Happy New Year! I am so glad to be on the other side of 2023 with you all. No matter how you greet it, witnessing the arrival is an accomplishment and a chance to begin anew.

As we observe and immerse ourselves within this passage of time, one can’t help but to take inventory of how people and events are shaping them in the process. It feels cliché to remark at the growth of the children in our lives, but can you blame us? The chubby faces narrow, their plump limbs elongate and their personalities morph further into their unique imprints. Darius, Nia and Layla are not young children anymore, but are well on their way to becoming thoughtful and principled people. It can be downright terrifying to watch them move with their own accords through life and the trials thereof, but showing up and being available can be the hardest part, so Calvin and I pride ourselves in maintaining that standard and building from there.

Whoever coined the term ‘sandwich years’—-raising your own children while watching out for your own aging parents—-certainly had it right. Check-ins are more frequent now with Mom and Dad, grateful yet filled with uneasy awareness of what will lie ahead. Every year also marks the loss of someone we watched or listened to from afar that has always been a part of our lives for so long that they feel like family: all my life until now, I watched and listened to Loretta Lynn, Anita Pointer, Barbara Walters, Olivia Newton-John, Ray Liotta, Sidney Poitier, Jesse Powell and Irene Cara, to name only a few. And those who left us by suicide, battling demons that only they could see (Stephen “tWitch” Boss, Naomi Judd, Charles Criss), reminds us all that mental health is never to be underfunded, overlooked or taken for granted.

If you peruse social media long enough, it won’t take you long to see lists: resolutions, trends to anticipate or ‘what to leave behind’ for the new year. Time will tell if it ever bears out, but here’s my own New Year’s list, in no particular order:

-I wish for an ever-dwindling presence of the Kardashians: they’re inane, inescapable and I will never be persuaded to do anything more than turn the channel or scroll past them.

-Kanye, wherever you are, I hope that you’re getting help and guidance. Your children need you and  the enterprising producer and rapper who once reigned my playlist with College Dropout is very missed.

-There are way too many new books are hitting the best-sellers lists constantly and other incredible classics to keep remaking 20th Century films. Please stop.

-Dear Nick Cannon: you’re probably too young to have heard of the show Eight is Enough, but you’ve far exceeded that with the birth of your twelfth. Quality time is just as important as finances, and at this rate, you can’t have much left of either one. By the way, that same message goes out to rappers Future (holding at seven) and NBA Youngboy, now allegedly a father of ten.

-I understand that Covid put a hard pause on many people’s livelihoods, but seriously, $1250 and up for concert tickets? Getting “Together Again” with Janet Jackson seems damn near impossible now, unless I just sit in the parking lot.

-The ‘manosphere’ mentality of arguing down and insulting girls and women on social platforms has to end: 36-year-old entrepreneur and professional misogynist Andrew Tate learned the hard way when he attempted to go tit for tat with 19-year-old climate change activist Greta Thunberg, outing his location to authorities and then getting arrested as part of an investigation into human trafficking. Game over.

Learning from our pasts, anticipating the future. Let’s get it!