How I Wrap Up My Year

Sending this email technically completes a resolution. Plus recs for Ellen Bass' poetry, Amy Estes on holiday parking, and Taffy Brodesser-Akner on trauma.

First of all, thank you to everyone who donated to the Silver Lake Food Pantry after last week’s newsletter! I really appreciate your generosity. I’m still waiting on the final numbers from the direct donations through the food pantry website, but between that, the donations people sent me, and the 2024 proceeds from paid subscribers to this newsletter, it looks like we reached our goal and the pantry is funded through 2025! Of course, if you still want to give, that just means we’ll be able to give out more food and be more generous with the bags we distribute, so you can still contribute at this link here.

This is the last newsletter of the year, which means I can check off one of my 2024 goals, which was to send this newsletter out weekly. Mission accomplished. I succeeded in a few of my other goals, like getting into the ocean or a lake at least 12 times and going on 6 dates with Mollie. Six dates seemed like they’d easy to accomplish when I wrote it down last December but turned out to be extremely ambitious and required us going on three dates this month, lol. I didn’t manage to submit an essay to the NYT Modern Love column despite having that as one of my goals for the second year in a row. I had also written “get 6 big rejections” but only got 2 rejections that I think count. You might say that’s a good thing, but I think it’s because I didn’t take as many big risks / put myself out there professionally that much this year, so I’ll aim for that again next year.

For the past few years, I’ve been trying to make a short list of those kinds of goals rather than resolutions. Specific, clearly defined goals that are in my control. I used to write things like “sell a tv show,” but I can’t make that happen alone, so now I write things like “write a new pilot script.” Coincidentally, that’s another goal from 2024 that I didn’t check off so I’m rolling over in 2025.

Another one of my end-of-the-year traditions is to make a long list of everything that felt like an accomplishment from the year. Whether it’s big or small, personal or professional, it goes on the list. Everything from “I survived another year” to “I gave a TED Talk” to “I got much more efficient at cleaning up spit-up.” For me, it’s a useful exercise to force myself to think about the things I accomplished rather than just everything that’s still left to be done.

After doing this for a few years, it’s also very revealing to see what made it onto my year end list in, say, 2012, but would never make it on today. Back then, I wrote down at the end of the year, “had coffee with a professional comedian!”. That was an accomplishment that made the list months after it happened. Now, my comedian friends make fun of me when I tell them about that because having coffee with them is such a regular, not big deal event. “Am I going to make it onto your big dreams came true list? I’m so glad I could be your Make-A-Wish.”

My last New Year’s tradition is one I learned from listening to Gretchen Rubin and Elizabeth Craft’s Happier podcast. They pick a word that’s going to be their theme for the year. Here’s their explanation of how they do it. In 2023, I went with “warmth.” 2024, I chose “presence.” This coming year, I’m going with "faith.” Less in a religious sense (although I’m not opposed to that too), but more in the sense of being ok with not knowing where things are going to lead or what’s going to happen. I like the theme because there’s no way to do it wrong, it’s just an overarching idea to think about when making decisions or plotting my course over the year. Is this choice leaning into faith/warmth/presence or pulling back from it?

Anyway, these traditions might be corny. In fact, I think they are. But I am fully and completely in my corny era (some would argue I have been there for years), so I’m going to run with it.

Happy New Year if you observe the passing of time. If you don’t observe the passing of time, have a wonderful past.

I warned you, I am in my corny era. Maybe that should be my one-word theme for 2025 instead, actually? I’ll mull it over.

My projects and upcoming events:

LIVE IN SF: Wrong Answers Only at SF Sketchfest - Sunday, January 26th at 7:00 p.m. at the Gateway Theater. If you live in the Bay Area, come see me, Samm Levine, Aparna Nancherla, and Dulcé Sloan learn from a wildlife biologist about all the animals that are roaming through your city/ Tickets are onsale now

TED TALK: How to find laughter anywhere - My TED talk is online and on YouTube. You can find it here

This week’s list

GREAT:

There’s a lot of pressure at this time of year to have things be feeling picture perfect. To have the family gathering be completely harmonious. To look back on the year and smile. To be excited for the year ahead. Sometimes that all can feel impossible. I love this poem about the chaos and shitstorm that life often throws your way. Relax by Ellen Bass (Another great Ellen Bass poem in the same vein: The Thing Is)

FUNNY:

I went to the grocery store multiple times in the past week to pickup essential last minute ingredients that I’d forgotten for recipes we were making. Every time I went, I thought about this classic Amy Estes piece in McSweeney’s: I Am a Trader Joe’s Parking Lot and I Am Here to Destroy You

INTERESTING:

In July, Taffy Brodesser-Akner published one of the toughest to read (and also best written) magazine stories I’ve ever come across. It was called The Kidnapping I Can’t Escape. Over the months since the story was published, she’s received hundreds of emails and responses. This week, she wrote a follow up piece about what she’s learned from people’s reactions. I found it fascinating and very moving:I Published a Story About Trauma. I Heard About Everyone Else’s.

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That's it for this week. Thanks for reading! Please share Bright Spots with anyone you think might enjoy it.

That’s a wrap on Bright Spots 2024,

Chris Duffy

This has been Bright Spots, a newsletter.

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…wait, who are you?

I'm Chris Duffy, a comedian, TV writer, podcast host, and both a former fifth grade teacher and a former fifth grade student. I’m currently writing a nonfiction book about humor for Doubleday.