easy.

Easy.

In a year when nothing feels easy (hello, saying goodbye to our firstborn as she becomes an adult and leaves home for college), I’ve decided – literally just this morning sitting on the couch with my hot coffee, the doors open, and the sound of the rain falling into the pool – that this is the word I’m going to embrace in 2026.

Because why not choose a word that feels like the antithesis of what life is like right now? 2026, but make it challenging in the best way.

I’m always down for becoming a better version of me, for thriving and improving – but like…let’s make it easy. Life’s too short to complicate all the things, right? When I sit here and break it down, there’s no need. I have a husband who treats me like a literal queen and loves me hard, kids who are actually really cool and funny and successful, friends who are the actual greatest, the sweetest pup, the freedom to live my best life, and all the things that go hand in hand with that.

What’s not to love?

(slow left lane drivers, sunshine-y days, sweating because it’s hot, people blocking the aisle everywhere I go, late nights, waking up in the middle of the night and realizing I already woke up once and drank all my water, my child turning 18 in a few months and moving away to college…I could continue)

So anyway, back to what I’m going to let be easy this year in the midst of having a perpetually broken heart, thinking of my daughter leaving home.

And let’s not mistake easy for lazy – except for when I’m feeling lazy, and that’s exactly the goal. With that in mind, however, there are a few things I’m going to let be easy this year to make room for the feelings that are coming in hot due to all the things that don’t feel easy to me this year. Have I mentioned my firstborn little love will be an adult this year, and she’s leaving us for college, and I hate every second of it? Let me just mention that again.

For the 12^th time – here’s what I’m choosing to let be easy in 2026.

Doing it right

Fuck it. I don’t care if I’m doing it right as long as it’s getting done. Everyone made it to school (because my husband takes them…) and no one cried. Perfect. That’s all I need. It’s done.

Not every moment needs to be a magical, memorable moment. I don’t have to be on all the time, doing everything right and perfect and with effort. I can just do it and get it done and let it be logistical or easy, rather than a whole moment on occasion. Everyone is alive and fed and has just enough moments of ‘what in the actual fuck’ to make them funny, and that’s fine by me.

Getting dressed

There’s no room for experimentation in my life. Getting dressed at my age should be easy, effortless, and without stress. Which is why I’m continuing my habit of buying my favorite items in every color and outfit, repeating items that don’t look like pajamas but actually feel like pajamas. Unless I’m at home. If I’m at home, I’m in pajamas.

If you see me in the same black sweater three times in the next two weeks of freezing temps, it’s because it’s a Ralph Lauren cable-knit and it’s so good (and I spent entirely too much on it), and it’s a classic. And you can’t go wrong with the classics.

This is me not reinventing the wheel or whatever that saying is my dad always uses that I half-ass listen to when he’s trying to instill a life lesson, but I also don’t care. Until I do care because he used a good line like reinventing the wheel or whatever, and then I can’t remember what he said.

Marriage

You know…I can be annoyed with my husband that he cannot find his car key on his nightstand because it’s on the left side of the tray instead of the right side, where it’s always located, or I can let it go because this man takes care of me in a million ways. In 2026, I’m choosing not to be annoyed that he cannot find his keys or remember that my dresses are hung in my closet in order by season, length, and color. He DOES MOST OF THE LAUNDRY, so I need to check myself.

This is a man who has taken such good care of me for almost 25 years that I don’t know how to use the coffee pot, the lights in our home, or the dishwasher. So, this year, I’m making our marriage easy by reminding myself not to raise an eyebrow when something is literally in his face, and he cannot find it because I’ve never poured my own cup of coffee, you know?

Our marriage doesn’t need to be loud to be good. It doesn’t need to be overly romantic or filled with performance. We’ve been married 21 years this year, and our marriage is relatively easy because we are a great team, and I’m going to make it even easier for both of us by reminding myself that what annoys me is literally stupid because what doesn’t annoy me is so, so good.

Productivity

I spent a lot of years being productive 100 percent of my life, and I’m a little bit over it. Life doesn’t need to be productive every minute of every day. I’m letting myself be deliberately unproductive for the sake of my own sanity these days. As we get into Carter’s flag football season and Addy’s final year of flag football season, there will be 2-3 nights a week we are driving an hour or more to watch her play in games that START at 8 pm (the HORROR) and when we finally get home in the middle of the night, I’m not setting an alarm. And maybe I’m just going to be a little lazy the following day. I don’t know. But I do know I’m not making productivity my entire personality anymore.

My feelings

And here we go, chat.

…me waiting to see if my kids read that and have something to say because I am absolutely making an effort to speak their (weird) language and be very uncool.

My feelings this year are so far from easy, it’s laughable. But…I’m going to make it easy on myself by letting myself just feel them without any big deal being made about it. In 2026, I’m proud as fuck.

I’m proud of my oldest daughter because she’s graduating from college with her AA two weeks before she graduates high school in the top 10 percent of her class of 300. I’m proud as fuck that she was accepted into every single university she applied to, and she’s made her decision, and she’s so excited. I’m also sad AS HELL that she’s graduating, turning 18, going to college, beginning her adult life, leaving home…leaving me. And it’s okay for me to be both. I’m just letting the feelings feel.

I’m making it easy on myself to just go ahead and feel proud and happy and sad and overwhelmed and slightly unhinged and a little crazed and mostly emotional but also so thankful and grateful and happy and fulfilled. I’m not trying to control it anymore. My feelings are what they are, and that’s how I’m leaving it.

Easy…

Deciding to live an easy life in 2026 isn’t being lazy or whatever. It’s just me opting out of the unnecessary things like trying to control everything or hide my crazy or whatever. Presence is going to replace pressure, ease is going to replace overwhelm, routine is taking precedence, and anything unnecessary or unnecessarily stressful is unwelcome.

It’s decidedly NOT easy to experience life as a mom who is so excited about so many things, but also living every single day of the beginning of the last few months of her first child’s senior year for the very first time. It’s quite challenging, in fact. But I can choose to make it easier on myself by choosing to make everything easy. And I am. Because life feels really, really hard when every day is one day closer to your family dynamic changing dramatically…so I’m making it easy where I can.

And also because I’m tired, old, and give like zero fucks.