I remember being a teenager and being the angstiest teen to ever angst. It was always the same on New Year’s Eve in my family.

Cheeseboards. Shrimp cocktail. And those tiny little hot dogs if we were lucky.

We watched a movie or two and then flipped on the telly to see mentally unstable people in New York City jump around behind Ryan Seacrest like they were actually having fun.

But who was I to say?

There I was like a loser, not even old enough to drink yet, just wishing I could rock a cute skirt and kiss a stranger at midnight.

I wanted so badly to join those idiots. Then I’d really be living.

Well, here we are, friends.

It’s the last few hours of the DECADE and I’m in my apartment in Brooklyn, In New Fucking York, warming up some of those little weenies and killing some time before my friend comes over to eat them with me.

My, how the tables turneth.

But this time, I don’t feel like such a loser.

Because you see, I’ve grown a lot this decade. Arguably the most in the nearly three decades I have graced this planet. This one was different. Why? Well, to find out we have to go into a time machine. Or, if you’re on your way to some ritzy bajillionaire’s yacht to kick off your decade then at least close your eyes in the Uber and pretend or something.

~cue whooshing noise and nostalgic music~

2010

The year is 2010 and I’ve graduated from Grandview High School.

I’ve had a boyfriend all senior year and I straighten my hair almost every day. In a surprise move, I decide to go to college in the middle of nowhere, Minnesota to go play ice hockey, a dream I’ve had since I was a kid.

Also, I am still a child.

I move away and surround myself with friendly Minnesotans but ultimately by Spring Break I am trying desperately to keep my long-distance relationship with the boyfriend alive. I finish my Freshman year and return to Colorado to be with him.

I’m sure other things happened but my memory sucks so let’s just keep rolling.

2011

I leave my friends at St. Ben’s, devastated but ready to start a new chapter.

Things with the boyfriend seem to be healing nicely after a year apart and I get accepted to the University of Colorado Boulder to continue my degree in History.

I join an improv team called Umbrella Improv Initiative. We are the first generation of improvisers and we call our team Slumber Party Knife Fight. I love discovering improv and that I’m not the only weirdo who wants to get on a stage and make up random shit.

Improv becomes my family.

Also, I get bangs.

2012

I go back and surprise my friends in Minnesota during Spring Break. This would begin my long saga of disrupting their lives with my unplanned presence.

I chop my hair off.

My boyfriend and I visit Paris, France.

I honestly don’t remember much about this year. Let’s keep going.

2013

I spend my 21st birthday in Minnesota because I just can’t stay away from those goofy Minnesotans.

I weasel my way into another improv troupe. This one’s called Amelia’s AirHearts and is all women. I’m so excited to share the stage with these ladies that are now my best friends. We take our team to a college improv festival in LA and my boyfriend tags along.

By this point, I have a promise ring and we’ve also been to Italy.

I get my first tattoo.

In the summer I work at a camp for rich kids at a country club.

I live with three beautiful and amazing women, one of which from my improv troupe and most of them teachers-to-be like me.

Could we be any cuter? (The answer is NO.)

2014

Oh, baby buckle the fuck up cuz shit’s about to get real interesting.

My boyfriend and I are about to celebrate 5 years together and I’m thinking of marriage. He’s acting kind of weird lately so I suspect he’s going to propose any day now. But the truth is we’re fighting a lot and he’s acting strange. I refuse to let myself believe that we’re not right for each other after all this time.

I “graduate” college and walk across the stage to my cheering friends and family. I am anxious because I still technically have to take one more science class in May to really get the job done.

I take my seasonal job back at the summer camp, this time as a Program Director.

One week after graduation my boyfriend dumps me and immediately gets with another girl and published the whole ordeal on Facebook and Instagram. I am wrecked.

I lose 20 pounds, run five miles a day, and somehow make it to my nutrition class and my job that summer. I turn in my final assignment five minutes late and the professor almost flunks me. By the grace of somebody’s god, I graduate college.

I discover Tinder and begin going on dates with sketchy dudes because I don’t know who I am as a single person.

In the summer I visit my friend Lexi in Germany. This is the first trip I haven’t taken with my ex-boyfriend. It hurts but we see so many amazing things. We go to the Anne Frank house completely hungover after spending the day drunk and high in Amsterdam. It’s fucking awesome and I’m still young so my body bounces back within a day.

