Kevin's Watch

We're at the end of this year--indeed, this decade--so I thought it might be fitting to reflect a bit on highs, lows, and whatever between. Feel free to add whatever list you want, for either the year or the decade. I might make several, both personal and more general.

Top Ten Things I'm Grateful For in 2019:

1. Angela. New love after a long divorce.
2. My son. Resetting our relationship on new terms. Watching him graduate high school and kick ass in his first semester at college.
3. Debt free. Taking control of my financial future.
4. New job. Movin' on up.
5. Nashville. New home, love this city!
6. My health. It feels good to still be able to run 3 miles approaching 50.
7. This economy. My 401k loves the Trump economy.
8. Tool. They finally released an album after 13 years!
9. John Frusciante rejoined the Red Hot Chili Peppers!
10. That weekend camping at the lake with Angela in the last warm weather of the year, right before my brother died; the innocent joy of not knowing what was to come 3 days later ...

Top Five Things That Sucked about 2019 (because it's been twice as good as bad):

1. My brother, my best friend, died at 46. He left a 3 year old daughter. My heart aches for him. There is now a hole in my life that never existed before, that will never be filled again. I love you Jason. Goodbye brother.
2. Learning how my parents act when one of us dies. Get your wills prepared, people! Don't leave this undone.
3. Losing one of my best friends to politics. He won't speak to me anymore because we disagree. I thought the Left was supposed to be tolerant!
4. Impeachment. Dems suck.
5. Cail getting banned.

I'll add things as I think of them, but so far off the top of my head:

Great things

1. My life in general - I'm really enjoying it right now.
2. Where I live. It feels like paradise - It's not perfect, but I love it.
3. Tool! (Thanks for the reminder Z). The new album is incredible.
4. Looking forward - going to Melbourne to see Tool and Queen in the space of 3 days!
5. Family - although we are all quite different and have had our share of dramas, I feel comfortable with all my siblings right now.
6. Sport - I'm still loving playing sport at my age. It keeps me keen to stay in shape as much as possible, and hopefully this year I will play in the same team as my son.

Crappy things

1. Seeing my son struggle mentally so much last year (he is 16). Minimal school attendance, extreme anxiety, self harm. (On the up-side, he has been great the last few weeks and is really looking forward to college - so I'm desperately hoping for a great 2020 for him).
2. This summer's bushfires in Australia which have burnt millions of acres in NSW and Victoria, destroyed towns, taken lives and so on. Skyweir is one of those affected by them - I'm sure she will come back to the Watch at some stage and report.


I'm sure I'll be back with more things that have totally skipped my mind!

Ten Major Things I'm Grateful For in 2019:
1. Learning a bunch about classroom management / leadership. And implementing it. Constantly.
2. Getting to "see" what my husband sees with regards to the necessity of keeping an eye on ALL the children at our small church plant. (I finally get it.)
3. The awesome High School students I got to work alongside in running a serious math coaching program for a Middle School.
4. Getting my hands on book 1 of "The Army of the Potomac" trilogy by Bruce Catton.
5. Making new friends and having amazing conversations with them. (!!!)
6. deer and sam "checked up on me" last summer; I was burned out and miserable.
7. Great joy over some of the students I tutor & interactions with them.
8. Doing math competition problems with my older son, doing Improv at home with my younger son!
9. SKYPE conversations with my dad; that's the relationship such joy.
10. My hubbie re-starting giving sermons more regularly. (invited to travel 40 minutes to preach to a congregation of about 15 people, and he spends about 20 hours preparing each one. that's just how we roll!)

Ten Things That I Would Say Really Stank about 2019: (because I have a discouraged frame of mind)
1. Repeatedly burned through all my energy coaching a math team.
2. One of my close friends moved away. She's 84.
3. The panic of Spring Break 2019. The weekend that was the beginning of spring break, the team I coached won state math competition. Which meant that I would be coaching my state's team. At the end of that break, my husband was getting ordained. In between, absolute panic hit me, and I behaved arrogantly about how I would use my time, and generally provoked/made-worse relational chaos in my home. Felt majorly alienated from friends. Would not like to re-live.
4. Had a huge falling-out with a few people who were crucial to the math team training thing.
5. Not re-connecting after the first conversation with some of those amazing new friends I made.
6. "Shutting down" and not doing regular, ordinary things that need done. Repeatedly in different areas of my life. My neuroses are always there to spring up and kick me in the face!
7. Some panic and paranoia that struck me in late spring. (I think back now, though, and see that the conversations I had when I reached out to seek help from others were amazing.)
8. Our involvement with a church I love has been ebbing away. I don't think I can just decide to fix it, but my soul has an allergic reaction to leaving a community I love.
9. Fear that every plan or program that I might try to invest time in to change myself (i.e. as a writer) will have doubt shed upon it by my hubbie, and I will doubt it in a way that makes me fail.
10. Fear that the real problem in that^ comes from me.

tl;dnr: Linna is terrified of her own capacity to be dysfunctional, and fears to step forward boldly into the future.

