January Recap
Not the January I ordered
I’m going to be honest: January was not a stellar month for me. Several chaotic things piled up at once, and a couple of weeks genuinely sucked. But it wasn’t all bad. And despite the roadblocks I hit personally, I’m still calling the month a win overall.
Normally, I split these monthly recaps into “things I loved” and “things that sucked.” But lately, that distinction has started to feel… artificial. A lot of things live somewhere in the middle—good with an asterisk, hard but meaningful, enjoyable and exhausting all at once. So for 2026, I’m loosening the format a bit. Less tidy categories, more honest reflections.
Which brings me to the things that stood out this month.
1. In January, I turned 46
I’ve never been someone who makes a big deal out of my birthday, but the older I get, the more I actually like the act of getting older. It feels less scary than it did when I was younger and more… steady. I think when you’re in your twenties and thirties, time passing can feel like a checklist you’re failing. You haven’t done all the things you’re “supposed” to have done yet. You’re behind. You’re doing it wrong.
Midlife feels different. I’m much less interested in measuring myself against some imaginary timeline and much more at peace with the choices I’ve made and the life I’m building. That’s not to say I don’t put pressure on myself—boy do I. But it feels like that pressure releases a little with each year that passes.
To celebrate, my best friend and I had a weeklong cruise planned. We were hitting the Western Caribbean with nothing on our minds but open water, fruity cocktails, good books, and real relaxation. Neither of us has taken a proper vacation in a long time, so this wasn’t just a trip—it felt like something we’d earned.
Unfortunately, we didn’t end up going.
2. The best laid plans of Shelly often go awry
As the trip was approaching, my mom got a bad chest cold. She also passed it along to me, so I spent a good number of days leading up to my birthday feeling like actual garbage. But the real concern was my mom: she’s healthy for her age, but she’s still 77. When something like this hits her, it hits her hard.
At the same time, her living situation became urgent in a way we weren’t prepared for. Without getting too into the details, what we thought would be a gradual move at some vague point in the future suddenly needed to happen. Like, immediately. My mom is incredibly strong and capable of many things, but she’s never had to orchestrate a move on her own. That, combined with how sick she was, meant the whole move fell on me.
The two weeks leading up to the cruise were chaos. I was frantically booking movers, setting up utilities, filling out association forms, coordinating with the realtor—and her health was worsening. It was a blur of logistics, stress, exhaustion, aggravation, and a growing fear that my mom might need to be hospitalized for pneumonia. As the departure date got closer, I couldn’t shake the terror of being on a ship in the middle of the ocean while something went wrong at home.
My best friend and I talked about it. She’s been my best friend for 32 years, and my mom is family to her, so it wasn’t a difficult choice. Neither of us felt okay leaving.
So we canceled the trip.
3. Unexpected gratitude
Here’s what I am grateful for: the move went well, even with the compressed timeline. My mom didn’t need to be hospitalized. She’s feeling much better now, and she’s happy in her new place. Her cat, Sasha, is happy there too, which honestly might be the best possible endorsement.
And it’s not just relief that things went better than we feared. It’s what it means for us. My mom has never had a place that was fully hers. Not once. She went from her family home to living with boyfriends, then to my father, then to another boyfriend, then to sharing a place with her brother.
She has never had her own space, her own independence in this way. Now she does. And she deserves it more than anyone I know.
So yes, the whole thing was exhausting. And yes, I’m sad about the trip. But at the risk of sounding disgusting, I’m also feeling pretty hashtag blessed. I have a best friend who showed up in every way that mattered. My mom is safe. She’s healthy. She’s settled. I have peace of mind I didn’t have before. And honestly, I wouldn’t trade any of that for a cruise.
No regrets. Not one.
4. When TV lives up to the hype
On a completely different note, I finally finished season one of The Pitt and—whoa. I know I’m late to the party, but episodes 12 and 13 were some of the most harrowing, realistic TV I’ve seen since Adolescence (another show that forces us to sit with the aftermath of trauma in real time, and does it brutally well).
Which brings me to a completely different, but equally important, observation: I knew all about the Noah Wyle appeal before I started, but no one warned me about Dr. Jack Abbott.
Listen. I am only human. The tired eyes. The emotional intelligence. The donating blood for patients while performing surgery at the same time thing?
Remember Stan from The Faculty? Yeah. Guess what? He’s dreamy in this, too.
Anyway, the show is obviously great, which you probably already knew. It’s been fun to finally experience the hype firsthand.
5. This season is cursed
Yes, now I’m going to whine about hockey.
If you know me at all, you’ve already heard how devastated I am that the captain of the Florida Panthers, Aleksander Barkov, is out indefinitely with a knee injury. But that’s not even the half of it. We’re about halfway through the season and we’ve been down anywhere from six to eight players the entire time. Every time one person seems to be on the mend or makes it back into the lineup, one or two more go out with injuries. It’s been relentless.
I don’t know what happened, but it genuinely feels like Leafs, Canes, and Bruins fans—plus possibly all of Alberta—pooled their money to hire the best Etsy witch they could find to curse our playoff chances.
And honestly? I blame her.
I’m trying to be okay with it. I am. (Spoiler: I am not.) I knew we weren’t going to three-peat, but good lord, this season has been a mess—and most of it doesn’t even feels like our fault. Again: Etsy witches.
The one truly excellent thing we got out of this chaos is that our beloved goalie, Sergei Bobrovsky, gave us a real goalie fight in January.
If you’re not a big hockey fan, please note that any goalie involved in a fight is rare, but two goalies fighting each other? This is the Halley’s Comet of hockey.
Sure, it was objectively unimpressive. (Goalies cannot fight.) But spiritually? Emotionally? Culturally? One of the greatest things I’ve ever witnessed.
6. A moment that’s hard to ignore
Finally, I don’t usually use this space to talk about the news, but it feels wrong not to acknowledge what’s happening right now. The killings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti—both by federal agents in Minnesota—have been… there honestly aren’t words to describe what it’s been like watching that unfold. “Devastating” or “horrifying” are pathetically inadequate. I live in this country, and seeing this repeated violence at the hands of our own government is unimaginable. But here we are.
If you’re feeling scared, hopeless, helpless, furious, exhausted—I’m right there with you.
I don’t have much else to say about it. I admit that calling my representatives feels weak, especially in such a red state as Florida, but it is something you can do from the safety of your own home. And unfortunately, I really mean safety.
Here’s a great how-to if you’re not sure where to start.
January really came at us.
If I’m being honest, it could feel like an omen for the year—but I’m choosing not to think that way. Instead, I’m going to focus on how it’s shown me more clearly what really matters and given me some perspective. I think that’s a good thing.
big ups to best friend💜
I laughed out loud at your love for Shawn Hatosy - he's been one of my celebrity crushes for decades.