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Leslie’s New Year

For the most part birthdays were always great growing up. Plenty of food. Plenty of attention. Plenty of cake. My eighteenth birthday was a page out of a dream with my date cooking me dinner at his place and singing me a song on his guitar for dessert. After that? Blech. The next note worthy birthday event would not occur for eight long years.

In 2009, on my birthday, I had some major life changes that occured. It was such a dark time and I felt as though I lost everyone and everything that I had worked with, for, and towards. In hindsight, that year (or so) was important. It was a year of grieving. Necessary grieving of old expectations, relationships, hopes, and promises.

Last year’s theme was ‘Think Pink’. I focused, and encouraged others to focus, on the ‘pink’ parts of life. Flirty, bright, passionate, feminine, lively, sexy, fun…We celebrated our pink with a two-part event with the first part being family night at the bowling alley and Saturday evening spent at a plush night spot in beautiful downtown Detroit.

My theme this year is ‘Leslie’s New Year’. I celebrated My New Year’s Eve at a steakhouse with a small group of family and friends. On my New Year’s Day I went to my cousin, aka The Hair Diva, and got the works. Later that night, I went on a date at a medium-high glitz velocity including Cuban cuisine and dancing at a Martini Bar just caliente to heat up the snowstorm.

Just as is the case with the start of the calendar year, My New Year is not a day but a year. See…I have always been a goal-oriented person and many of the accomplishments I have made in my life were motivated by a goal and fulfilled by hard work, perserverance, yadda yadda {you know the rest}. What struck me this past holiday season was, however, I am not in the same place, not even the same person who has made and succeeded at these resolutions. Over the past eight years, I have been in a constant state of transition and change, moving farther away from my foundation.

The start of my New Year marked the beginning of my year-long trek to rebuilding my foundation in my life as it is…not grounded in past or future circumstances…but where I am right now.

Today marks the beginning of something new. A new chapter. I am not even completely sure of all it entails. It is unwritten chapter. But, to the best of my ability, I will share it with you.
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Leslie discovered the power of the pen in the third grade after her family moved to a new school district. Writing became a way to sort out her new surroundings and escape to fantasy landscapes. That child, and voice, has matured into a poet, writer, blogger, journalist, online content creator and editor. Leslie is a social entrepreneur with a demonstrated commitment to community. She is an active community member in Washtenaw County (Michigan) with expertise in social media marketing and content management systems, volunteer coordination and writing and 19 years of experience in the areas of online community management, training, leadership development, and social networking. She is interested in facilitating connection with both community residents and businesses. Through this work, the economy of the community is improved and the organizations are financially successful. Her main mode of advocacy and online community, however, is through writing.

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