My 28th Year of Life in Review

I've been meaning to write this blog post for quite sometime, but the real world has been bringing me down and I haven't had time for anything really except for a few baller nights in the city, work, and maybe a few hours for sleep. I wanted to write this post before my 29th birthday, but I am a slight procrastinator and haven't had much inspiration lately. This blog post is all about my 28th year of life. 28 doesn't seem like such an exciting year. 28 is not really milestone in life nor does anything really important happen at 28. But to me, 28 was pretty life changing. 28 was my year of life lessons. My year of quarter +3 year crisis. My year of excitement, adventure, spontaneity, trials, travels, heartache, appreciation, incite, friendship, hardship, inspiration, reflection, independence, fear, strength, change.

My 28th year of life began in the beautiful city of Copenhagen, Denmark. Everyone that knows me knows that I love to travel. I live to travel. Being a writer you'd think I'd write all about my traveling experiences and I really don't know why I haven't gotten around to doing so. In my 28th year of life, traveling was a huge part of it. I loved Copenhagen and thinking back now, I literally miss it. I was basically living there for a month while opening the first AnF store in Denmark. On October 21st, 2010(my birthday), I spent working my ass off with my team getting ready for the Abercrombie Hitler to invade the country of the beautiful and tasty Danish(beautiful being the people, tasty being the pastry). After Copenhagen, it was back to NY, then off to Milan for 2 weeks. Milan wasn't as exciting to me as Denmark or Hawaii because I had been there already, but it still was pretty amazing. I found myself trying to speak Spanish to the Italians as they looked at me like I had two heads. In Denmark, everyone spoke English. In the outskirts of Milan, not so much. This made my job very challenging and sometimes frustrating. But I love the Italians(which I already knew seeing how mostly all the guys I date have some percentage of Italian in them) and want to go back soooooo bad(next time it's going to be Florence, Rome, and Venice).

After my 2 weeks in Italy, it was off to the other side of the world. 27 long hours of flying, watching about 10 movies, waiting in airports, watching my feet swell from sitting too long, reading, and texting everyone once I got back to the states, I had finally arrived to a place of paradise. Aloha! I had made my journey to Hawaii. The day I left Milan, it had been snowing. They had to deice my plane. Now it was time to take off my winter coat and change into my swim suit. But first I needed to sleep and try to figure out what time it was in this new time zone. I was all sorts of screwed up.

In my 28th year of life, I got to see so much I had never seen before. Copenhagen, Milan, and Honolulu were amazingly beautiful all in different ways, experiencing each place with different people and I have the best memories of it all. Although it was all for work and the work load was sometimes overwhelming and the stress would at times bring me to tears, I was blessed to be able to experience these places and meet these awesome people.

After my travels ended, it was off to Florida for Christmas. I loved that I didn't have to work on Christmas this year and got to spend an entire week with my family. After flying back to NY, it was back to working at Shit Haven Mall. One of the busiest days of the year for shopping just so happened to be the biggest blizzard of the year. Being from Florida and not knowing snow that well at all, I thought for sure my muscle car Mustang could speed straight through the mounds of snow and ice on my 60 mile drive back to Long Beach. I didn't even make it through my first stop light. This continued the rest of January since the snow continued on a weekly basis. I was beginning to think my Sunny wouldn't make it through the winter. After a short road trip to North Carolina and back, I had a new SUV friend named Mitzy. I'll hopefully never get stuck in the snow again!

February, March, April and May of my 28th year was full of traveling yet again, but this time not to the extent of the Fall. In February it was back to Boston to help a store out for the tour of the AnF Nazi. AnF loved sending me to Boston for some reason. I'm not complaining since I love Boston. After that, it was time for a vacation. It was Vegas time baby! My yearly trip, and still as baller as ever. For Easter weekend, my friend Laura and I took a little get away trip to LA. If I had to move away from NY, I would definitely move to Cali.

The snow had finally cleared the streets of LB. Trust me, it took a while for all that snow to finally melt. Flowers were blooming, neighbors were out walking their dogs, restaurants set up chairs and tables outside. It was finally summer. SUMMER! The season all LBers suffer through the rough winters for was finally here. The summer of my 28th year of life was absolutely unforgettable. It was the best of times, yet it was the worst of times...

My summer was spent down on Indiana beach making new friends and playing with old ones. Downing Twisted Teas or to go Cabana margs. Having random dance parties when we were rained out at the beach. Sunday brunch with iced coffee and a centerpiece of pancakes followed by more beach followed by family dinner and then Sunday Funday with Ricky Roach. The Inn every Friday and Saturday night with my girls wondering, "who the hell are all these out of towners?" From BBQs to block parties, summer romances to heartaches, shakeweights to beach umbrella throwing, surf competitions to hurricanes and boardwalk work outs to emergency rooms. My summer had it all. From Memorial Day to Irish Day, each day was an adventure.

By the end of the summer, I was in a state of depression. I absolutely love the summers here. The end of the summer was an end of other things as well. It was the end of my 8 year relationship with the moose. It was time for me to throw in the towel. It was the end of a summer romance that I believed so much in. After picking myself back up from beating myself down, it was time for some more endings. It was time to stop feeling sorry for myself. I almost lost an ovary over the summer, so what? It's not like I almost lost my liver or some part I really needed. I have two, right? It was an end of me putting my whole self into another person. It was time to put my whole self into the person that should be most important to me, ME. It was time for me to start looking towards my future. It was time for change. After a night at the Inn with the ghost of boyfriends past,(basically every guy I had serial dated with was present) and a slight drunken mental breakdown, it was time for me to take a manbatical. I was done with men. For a while anyway. It was time to start a new job where I felt appreciated and make more money for the hard work I put in. It was time for a new and improved Stella Elizabeth Taylor. And it was time for a trip to Atlantic City.

I gotta say, the quote "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger", yeah I believe in that. I feel at the end of my 28th year of life, I'm the strongest I've ever been in these 28 years. I feel after my experiences through my 28th year, I'm way more smarter about things. I look back at some situations in my life and think, WTF was I thinking? Really Stella? REALLY? I'm way more cultured. Way more spontaneous. Way more baller. Totally baller. Way more funnier. Way more mature. Okay, maybe not so much way more mature, maybe a little more(that's what she said). And a little more hotter. Or maybe just grew more self confidence.  

So after my 28th year of life, I am a more stronger, intelligent, confident, experienced, cultured, hilariously hot woman. I am happy with the place I am in life, but always hoping and working towards more out of my life. So in my 29th year of life, I hope it's even more baller but maybe not so challenging as my 28th. So far, so good :) Who knows what my life will throw at me this year. 

Other things that happened in my 28th year of life:
-I lost my Blackberry on New Years. I finally upgraded to the amazing IPhone thanks to my lovely parents.
-Found out my bestest is pregnant with twins! So excited to be an aunt but feeling so old!
-Made way too many new friends that I can't even count.
-Experienced my 4th hurricane and wasn't even in Florida for it.
-Know the feeling and confusion of medical bills and have a cool scar to prove it.
-Went to my first surf and skateboarding competitions.
-Went to four different foreign countries.
-Ran into the ocean in February.
-Had a visit from my brother.
-Got my 3rd black eye from a run on the boardwalk.
-Made up a hand full of new dance moves.
-Became a real New Yorker(on my ID anyway).
-Got a new addition to the family named Bully