Every morning just after Skylar leaves for work, I don our son in weather-appropriate attire and take him to our covered patio in the backyard. This is where we keep our now embattled and expensive stroller that was worth every penny. Our house is small and our garage is packed with shit we don't remember acquiring but are too scared to discard. Fortunately for us, we have a covered patio that's the perfect home for the embattled stroller.

In hindsight, I wish we had installed a odometer on this thing. I'd be so curious to know the distance our own infant Voyager has traveled. We use it every day, usually more than once. It has taken the dogs for countless walks. It has traversed our neighborhood for grocery shopping trips, pediatrician appointments, and visits with friends. In September, it rolled the length of Paris, tenfold, our one-year-old holding onto the little leather bar over his lap, his eyes wide, staring in awe at a world he somehow already seems to appreciate.

We walk the neighborhood together, West and I, every morning. It feels like a sacred ritual at this point.

We stop by whichever coffee shop is on rotation that day for some caffeine, which I do not share (in case you had CPS on speed dial). I get him some scrambled eggs, or make them at home, and watch him kick his feet in delight as I hand him a croissant.

It's his job to point out the squirrels when we see them. It's my job to act surprised and impressed that he's found another.

My sister, Krisanda, has been working as our parttime nanny. I like to refer to her as West's governess when I'm feeling fancy. She comes by around mid-morning and stays for several hours so I can get work done. I can't help but peek my head in the nursery every thirty minutes to say hello. West has started blowing kisses recently. It's the most important thing that has every happened to me.

West takes his afternoon nap just after Krisanda leaves for the day. I could put him in his crib and continue to work at my desk, but I usually can't resist holding him while he sleeps, in part fearing I'll one day regret not doing just that when I miss having the option because his frame and constitution won't allow for it anymore.

I know it's odd, but I spend a lot of my time thinking about our age gap and feeling awed by the fact that one day, if I'm lucky, he'll be my age and I'll be eighty. He'll be worrying about me falling for scams or, you know, just falling, and I imagine I'll be amazed that I've been afforded four full decades of loving him.

Skylar returns home just after the nap has wrapped and West has started helping me make dinner. The way he helps usually consists of standing in a kitchen contraption we trip over every time we get up in the middle of the night to pee—a circle chair surrounded by baby toys. He gnaws on a pickle I canned the prior autumn and babbles away.

We never know what he's saying, but I can tell he's a storyteller, or at least I hope so. I chop vegetables, and I gasp as he babbles. I say things like "that's amazing" and "I can't believe that happened to you." The bigger my reaction, the more it makes West giggle.

After dinner, we go for a family walk. Tick, tick, tick. The nonexistent odometer registers more life as Skylar asks me to tell him everything West did that day. He takes over most parenting for the remainder of the evening, and is usually the one to read West his bedtime stories before putting him down in his crib after we debate whether we should just have him come snuggle with us in bed.

I know our daily agenda would read as monotonous on paper—that our schedule paints a small life, to some maybe not worth documenting. And yet, I've now spent over 700 words doing just that, with a lump in my throat and mist in my eyes. It's the greatest story I've ever told—the one I think I've been writing toward ever since I sat down in my small shared college bedroom in 2007 and typed the words "It Just Gets Stranger" into a blogspot prompt asking me to name my website.

In the nearly twenty years since then, I've lived in other countries. I've worked through the growing pains of young adulthood and the impending crisis-inducing feelings of becoming middle-aged. I've dated, married. Evolved spiritually, politically, emotionally. I've joked with you about all of it, and I've had a wonderful time in the process.

But 2025, in a lot of ways, was the year when my creative projects felt the most like the exact thing I was supposed to be doing. And that's all thanks to him. (West. Not god, although I'm sure she's nice.)

In 2025 I signed two publishing contracts for two separate books and I felt like I was finally formalizing a dream. I withered away and then wondered if my quest to become healthier had backfired. I recorded video stories with a baby sleeping on me. I think I became a gentler person. I accidentally caused a type of popsicle to sell-out nationwide. I got yelled at by Mitt Romney online for something I DIDN'T EVEN DO. I recorded an audiobook for which I better win a Grammy because it was exhausting. I taught my son to clap his hands and then began looking for more reasons to celebrate just so I could watch him do it. I had a sixth wedding anniversary with a husband I can't believe I get to know.

Thank you for being here with me for another year. Thank you for your kindness and your support for however long you've been around. It means the world to me. I can only hope my words have sustained you a tenth the amount your encouragement of my work has truly sustained me.

Happy new year to you. My wish for you is the same it has always been on this holiday—that you adopt exactly as many naughty pets as you can handle, that your refrigerator may always be full of cheese, and that life continues to Just Get Stranger wherever it is you keep your stroller.

~It Just Gets Stranger