2016: A Recap

With barely two days left in this year I feel this would be the best time to share my end-of-year review. This is the time when I imagine myself as a nervous school student terrified and living at the mercy of the teacher armed with my report card. There is that judgement day and then there are the other days.

Travelling has been a major part of my itinerary this year. After I returned to the U.S. in August from the trip to India, the husband and I have managed to visit close to nine national parks including a few national monuments. I have a terrible fear of heights and the fact that I was able to complete few of the moderate level hike trails was a personal milestone. We plan to wrap up the year by driving down the iconic Highway 1 in California, from Monterey to San Diego.

My cooking skills are modest at best but with a partner who is foodie I am pushed to experiment and explore with spices and ingredients. It has been little more than two years since I ventured into cooking all the homemade meals. The best food items made in my kitchen are the final result of numerous hit and trial run of recipes across the internet. That Dal Makhni served for dinner our second anniversary, was cooked at least four different occasions before the final recipe was found, adjusted, perfected and saved for future meals. Patience is rewarding and cooking has made me a better person in countless ways. I intend to discuss its merits in detail in a separate post.

If watching Jonathan Rhys Meyers essay the role Henry VIII can be counted as inspiring, in a way I could say that I have a renewed interest in the English History. Yes I am reading history books for pleasure! The Tudors was a sensational dramatic narration of the English king’s life and his six wives. On the other hand,  Wolf Hall focused more on the religious and political scene during the reign of Henry VIII with special focus on Thomas Cromwell’s role in establishing the first ever known bureaucracy in England. While waiting for the second season of this Emmy nominated series I have made an attempt to learn more about this monarch and his times. I bet my History teacher from Seventh Grade will be surprised if ever he comes to know of my extra reading.

In the beginning of the year, a bitter personal experience left me nursing a broken bruised confidence. For a very long time I had denied the existence of certain questions and remained quiet taking comfort in the knowledge of its absence. This experience tattled me into action and pushed me to seek answers to the questions. I learnt an important lesson of self-love.

To accept my identity and to promise to keep working on making myself the best version of me.

As I begun to understand and accept this, there are less moments of doubt and uncertainty. I intend to work to preserve and protect this reassured self. Self-love is important.

Namastey!

Retrospective – Discover Challenge by WordPress

This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.