Happy New Year, friends! Though 2018 started off with great promise, by summer time, I did not think I would make it to the other side of 2018 intact and whole. And yet, here I am, on the first day of 2019, more hopeful than I was last year at this time. Despite the six months where I wanted to set my life on fire, I am grateful for 2018. In fact, I am grateful for precisely those six months of excruciating emotional turmoil because I think I am a better person for it. My Phrase of 2018 was, Just Go! and I did just that. So in an effort to remember 2018 and reflect and grow from the past, here are some of the things I want to build a figurative stone altar to commemorate. 1) I got my first long term writing contract with Sagebooks at the start of 2018.…