An Anniversary

Hello, friends! A very happy secular New Year to everyone.

Today happens to mark a personal anniversary for me: it has been one year to the day since I started this blog. Whoa! As someone who has never successfully managed to keep up a regular diary, this is a minor win for me, especially since there were 34 posts in 2013 (which means I wrote on a fairly regular basis). I figure I should look back and see what has changed--and what hasn't changed--over the past twelve months. Because it's been a pretty crazy year on my end.

Last January, I was at my parent's house on Long Island, home for winter break, just as I am now. My maternal grandmother had just passed away, I had just finished one of my most emotionally-trying semesters of college, and I was still in the throes of writing a senior honors thesis (which was something I seriously doubted I would be able to finish). It was not a hugely happy time, but it was a very thoughtful one for me. I did not know where I would be mentally over the final months of college while trying to finish the thesis, or where I would be heading after I graduated, but I knew that I was passionate about getting people to talk about religion, and so I started this blog.

What has happened since then? Well, I finished and successfully defended my thesis (thank G-d).* I had some good times during my last semester of college, published this (lengthy) article on the website of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, was invited to join the Medieval and Renaissance Honors Society (something I found endlessly hilarious, since my research really only focused on contemporary Europe, but I appreciated it nonetheless), was selected to give the student speech at my European Studies graduation ceremony, graduated from college, went backpacking through Europe for three weeks, interviewed a few religious leaders over the summer for Dan's Papers (including Rick Jacobs!), roadtripped up to Chicago with some of my closest friends, had this article about my Mama posted on the URJ blog, moved to Rome, began attending classes with mainly priests and nuns, took a few short trips around Europe in between those classes, and finally returned home to New York for a three-week vacation (during which time I've celebrated Christmas, been to Manhattan twice, threw a successful forty-person surprise party, and gotten together with a few friends). It's been a slightly busy year.

It has been a good year for this blog, too, which has only grown in the number of people reading it. According to Google Analytics, a website that tracks how many people visit websites, 2,805 unique people have visited this blog in the past year (a total of 4,326 visits). I hope that means that 2,805 people around the world are having more conversations about these topics! The highest number of visitors in a single day happened on June 30th, when I put up the blog post about my thoughts on gay marriage. Hopefully 2014 will see more people visiting, more people sharing the blog and commenting on the posts, and even more people starting to care about faith relations.

So that's a bunch of stuff that has changed for me over the past year. But what hasn't changed? Here is part of what I wrote last January in my first post, when I was just starting off on this blogging journey:

"I have had a lot of thought-provoking experiences with religion over my four years in college, and I wanted to talk about my life through the lens of interfaith relations in a more public space to encourage discussion about how we can all come together to create a stronger world."

Now, aside from adding in new locations where I have had thought-provoking religious experiences (Rome, Dachau concentration camp in Germany, Prague, Dublin...the list goes on and on), I still feel the way I did back then. We need to have these discussions. We need to consider that religion does not have to be a dividing force, but can instead bring people together in their mutual desires to improve the world and improve human relationships. But it takes every individual caring and speaking out about these things to make that dream a reality.

As some of you may know, by nature I am very futuristic, so it's time to look ahead. What do I think will happen in my life over the next year? I'm again in somewhat of the same place as I was last January, unsure of where I will be emotionally as I head back to Rome for six months (the longest span of time I've ever been out of the US). I finish in Rome in June, then I'll be back in the US next June-September working for an interfaith office in Manhattan. And after that...I am not sure. Back to Europe? Maybe. Working in the US? Maybe. Debating religion and the value of interfaith relations with everyone I meet? A very high probability. I hope you'll all join me on that last one.

Thanks for reading, and thanks to those who have shared this blog. Together, I know we can make this world a better place.

Now go out and love one another.

<3,
Allyson

*If for some reason you're interested in reading my 50-page thesis on Spain, the Jews, and Francisco Franco, here you go.
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