you deserve better
I'm not going to sugar coat it: 2025 sucked. It's not to say that nothing good happened--there's always some good to be found, to be held, to be cherished--but the onslaught of atrocities marched on faster and more brazenly than all but our very bleakest oracles could have predicted. Every day I see a million tiny tragedies and can offer nothing but my hand in solidarity, and hope that the knowledge that you are not alone will help. That maybe it will make the burdens easier to carry, even if only for a little while. It sucks out there.
You deserve better.
Some of you I know; I know your struggles, I know the ways in which the world has not been kind to you. Know that I carry those with me, too. Others are strangers to me. No matter--you deserve better. Some of you carry with you this sense that maybe you deserve the ways in which the world has mistreated you, that this is just a natural result of the choices you have made. You are wrong. You deserve better. You deserve love and joy and kindness; you deserve to be happy.
I've seen people who feel that it's inappropriate to complain, that perhaps because the world is so rough, that things are so bad out there, that their problems are minuscule in comparison; they are wrong. This world has failed them at every level; at every level they deserve better.
It is not wrong to dream of a better world; it is not misguided to imagine that better things are possible. It is correct; it may be the only correct thing. The road ahead will be long and the work will be arduous. But the reward at the end, the better world that we dream of, is one you deserve. Do not lose sight of that. They want to normalize making the world worse; don't let them.
It's not all bad. It's never all bad. And it is important, now more than ever, to celebrate our small victories--because they are victories. They matter. This year I wrote some things that I think are pretty cool. I've discovered and rediscovered so many cool musicians, I've watched some great movies. I continue to have the fortune to know so many amazing and inspiring people, each doing their part to make this world a better place to live in.
I'm going to keep exploring in 2026. I'm going to try to learn new things. I'm going to keep participating in the great conversation that has been going on since we started singing songs and painting in caves and telling stories around campfires. And I hope I get to keep doing all of these things with you all. There is immense power in solidarity; there is a reason they want you to feel isolated.
It's been cool and clear here the past few days, with fog creeping in at night and burning off over the course of the day. We will enter a new year shrouded in mist, and then, as we arrive, the weather will change. It always does, eventually.
Happy New Year, friends. You're not alone.