In the fall I get ready for my student teaching semester at East High School in Denver. I put together lesson plans and buy cute teacher outfits.

East High School, approximately two months before my head exploded.

After five days as a teacher, my brain explodes on a blind date. I have a bad headache which eventually is diagnosed as a brain hemorrhage after my poor mother threatens to sue every single person in a hospital with a fake attorney.

The rest of this year is spent losing motor functions, watching a lot of Netflix, and continuing to hate my now ex-boyfriend who doesn’t seem to have noticed that I’m on my death bed.

Here I am in all my post-brain surgery glory!

In October I have brain surgery and spend several weeks in a brain hospital with old people relearning how to walk and see again.

My ex finally texts me.

I tell him to fuck off.

I start writing my book and prepare to get back into teaching again.

2015

After a small hiccup getting a little too “lit” on New Year’s (alcohol now impacts me differently post-brain), I make my triumphant return to East High School for my student teaching semester.

My head doesn’t explode after the first week (thank god), but I am learning quickly that teaching is much harder after having a brain bleed.

I hustle very hard and get a job lined up for the following fall at Gateway High School. I’ve moved back in with Mom and Dad since after college and they are the most supportive humans I’ve ever met.

I get my second tattoo.

Also, I start doing stand up comedy. I joke about my brain exploding and absolutely nobody thinks it’s funny but I keep doing it anyway.

I go back to LA for the college improv festival even though I’ve graduated. I perform again with Amelia’s AirHeart’s and have a great time but start to notice that I don’t feel like I fit in with the drunk college kids anymore.

I go back and surprise Sami in Minnesota on her birthday for kicks and hide under a box in a hotel room and pop out at her.

Before my big girl job starts I spend a week in New York City to take an improv class at the Upright Citizen’s Brigade. I’m overwhelmed and in love with comedy but tell my mom “I could never live there” when I get home.

In the fall I run my first half marathon and cry the entire time because not too long ago I was in a wheelchair.

I start teaching and work upwards of 80 hours a week.

I go back to Minnesota for Sami’s wedding.

My book becomes merely a list of bullet points and I can barely make it to one open mic a week.

My older sibling comes out as transgender which takes us all by surprise but we are supportive and love her as she begins her new journey.

I move out of my parent’s house and into a shady studio apartment in Capital Hill in Denver. I suspect my neighbor is on heavy-duty drugs and he keeps me up at all hours of the night screaming and one time I even call the cops on him because he tries to break my door down after I leave a sticky note asking him to keep it down.

Most of my friends are engaged by now.

2016

My best friend Kristen and I get a crazy idea and have a gigantic art show in Denver just because.

I finish my first year of teaching, in a blur, and continue trying to fill the hole in my heart that is still gaping wide open even two years after my bad breakup.

I am joyous to start dating a lovely man, we’ll call him Ben, who reignites my belief in love again and treats me like a queen.

We have an amazing summer together and I start writing again while on break from school. I get back into comedy and am starting to get into the big club Comedy Works.

Trump gets elected and the next day at school I have to tell a bunch of 14-year-old’s why our country is going to be completely fucked.

I run another half marathon.

I have a bipolar roommate now and in the course of this year, we go from friends to enemies.

Ben comes out to me as transgender, like my sister, and I’m even more shocked. We try to stay together for another month but things are weighing on us both. We break up after saying “I love you” for the first time. It is horrendous and painful.

The next day I am a bridesmaid in a wedding.

I go to therapy for a few months.

School starts again and I am quickly feeling like a shell of a person since the breakup and with the daily trauma of being a high school teacher. By September, I decide I’m going to finish the school year and move to New York City.

2017

I go to Spain with Kristen and dream of the life I want to live and also walk into a plate glass door.

Kristen and I have our follow-up ROUGH art show and I know in my heart that I am meant for so many big things.

I get my third (and favorite) tattoo.

I run yet another half marathon.

I move to New York City in the summer with nothing but two bags and a manuscript of my book that I printed at FED EX kinkos.

I don’t have a job and I live with my cousin for 10 days before moving to a “co-living” house in Brooklyn. I live there with 10 dudes until some other gals move in. I date one of the dudes in secret and run the house as a house manager and live there for free.