Z wrote:1. My brother, my best friend, died at 46. He left a 3 year old daughter. My heart aches for him. There is now a hole in my life that never existed before, that will never be filled again. I love you Jason. Goodbye brother.

I am so sorry.
I also find these words beautiful. <-- (but what do you expect from people you meet on a Stephen R. Donaldson forum?)

Losing one of your best friends to politics stinks.
(I admit, it's something I live in fear of.)

5. Cail getting banned.

I kind of wish he was around.
me being ignorant of the specifics of how that conflict went down.

Z wrote:2. My son. Resetting our relationship on new terms. Watching him graduate high school and kick ass in his first semester at college.

Woot!!!

StevieG wrote:he has been great the last few weeks and is really looking forward to college - so I'm desperately hoping for a great 2020 for him).

When is he anticipating college?
like soonish, or a year off? or two years?
*ponders* Hmmm. you guys have inverted summer there.

10 best; going to Iceland, health slowly improving, cutting down my drinking to effectively zero, going to Copenhagen, rediscovering fantasy, leaving my job of fifteen years, buying a sweet car, my PS4, learning to sleep again, the film The Green Book.

10 worst; being unemployed, Boris Johnson winning the election, Brexit-Brexit-Brexit, my arthritic shoulder, the three hangovers I've had (count these as one unless I run out of bad stuff to make up the 10) for the year, getting a year older (when you get to the age where you probably ain't got that many left), wasting so much time gaming, seeing my country go down the tubes, knowing there is shit I can do about it, noise-pollution.

Thanks to linna for alerting me to this activity. <3

Ten of the best things about 2019:
1. My husband (Stag of the dawn) leaving a toxic work environment that was killing him slowly.
2. Stag also accepting a job offer to do what he loves best, minus the toxicity. Even with a significant income drop, we are both so much happier.
3. My son (Buck of the dawn) getting engaged.
4. Finding out that I do not have breast cancer.
5. The way friends and family supported me through the medical travel, etc.
6. Realizing that I have less stress since then, than I have in several years.
7. Realizing that I am happy teaching 3rd grade. The kids aren't too cool for you yet, but old enough to be interesting.
8. Directing another Christmas Musical with a cast of 127! So much fun!!
9. My nephew marrying a girl so smart, funny, and nice that if they ever divorce we told her we'd still keep her.
10. Overall incremental improvement in my health and attitude.

Ten worst things about 2019

1. Losing (to heart failure at way too young an age) two friends I liked immensely and admired the holy #$%^ out of.
2. Losing weeks of sleep wondering if I had cancer. I thought I was more spiritual than that, but surprise!
3. What we went through as, and the way people reacted after, Stag left the work he had done for 13 years. (Good thing God had something better in store!)
4. Buck of the dawn's future in-laws treating him like absolute garbage.
5. DONALD TRUMP.
6. Continued minor but painful health issues you don't want to know about.
7. Realizing how few close friends I have that really stick around.
8. My best friend's family imploding, with horrifying allegations and two possible jail terms involved, and the way the community has treated them as pariah, proving again that no good deed goes unpunished.
9. My FIL's continued decline into batshit crazy AND dangerous.
10. The planet's continued decline and loss of diversity and beauty. Australian bushfires being the icing on the $%!& cake.

the heartbooger wrote:deer and sam "checked up on me" last summer; I was burned out and miserable.

Glad to see "was" in there. I could see it in your face and felt like I hadn't been very helpful, but I know sometimes just for someone to acknowledge and ask can save your life.

Well, here we are. 2020 is another year to take the good with the bad, and try to make it through with a "damn the torpedoes" smile.
Thank you Zarathustra!! Blessings to all.[/quote]

peter wrote:learning to sleep again

This is huge!
I bet that both Iceland and Copenhagen were gorgeous!
And yay, re-discovering fantasy!

peter- has noise pollution especially increased right around where you live?
or in a larger area / in general?

deer wrote:Realizing that I have less stress since then, than I have in several years.

Yesss!
this makes sense to me.

Glad to see "was" in there. I could see it in your face and felt like I hadn't been very helpful, but I know sometimes just for someone to acknowledge and ask can save your life.

Well, I'm mostly not burned-out.
Right now, I'm in generating-ideas-for-great-grand-schemes-but-not-starting-them mode.
Once-bitten, twice-shy?

Both Linna; my neighbors fight like cat and dog and I can hear them through even my solid concrete walls. The absolutely essential helicopter service to our local hospital runs over my house (and I wouldn't have it not so for the world) but damn it's loud, and often, and nearly always in the middle of the night.......! And then there's the benighted strimmer....... don't get me started on that!

I'm just getting old is all!

Linna wrote:When is he anticipating college?
like soonish, or a year off? or two years?
*ponders* Hmmm. you guys have inverted summer there

School / College starts at the beginning of February here after the summer holidays.

Oh and Deer, I like the comment about 3rd grade. I'm not sure if it exactly relates to our 3rd grade (about 9 year old kids) but I tend to agree in general. Although teenagers are very interesting, they would be a nightmare to teach I imagine.

peter wrote:And then there's the benighted strimmer....... don't get me started on that!

