Your best photos of the week, December 21, 2018

This time of the year is always chaotic between personal and professional life. It’s when expectations are higher to manage your time well, stay healthy and to remain positive. While that’s all easy to say, it can be hard to sustain…she writes as she coughs into her elbow in between sips of “soothing hot drink” that David Y. Lee provided to her. What was that I said about staying healthy? I’ll have to consult some Future of Medicine pieces from the January issue of National Geographic magazine.

Okay, back to business. Each week on Your Shot, I am continued to be blown away by the raw talent and creativity that thrives in our photo community. However, our team is not the first to pat ourselves on the back but this week I think we should. Through numerous Slack messages, email chains and in-person “war-room” meetings, we were juggling uncountable tasks that would retain the overall health of the site, all behind the scenes.

The Your Shot team is small but mighty between four of us on the editorial team and less than ten on the product and technology team. We think of ways we can say thank you from a surprise Monster energy drink being left on a desk to hand-written cards that can make someone a little misty. We take care of each other when things can be rough and celebrate when we have the tiniest of victories. For that, I think we can allow ourselves a pat on the back for being the best team around, in my most humble, biased opinion.

I wanted to dedicate this week’s series to the talented, kind and overall lovely human being, Marie McGrory, who is closing her chapter with National Geographic this week. Marie previously worked on the Your Shot team as an Associate Photo Editor before transitioning to the Travel team as a producer. If not for Marie’s encouragement, I might not have felt as confident in applying for my role with Your Shot but I’m so happy I did.

It’s hard to say “see you later” to her but she helped build this community to where it is today and the office certainly won’t feel the same without her mirth. We owe a great deal to her gentle energy, whip fast sense of humor and commitment to exceptional story-telling. Cheers to Marie on her next journey! I trust she’ll be employing her sustainable travel tricks while she’s on her next adventure.