In a day and age where all thoughts, emotions and testimonials can be summed up into a text, it becomes ever so important to express my deep and warm gratitude to those individuals with the imagination, admiration and love to give of themselves each and every day.

As I reflect on the last year, it has been filled with personal tragedy and struggle. Nights of unanswered questions, lives lost well before their time and obstructions in the path of life.

From tears heard across another continent, to new lives being welcomed into the world, to parents watching their children laid to rest, to disaster ripping families from their homes; I have spent many a long quiet evening in a meditative state trying to piece this puzzle of life together.

Each time, I draw the same conclusion: It is in the outstretched arms of those that have continuously put others ahead of themselves, who have greeted every challenge with passion and hope and been that shoulder to lean on that I need to personally thank. Not due to a holiday or an end of the year need to repent, but because they are the foundation of this wall that provides me shelter from the storm and fuels my drive.

I thank you

• I thank you for being patient with me when I had to make many sacrifices to be by the bedside of a dying friend.
• I thank you for emotionally being by my side and relying on me even though an ocean separated us
• I thank you for allowing me to bear witness to your life changing events
• To those that called, emailed or sent a picture or cute message at the most opportune time when I really needed it, I am eternally grateful
• I am not perfect, a scholar or always a gentleman.  I have flaws and for the few that understand and accept me, words do not say enough about how important you are in my life
• Some have been unconditionally supportive to me through my writing, my vision on life, my creative ups and downs and for that I bow to you
• To you, the one that finds inspiration in my writing and acts upon it with a closer hug, a warm message of love, a charitable act or seeing life with a little more happiness, you are my reason for living

Sometimes, I lie out on the beach or an open field gazing upon the stars vast in the sky that reach infinitely through the cosmos. Right at the moment it begins to sink in how small we are in the scheme of the universe, memories rush through my head.  Good refreshing memories that put a smile on my face.  They are visual images of times I have spent with you; all of you.  Each person that is important in my life has an equal piece of my heart and as you have and continue to shape who I am, I hope my actions and my words help you understand how you have given me all a man could ask for.

To my family and friends, your love continues to give me strength and energy.  Thank you.