I had to google "strimmer", lol. Nobody likes those while they're running.

We are super-blessed to live in a relatively quiet area, away from major roads, mosques, and churches (both of which are likely to wake you at 4am with religious wailing).

linna wrote:Right now, I'm in generating-ideas-for-great-grand-schemes-but-not-starting-them mode.
Once-bitten, twice-shy?

I realized that I never want to write another book unless I do it strictly for my own enjoyment, the way I wrote Ardinea, which was a sheer joy to create with little thought of publication. That was 20 years ago. Since I will never sell large amounts of books, I want to be willing to do it for nothing. And I'm almost there!

Ten good things about 2019:
1. Bought first house of my life - in the past lived in apartments, or homes owned by others.
2. Got rid of my Ford Focus. Don't get me wrong it lasted me many years and was a good car for me. However, it was beginning to be a riding death trap. Finally, invested in a newer car(2016 Honda CRV)
3. Forming a stronger bond with my Mom. She has been in therapy hospital after hip surgery. Been calling and talking to her quite often.
4. Getting higher comfort level at current job.
5. Obtaining good review at job.
6. Learning new things about how to maintain a home.
7. Enjoying a nice yard and letting our dog run around in the yard.
8. Getting closer to my younger sister after her husband died. Called her many times and talked at length about her fears and sadness.
9. Learning how to relax and enjoy my job instead of being continually stressed.
10. Taking a nice fall trip to Michigan with my wife.

Bad things about 2019:
1. A lot of new debt.
2. My Mom in hospital and not being able to see her in person.
3. Stress of little home maintenance that costs $100's to repair or replace.
4. Rumors that our company is relocating to Florida (and all our jobs)
5. Gained all the weight back that I lost in 2018.
6. Got sick around Thanksgiving and it lasted for about week and half.
7. Not saying a proper goodbye to sisters husband. He had been a man that called wolf for about 20 years so none of us believed he was really dying until it was too late.
8. Ugly relationship between wife and her sister got blown up around Christmas.
9. Dealing with a car that had no air conditioning, shook when I drove it and was never properly cleaned out after the move.
10. Losing contact with friends because of the move.

sam wrote:9. Dealing with a car that had no air conditioning, shook when I drove it and was never properly cleaned out after the move.

I don't think I've ever owned a car in which the AC didn't crap out within a month of my owning it, including the one I have now. (The car I drove for the past 11 years had no AC and crank windows, but it was a workhorse that would go anywhere, it just was losing too many knobs and handles and straps and things.)

It's fine now, but in April when it's hot season, it will be brutal if I don't get her fixed.

It gets hot enough to melt musical instrument cases in cars in Nigeria. Fawn of the dawn found that out when she left her flute...

Top Ten Things I'm Grateful For in 2019: In no particular order

1. My wife. There is no one I would rather share this life with.
2. My Granddaughter who turned 1 in November.
3. All the beer they have in Cincinnati. Who knew this was the beer capital?
4. Health - run 3 miles a day, hike when I can and ski at 56 years young.
5. My retirement accounts that have enjoyed the Trump economy!
6. Music - I've been rediscovering vinyl and going to a lot of concerts.
7. My job. I moved here from Georgia in 2018. The new job stress is much lower. A great way to finish the last few years before retirement.
8. Being out of debt. Very grateful for that. I've been debt free for 10 years now.
9. My kids who have become independent adults. Who can ask for more?
10. Reconnecting with a High School best friend that lives in Connecticut.

Things That Sucked about 2019

1. Lost a friend of 30 years to liver cancer. Met in 1987 when we worked together. We have been friends ever since.
2. Being away from my kids. I relocated, they still live in Georgia.
3. Cail getting banned. (Could not agree more). I'm still a bit salty about it.
4. Falcons football season was the worst.
5. My wife having to travel for work.
6. Lost contact with my Brother. No idea why. I seem to be running on silent. He posts on KW... you know who you are.. get in touch!!!

I...I just don't have a list. On the whole it was a good year, but it had a couple of low points.

I'm pretty strictly a present-oriented person, so I don't dwell on the past, or dream of the future. There is no real "good" or "bad." Stuff just "is" and we deal with it as it happens.

Neither past joys nor past sorrows cast much of a shadow over me.

--A

deer of the dawn wrote: 7. Realizing that I am happy teaching 3rd grade. The kids aren't too cool for you yet, but old enough to be interesting.

Every teacher I've know has always said that 3rd to 5th grade is the "sweet spot" for teaching for reasons just like you said.

Younger grades are usually described as like herding cats.

Good topic Z!

My 2019 list was pretty boring and I'm glad.
It's been a nice holding pattern of normal.
Health has been fine, except for losing my appendix and a hundred little minor things a 50 year old body gets (which does kinds suck).
Job is good....kids are good....

Yeah, it's good to write this down to look back on when life gets crazy/shitty again.

High Lord Tolkien wrote:Yeah, it's good to write this down to look back on when life gets crazy/shitty again.

Which it will. And then it will get better again, and so, ad infinitum.

--A

Well...... not exactly ad infinitum........

Ok, for as long as any form of life is in existence.



--A