Another year, another set of wishes

I’m a bit early this year for my year-end reflections, but I won’t be around my internet at the end of this year, so I thought I’d get to it earlier. Last year, I had just started what I thought was a fabulous new job, we moved to what we thought would be a better apartment, and Neal had started teaching a new class that he thought would be a joy to teach.

My job truly was (and is) fabulous. I love my boss and my coworkers, even if one of the most wonderful ones just left us (hi, Jen!). I’m realizing more and more how good for me my “new” workplace is, mainly because I am around people I enjoy, I get to work with kids, and I never fall into a monotonous routine (similar stuff happens, but since I’m dealing with so many people, no two days are ever alike!) I’ve also realized lately that one of the things I love about where I’m working is that, unlike other places I’ve worked in the past, I’m not embroiled in the middle of all the “office gossip” all the time. Every once in a while learning about the “things going on” around the building is nice, but since I generally deal with the kids more than anyone else, I don’t get tangled up in the office politics as much as I have in other places. Sure, I’ve had my share of run-ins with certain people that I won’t mention here, but I’m mainly not involved with all that. On one hand, the nosy part of me kind of wants to know some things that are going on, but then another part of me kind of likes just knowing what I need to know in order to do my job. I don’t get all the gossip about the students or parents or coworkers, so I can smile and say “Hi” in the hallway without wanting to throw up from false niceties (well, to too many people. Believe me, there are a few in each category that I could definitely do without seeing).

Our new apartment last year turned into as big of a nightmare as the one before it. Turns out the apartment wasn’t the issue; the management was. Since we wised up and moved completely away from those apartment owners, we are now much happier. Sure, we somehow still ended up with the noisiest upstairs neighbor in the world  (case in point: stomp stomp stomp up the stairs, we hear. “Guess who’s home?!” one of us will shout to the other. Bang, stomp stomp stomp, we hear above our heads as he enters his apartment), but we love the space we have, the view we have, and most of the other neighbors we have. Wanna see my “backyard”? Here’s Neal sitting on one of the benches back there, looking out over Lake Superior:

Neal looking at our wonderful view. I have one of him turned around to look at me, but I didn't ask him if I could put it up on here. Like the ore boat?

My backyard, complete with the bench from above and the lake, although that kind of blends into the sky, eh?

We even have a shelter house where we can grill out and enjoy our food (along with some grills around the property, just like in a park). We regularly see deer crossing our paths (three tonight, frolicking in the yard as we left to hang out at a coffee shop). We have a deck, upon which we have hung real pine garland for the season. It’s pretty wonderful here.

Neal’s job has had some bumps this year, but he did greatly enjoy teaching the new class. We had a scary summer where he didn’t work and didn’t know if he’d have a job come fall, but he was asked back for the fall semester (which led to a scary fall semester where we didn’t know if he’d have a job for spring). We now know he has a spring semester position as well, but I’ll worry about the summer and next year when 2010 comes. Until then, I’m going to enjoy the fact that things are okay right now for him job-wise. Not where we want him to be (not where he wants to be), but it’ll do for now.

My feet, oh my aching feet! I’m still having the stupid foot problems I’ve had for a few years now. I’m still doing exercises for them, still stretching them, still icing them…still dealing with the pain. Here’s hoping (yet again) that next year brings healing for these painful things!

And cars! Blech. We just found out yesterday that our only, last-surviving car has decided to leave us — or will decide to do so soon. Sully has so many things wrong with him that it’s just not feasible to fix really any of them. We’ve decided to just do it, just get a new (to us) car. At the moment we realized we needed this, Neal’s parents called and said they were selling their car — did we want to think about buying it? Hmmmm…we’re still debating it for the evening, but I think we’ll go with it. We know it’s been maintained; we know it’s in good condition; we know we’re getting a fair price. Poor Sully. We’re going to miss him, but his time of reliability is probably over. (And I’m going on record: I hate CV boots. I hate ‘em. La Uvita had problems with hers and this is one of the many problems Sully is having, albeit one of the two most troubling ones.)

Blessings for this coming year? May the promises the coming year holds wrapped up to be opened end up being endlessly joyful and lovingly bright for you and your loved ones. May at least one of the biggest desires you hold come true and at least one of the biggest pains in your life disappear. May you be happy in 2010.

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