“There’s no place like home for the holidays.” That’s why this year, I’m packing up my prized butter churn and heading back to my hometown of Willow Canyon, Arizona to spend the holiday season rediscovering my roots. Though I have no remaining family members with which to spend the holidays (no decent family members, that is), I’ve always felt that there is nothing like the empty desert to bring about feelings of holiday cheer. 

Over this break, I’m focusing on what really matters, deep down in the bottom of my heart: winning. I plan to spend most of my time in Willow Canyon strength training for my upcoming butter-churning tournament. (Although I retired from the sport in 2017, the churn beckons me most insistently during the holidays, and I always find myself falling back into passion for it).

Training will consist of 4 hour olympic weight lifting sessions each morning, followed by a 26.2 mile run, then wrapped up with an aggressive obstacle course (think American Ninja Warrior). In the evenings I will retire to my cozy underground bunker, where I will churn butter from dusk until dawn. Each day will repeat like this so that by the time the ball drops on New Year’s Eve, I’ll have been whipped into peak athletic condition. I’m determined that this year, I will win that Churning Championship title, and I don’t care what I have to sacrifice to do it. In my free time, I’ll be watching Dolly Parton’s Christmas of Many Colors and knitting a scarf.