A Year in Rearview.

So here I am looking back at 2014. I didn’t do any of the things I set out to do. But maybe that is just as well.

I did, however, create almost 50 blog posts, went half of the year without eating wheat, and started painting my house. I also changed jobs so was able to cut my interaction with the person I was consistently saying negative (if true) things about. The co-worker in question was the reason I set the goal in the first place so it worked out well.

For this next year, my one real goal is to not really have any goals. Nothing to stress over and nothing to feel guilty over not doing. In fact, I am going to try to do away with guilt for a while. I tried to get Hugh to set a goal with me to write a book next year but realized it was time to relax for a while.

Instead, I will try to be the best person I can be. Try to eat as well as I can. Try to affect those around me in a positive way to my utmost ability.

Over the holidays I was able to spend some time with much of my family. It was great to look around and just realize these are people I love and trust. Sometimes you know something like that but when you step back and look with fresh eyes it is an amazing feeling.

I also spent some time with my grandpa, Pope, last Sunday. He has this uncanny ability to tell a story forever. And all his stories revolve around airplanes, getting a good deal on airplanes (or cars), or when he almost punched somebody in the nose. All the stories flow and mesh into each other and have heard most of them for the last 30 years I start wondering about timelines and how old my dad was in certain stories if Pope was married at this time…

This time however he had photos. Being who he is he started by telling me he had a photo of his Packard that he sold before joining the service. He brought me to his photo album and I watched him reminisce over all these airplanes he had over the years. I would always interrupt him by telling me about how much he bought and sold the plane by saying, “Wait, is that you?” I hadn’t seen many pictures of him in his younger days so it was really cool. He dismissed it and went on with the airplane stories.

I had to tell him I was leaving 4 times before I left. 2 hours in, was the first. He told me he would make me lunch before I left. It was around 1 o’clock and I was starving so agreed. But when we went to the kitchen he started telling me another story and damned if I wasn’t tricked again. It took me another hour before I managed to tell him I had to leave. This time he started making whatever you call that late of a lunch (linner? dunch?).

Pope was always there for me whenever I had car problems as a teenager and I am probably the only person that will listen to his stories for half a day without showing signs of fatigue. He once told me I was his friend and it meant the world to me.

So it was a little sad to me when he said he wasn’t going to work on airplanes so hard next year. I had this feeling when he said it that he was somehow letting go. If this man so focused and passionate about working with machines was going to stop, what else was there for him?

But still, there was something beautiful in all his stories, the good parts and even the tragic parts of losing his wife and two sons.

If you learned anything from this blog, I hope it is, just live. Enjoy your life and make it the best one you can have.

That is about it then, this concludes my final blog post…

…of this year!

I just noticed I have 9 subscribers. Even counting myself as one of them we are almost in the double digits! I couldn’t let down the multitude by just giving up, could I? Who are you all anyway? I know 3 coworkers from SUCCESS. Maybe a cousin or two.