An Anniversary

I had this memory pop up on my Facebook feed recently:

This is a photo of the sign at the entrance to MITRE (my employer since college) that I took as I drove away for the last time ten years ago. Which made me realize this blog is ten years old. This is my 300th post.

In my first post, I wrote “Every day, my goal is to attempt to learn something new or do something outside of my comfort zone.  We’ll see where it leads.  So far I’m having fun.”

As far as comfort zones go, I now think doing things outside your comfort zone might be a little overrated. Especially on a daily basis. And especially when your comfort zone is fairly large to begin with (keeping in mind there is a difference between not being comfortable doing something and not wanting to do something.) So while I occasionally go outside my comfort zone, I’m good with staying inside of it. At my age, I don’t need that stress.

But I do enjoy learning. Specifically, I enjoy improving. I like to get better and better at whatever it is I attempt. Over the past few years, I have focused on improving at tennis, pickleball, and, most recently, golf. (Are some of you judging me?)

I am struggling to like golf. Maybe because I am not improving. Actually, I’m not sure I’m improving at tennis or pickleball either. I might have to discuss this in a separate post where I explain how I had a hissy fit on the pickleball court and embarrassed myself.

So, I’m ignoring one part of my original goal and failing at the other. But one thing I learned at work is that it’s really hard to come up with good goals, and goals probably need to be revisited more than every ten years.

Despite the lack of clearly defined goals, what have I done with the past ten years?

Part of the reason I left work was because of Nicole. I was home in case she needed me. She feels guilty about that and apologized to me recently. I told her there was no reason to apologize. Leaving work was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

If I hadn’t left work, I wouldn’t have started this blog. As I work on this post, I’ve been reading some of my early posts, and I’m laughing out loud (with myself, not at myself). I’m proud that these family memories are recorded. I wish I had recorded more.

If I hadn’t left work, I wouldn’t have been able to see Phil and my mother through their cancers. I wouldn’t have been able to help Phil out to the sitting dock where we talked about things like Hillary’s emails. I wouldn’t have been able to rush up to the lake after getting a call from my mother telling me she didn’t want to be alone. I will always have the feeling that I was a tremendous help to them. Although I don’t want to give the impression I was perfect in that endeavor. I remember a particularly heated discussion regarding mozzarella and tomatoes where I wish I had been more supportive.

If I hadn’t left work, Dave and I wouldn’t have bought this house in Jupiter when we did, and we may have missed out on that opportunity. We are living the life down here.

If I hadn’t left work, the last minute and not so last minute trips would have been more difficult. The last minute trips included flying out to Hermosa for Heather’s ACL surgery and driving down to New Jersey for the arrival of Caleb and then Lucy. The planned trips have included the Cape, Florida, D.C., Wisconsin, Colorado, Italy, North Carolina, Vermont, and California. And so many trips up to the lake. Trips full of family and full of fun. And, of course, always with some tension that we tend to forget about from one trip to the next.

For the past ten years, this blog has been primarily family focused. Over that time, there have been changes to the family. On the plus side, there have been numerous weddings and babies with more babies on the way (two! three!) and hopefully another on the way soon. In my immediate circle, the additions have included Chris, Caleb, and Lucy. How have I not blogged more about them? Chris – always in Eagles’ attire (poor Chris) – has suffered crushing Codenames losses but maintains a sense of humor that keeps me laughing (with him and at him). Caleb melts my heart when he says “Grandma” even when it is “Grandma, leave!” (He also tells his mother to leave when she won’t let him have, for instance, mac and cheese, and then he turns to me and says “Grandma, mac and cheese?”) And Lucy who I let gnaw my face because she enjoys it so much (which provided a clear path for the bug from daycare through her to me.)

While we’ve had a number of weddings, there have not been any divorces! Dave and I have come close a few times on the pickleball court, but so far, so good.

But there have been losses. Heavy losses. Most recently Memere. We visited her just before Christmas, and she wasn’t herself. I’m not sure she recognized us at first, and beyond knowing that we were family, I’m not sure she knew exactly who we were. She was tired and kept dozing. I suggested a couple of times that we leave so she could rest, but she wanted us to stay. Whenever she woke from dozing, she would ask “How is everyone?”

I posted about her on her 100th birthday because I knew this day was coming, and I didn’t want to try to adequately cover her life and what she meant to us after the fact. But I loved her smile, her laugh, and her hugs. As my cousin Justin said in a comment on her wedding anniversary post, “Memere welcomes us with a hug like she really means it every time we see her and I’ll certainly never forget that.”

And I loved the way she said my name.

In an effort to reduce my digital storage, I recently went through some of my old text exchanges deleting many but saving some where I’m just trying to keep some part of those I have lost. Here’s one with my uncle Donald.

Thank you Donald.

And I think this blog has shown I loved in return.

Maybe I’ve always had a clearly defined goal.