Don't hate, appreciate.

Prompt: Appreciate. What's the one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do you express gratitude for it?

First, AC. Seriously, I cannot even imagine my life without him. He is patient, kind, humble, generous, silly, affectionate and the smartest person I know. He is working SO hard and kicking serious butt at school and work and I am so, so proud to be married to him and call him my husband.

Moving away from a place where I was most comfortable made me appreciate ALOT of things that I took for granted and didn't notice til I left it.

Despite hearing the unemployment rate over and over and over again, I took being employed for granted. I miss having a schedule, coworkers, and a regular paycheck. I want all those things again, with the paycheck being at a living wage and a job that actually challenges me.

I appreciate weekly trivia night, deep fried cookie dough egg rolls and saving seats for my friends. I miss them. They were funny, smart, intelligent, unbelievably witty (moreso than I am) and caring.

Sounds weird, but I'm glad my cell phone company for rarely being down and allowing me to call my Mom and R whenever I need a friendly voice when AC is at school. It's lonely out here for an unemployed wife of a grad school student who also does work/study 20 hours a week.

I appreciate things that are within walking distance, like bars and corner stores and pharmacies. We have a couple of little markets nearby and a bar (that we haven't tried yet), but nothing will ever compare to living within walking distance from my favorite bar/indian place/pharmacy/ cupcake shop/starbucks/walmart/Kroger/ 50 fast food places. Some of them were ambitious walks, but I did it quite a bit when I was bored.

I appreciate good neighbors, or friends who are neighbors. R lived across the backyard from me, and there were a couple of times when I couldn't sleep and saw that her lights were on. Once it was at 2 AM and I'm pretty sure I scared her to death, but she answered the door anyway. She was the first one that saw my ring when AC and I got engaged, and when she got engaged I was over there as soon as I knew. Our friend J lived above me, and we had a great time- impromptu popsicle parties, movie tavern, and most notably, a late night trip to Waffle House after watching White Christmas and too much drink. There may or may not have been Johnny Cash karaoke. We have good neighbors here too: J next door and A and J downstairs. Both nice, quiet, and sociable without being nosy. They're great and pretty much the only people I know in New Haven