post for three years(?!), which says something about how those years have just evaporated and blown past in the wind.

I feel bad about missing so many, so here is one for this year. It’s two days late though, oops.

I’m thankful…

• For my parents and siblings. Moving away from home in 2021 has made me much more conscious and intentional about maintaining our relationships with regular video chats, a siblings group chat, phone calls etc. I love you all.
• For my continued health.
• For my continued employment through some questionable economic times in the tech industry over the past year. We are VERY privileged in this field and it’s important not to lose sight of that.
• For my precious friends, new and old, for coming into and staying in my life. I’ve never been very great at being social so it’s been a goal of mine for the past few years to treasure everyone I’ve been fortunate enough to form a connection with. Nonexhaustive shoutouts: John, Ben, Marisa, Hailey, Aaron, Jenny, Wanlu. Y’all rock!
• For my past and present music educators. This item appears every time I do these lists and it might be strange given that I don’t do music as a profession at all nowadays, but the lessons I’ve learned in both solo and ensemble settings have stuck with me to this day, and it’s such a joy to be able to occasionally unwind and spend an entire holiday or weekend afternoon just jamming on my instruments (guess what I did all of yesterday afternoon instead of going out for Black Friday shopping? :P).
• For the Violet Moon community, in particular the regulars on IRC. It’s a joy to log into IRC, greet everyone every day, and ask how life is going, even though we’re “strangers” scattered across the globe. My retirement from modding Minecraft is coming soon, but I promise to continue staying with y’all for a long time to come.
• For the Touhou Project community and fangame community. You continue to amaze me with the incredible fanworks that are released year after year, and I look forward to continuing to contribute in my own way through Chinese -> English translation work, showcase videos, etc.

Overall, I am enjoying life and slowly learning how to figure out what truly matters to me. At the risk of sounding narcissistic, when I reflect on who I am, I like what I see and I like that I can see myself changing as I grow up.

Anyways, I’m thinking of making a separate longer “new years reflections and new years resolutions” post at the end of the year which will have much more rambling along those lines, so stay tuned for that!