New year, not a new you.

by Katie Welker

Yup. I’m that girl on New Year’s Eve. The one who broke her phone to the point of no return. The same phone that has the only copies of the pictures my girlfriends and I took. I reached out to people that I probably shouldn’t have (sorry if you fell victim to this). I was asleep in bed before the ball even dropped for reasons that are still a mystery to me. I got dolled up. Wore a new dress that, to be honest, I looked fabulous in, just to share the “big moment of ringing in the new year” with my pillow and teddy bear. I was dead asleep before midnight even hit. Gee, being 23 has never looked so good.

I’m a digital nutcase so the thought of losing everything I have stored on my phone is traumatizing. But, like always, I try to take a lesson out of these plain stupid situations I find myself in the middle of.

You are not defined by the date on the calendar: I do not believe for a second that your year is dictated by what you do or who you are with on January 1st. I brought in 2012 with a now ex-boyfriend and a group of people I barely knew. And 11 out of the next 12 months was spent without those people. And they were an amazing, exciting and extremely memorable 11 months.

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One of the only surviving pictures. Thanks, Instagram.

You have the choice to live your year, your month, your week, even your day, however you choose. I laugh at everyone who says, “new year, new me!”. If it takes a giant ball dropping down a big tower and tons of people gathered together yelling “Happy New Year” in unison to make you realize that you’re a “new person”, then I think you need a wake up call. But that’s just my own blunt opinion.

For now, I’ll hang out and hope that my iPhone, which is now submerged in a bowl of rice, will magically revive itself before I head to AT&T at 10 a.m. and drop an unnecessary amount of money on a new one. Until then, think about what kind of life you want to live. Not just what kind of year. 2013 and every year after will only be as good as the effort you put in each and every day.

Snow brings out the best in people.

by Katie Welker

Snow doesn’t phase me. I was born and raised in Western New York. My Dad helped my twin sister and I build an igloo in our front yard using nothing but our hands wrapped in cheap mittens and empty 2 liter-sized pop bottles filled with water from the kitchen sink (we made a lot of trips in and out of the house, my mom was not thrilled).

Now I am in no way a fan of snow. My car is old and can barely make it up a steep dirt road let alone the slippery unpaved city streets. I get cold even in the blazing heat of summer and I’m much too klutzy to deal with black ice and unsalted steps. Needless to say, brisk Buffalo weather is no fun for me.

What I do love, though, as I’m sure everyone does, is witnessing random acts of kindness, especially during a time when there have been so many sick and twisted events happening around the world, and in our very own backyard.

Now I consider myself very fortunate to not only have a great job right out of college, but to also have one that allows me to occasionally work from home. And this morning while I was cozied up in bed watching The Today Show, I noticed an awesome act of kindness happening right outside of my window. Of course I documented it:

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A lady on my street couldn’t get her car out. This stranger ran into his house, grabbed a shovel and started digging her out. One heavy scoop of snow at a time.

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After struggling to push this woman’s car out, a second stranger came to help.

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Just when I thought cars were going to continue to pass by these two men struggling to get this woman’s car out, a third stranger hops out of the car to help.

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Together, after over an hour of work, these three strangers finally helped this woman get out.

The woman got out of her car and gave them all a huge hug, and the three men exchanged high fives before they all went their separate ways.

Maybe I was the only one that witnessed this act of kindness in its entirety. Maybe those four strangers will never see one another again. But if nothing else, it restores my faith that there really are good, genuine people in this world. I’m an optimist, but I’m not naive to the fact that there are a lot of negative things that surround each and every one of us. But there’s also a lot of positive things happening. It’s those things that we should focus on and share with others. And you never know, sometimes they’re happening right outside your own window.