Love Letters - what it means to stay

Two to four inches of snow. How gorgeous it is, quieting the streets in its insistent blanket. I love walking in snow. There's a reassuring peacefulness I've always found in winter. I can't explain it; my oldest friends and family know that even as a kid, if there was snow you were likely to find me outside.

Just like the snow, there are people in whom I find my home. I seek them not just as refuge, but as comfort and kindness. Each of the friendships dearest to me have vantage points that vary from my own, at times wildly. I cherish these lenses, these opportunities to let my friends be my mentors and guides. Learning and exploring things unknown to me with someone I trust at my side is the greatest of treasures. I cannot overstate how much I love the people still being supportive and caring. I am a deeply lucky person, because when I look around, you are still here.

I've been married for three years today. I would write the tiny pieces that seem so mundane to most, but mean the world to me, but these are words wasted. You would understand that I cherished each image, and you would possess every detail, but you wouldn't realize the gravity and depth of the sentences that still make me cry.

Throughout a year of hospitals and doctors, throughout job ups and downs, fears and friendships, and even through tragedies both personal and public, he is still here.

I would not ask for anyone to walk next to me through this. Internalizing most of what happens to me is a matter of course, for whatever reason. I admit that I have turned to this medium as much to divest my fears as to inform or expound. I am humbled. Baffled. Moved to tears, by the faces I find when my gaze turns to my right and left. I cannot believe how many of you are still here. I am grateful for each hand that has held mine, and the tears whose tracks have been dried by hands or words, by family across the globe.

I cannot thank you for being with me through 2013. I can say, without doubt, my life is made better by the people I love, and I hope to fill 2014 with happy memories of you all.