I am unemployed for what feels like ever and watch my 401K slowly dwindle away.

While I am away, my ex-partner and my sister become best friends. I struggle at times with this, but I am ultimately very happy to see that they’ve both found each other and are building their tribe together.

My dad gets tongue cancer randomly but they take it all out and he’s all good.

I take an improv class at Reckless theater which lasts all of two months before the theater closes because of a scandal. I make friends there though and one of them knows a publisher.

My secret boyfriend and I split because his visa expires and he moves back to India. After we break up at JFK a really nice COLOMBIAN taxi driver helps me stop crying and then takes me out for pizza.

One month later I get an email. My book is getting published.

I take a job as a nanny to three little boys in Brooklyn. The family is pretty wealthy and I don’t mind all the fancy cheese in their fridge.

I sign my book contract and get an advance of $750 which I use to pay rent with.

I start doing sets at Broadway Comedy Club, Stand Up NY, and more.

2018

I move out of the commune with two of my favorite women, Joy, and Simone. We move to Flatbush, Brooklyn which is absolutely the farthest place from everything.

I fly to Colorado for a TED Talk audition. I don’t get it.

I get bangs (again).

I work at a Matcha tea place for a few months then get fired for being on my computer when nobody is around.

I take fancy author photos and prep my book for edits.

I spend the entire year planning my book launch party.

I potty train a 3-year-old.

I start a podcast.

I get on TV three times.

I do a keynote at a fancy brain conference.

I take all my books from the bottom shelf at Barnes and Noble’s and put them on the Best Seller table while nobody is looking.

I become a Vegan.

I make a lot of new friends and “Brain Buddies” who are just as crazy and wonderful as me.

Mimi and The Brain is a finalist for the Werk It Women’s Podcasting Festival.

My sister has her big operation.

I get laid off from my nanny job unexpectedly at Christmas time.

I immediately take a job as an assistant for a science rapper.

2019

I hustle with multiple jobs.

I learn how to run lights and sound for an off-Broadway show.

I nanny some more.

I get punched on the subway and meet josh groban in the same hour window.

I apply for another TED Talk and I am the last one cut.

I battle depression, anxiety, and don’t have health care.

Why do I keep running all these fucking half marathons?

I get my fourth tattoo after getting my tongue biopsied.

I take a one-woman show and a giant foam brain costume to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, fall off my stage, and almost catch the speakers on fire, but I have a lovely time and come out of it alive.

I take a five-day road trip with a stranger from a Facebook group up Scotland which is hands-down the coolest thing ever.

I find out my tongue doesn’t have cancer. HOORAY!

I solo travel in Ireland, London, Paris, and MARSEILLES, eat the most amazing food, and fall in love with several street musicians along the way.

Our family doggo Tucker passes away suddenly.

I get home from Fringe and my mom immediately tells me she has breast cancer.

I fall off the Vegan wagon.

I eat a lot of Ramen.

I pitch an audio story in front of 300 people and a panel of producers.

I meet Bill Nye, Emilia Clarke, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Jim Gaffigan, and briefly touch Neil Patrick Harris.

I write a TV pilot.

I get a full-time job right as I nearly run entirely out of money.

I apply for another TED Talk…third time’s a charm???

I play with my parent’s cute puppies Stanley and Dug.

And most importantly, I close out this decade truly, and fully in love with myself for the first time ever. Here, in my room, hiding away from all the flashy skirts and champagne towers, I am so in awe of the woman I have become this decade. Just me. In my sweats and cozy Christmas socks munching on my lil’ hot dogs.

I have come so far. I have learned, loved, and lost. I have suffered and rejoiced and done a lot of weird shit with my hair but hey, at least I am finally me.

I am the me’est me to ever me.

As I enter this new decade I know that the passing of time will continue to accelerate and hit warp speed. I will continue to change and grow. I will lose loved ones and experience new and profound traumas.

But I will never take for granted how powerful life can be and that we only get one to live (that we know of).

OK, now open your eyes. I’m sure you’ve arrived at your party by now.

Go on, cut a rug, hook up with a random hot stranger, jump up and down behind Seacrest why don’t you. Just watch out for that killer New Year’s hangover.

I’ll see you in 2020!

My Last Blog of The Decade