Holy moly this has been the hardest year of my life. It’s kind of crazy how that keeps happening, is that what we can come to expect from our 30s? Everything just keeps getting harder and nothing gets better?

Well, that last part’s not true, plenty of things got better and there were plenty of things worth celebrating and places to find joy. But man was there also a lot of challenge. Theo was diagnosed with lymphoma at the end of the summer and started chemotherapy this year. As of this week he has finished his treatment protocol and starts maintenance going forward, it’s been a little tough but overall he’s done great through the process and is now cancer free. The hope is that he can stay that way for quite a while going forward.

We had scheduled some professional photography for the three of us just before he got diagnosed and the timing of it ended up being right after he started his first few doses of chemo, which was perfect. To celebrate his current remission and the start of a new, hopefully cancer free year, here’s one of my favorites from the collection.

Danielle Theo and I

So anyway - we can dive in to some of the media I enjoyed this year and then we can talk about the rest later.

Music

Emo music listeners definitely stayed winning this year.

2025

A lot of new music released this year, here are my top handful, listed alphabetical by album:

  • Blame It On The Weather - Kerosene Heights
  • caroline 2 - caroline
  • Dreams Of Being Dust - The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die
  • Lullabies For Dogs - Chase Petra
  • NEVER ENOUGH - Turnstile
  • Parade! Parade! - Aren’t We Amphibians
  • Patience, Moonbeam - Great Grandpa
  • Sofa So Good - Totorro
  • Success Is Unlikely - Bears In Trees
  • The Sound A Body Makes When It’s Still - Hot Mulligan
  • These Things Happen - Saturdays At Your Place
  • Who Will Look After The Dogs? - PUP
  • Wisher - Ben Quad

And a special shoutout for Cosmic Debris Vol 2 from Counter Intuitive Records with some bangers.

There were a handful of albums that released that I’ve not had the chance to listen to thoroughly enough to judge as a “favorite” or not that are excluded from the list, even though I have enjoyed them.

2024

Releases from 2024 that I got into (or more into) this year, also listed alphabetical by album:

  • Keep Your Cool - Riley!
  • Manning Fireworks - MJ Lenderman
  • Plastic Death - Glass Beach
  • SMILE! :D - Porter Robinson
  • Stay Golden - Combat
  • The Cleanest Of Houses Are Empty - Carly Cosgrove

Etc.

I feel like I never have a good method of indicating these are bands that I rediscovered or discovered this year and got very into, or even just listing the like staple bands that have stuck with me for years.

I guess part of that comes from the last.fm style of describing myself by the music I listen to, even if haven’t scrobbled in like a decade. Which is to say, I think I’m going to resist the sirens call of listing out bands that I think are particularly good and can save that for random album re-listens or anniversaries that call to me instead.

Books

I have kept my annual goal of roughly 2 books per month by the skin of my teeth this year, having finished exactly 24 books, with 2 additional currently in progress that it’s possible I’ll finish before the end of the year.

A lot of this year was slowed down by reading some heavy non-fiction that probably won’t make this list.

Favorite Reads

  • Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut
  • The Broken Earth Trilogy - N.K. Jemisin
  • The Twisted Ones - T. Kingfisher
  • Waterblack - Alex Pheby
  • The Little Sparrow Murders - Seishi Yokomizo

Seeing this laid out this way really shows probably why I had trouble reading a lot more this year than I have previously, I did not have good luck choosing books that I really enjoyed. Lot of ~3 star books this year, which is not bad but definitely doesn’t create a ton of motivation to read every day.

Most of the things I enjoyed reading were sequels or books by authors I already enjoyed. Most of the new authors I tried just didn’t grab me that much. Definitely also because I jumped genres a lot I think.

Reflections

As noted at the start, Theo’s chemo diagnosis certainly was a major factor in my life this year, it honestly feels like the fall just flew by as we dealt with that. In addition in the spring I took on a new role at amplo which has been equal parts challenging and rewarding.

My intent in the coming year is certainly to make better use of this space and write more, whether that’s personal thoughts or technical notes I’d like to get more practice getting my thoughts to “paper” and articulating ideas. I also have some creative projects in the works. And most importantly Theo is on track to be cancer free and healthy again, which should be an immense weight off my shoulders.