I’m generally not one for New Years. Almost every year I can think of I always feel as if there was so much not completed in a year that it is hard to celebrate its passing. The end of a year has felt like the end of an opportunity. This’s ear is different. It wasn’t a perfect year, but I am not a perfect person and I don’t see how this year could have been more fulfilling. Not only has a lot been accomplished, but most of those accomplishments have plenty of room for growth. What do I mean by that?
Take for instance my novel. It is finished, published and successfully crowd funded. I could mean that the growth is receiving the printed volumes and shipping them to contributors, and that is incredibly important to me, but that is not what I mean. Of course one area of growth is just in quality of writing. I am very proud of Deadly Troubadours. I think it is a noble first novel. But I do want the second novel to be better. Maybe a little longer. With fewer typos at the time of release. But I also want to handle the business side much better. Looking back on things I have realized that everything I did was pretty much in the opposite order. Whoops. Only thing to do is learn from it and do better next time.
Also, this year I became a father. Talk about unlocking a prestige class. Even though I’ve only been a father for seven and a half months, I’d like to think I’m doing a good job. But I’m pretty sure this is something that is never mastered. I can always do better, not just in directly interacting with my son, but in the example I set for him. Being more proactive with cleaning and chores and cooking. He is going to learn from my actions so I need to make sure the lessons are correct ones.
At the beginning of the year work was one of the things that I was least hopeful about. Now, I am surprised at how hopeful I am. I really do like teaching and am at a school that values its teachers and am surrounded by good people working hard for our students. And I do think I can further that sense of community for this school while learning to be a better teacher. And not only that, but I am a part of the community at my camp job and I want to continue to be so. Really the hardest aspect of those jobs is they are both technically part-time or seasonal positions with comes with some flexibility but also a lack of stability. I’ll admit to being curious as to which, if either, of these positions might try to win me over to a more secure future, but I doubt that will be part of 2016.
Lastly, I’ve been working on my health. This is a part of my life I’m not exactly comfortable talking about. I’ve been heavy for almost as long as I can remember. As an adult my weight has fluctuacted to as low as 225 to as high as 270. When you learn you are going to be a father many thoughts go through your head. Early among those thoughts was that I don’t want to be a Fat Dad. I don’t want to be exhausted after five minutes of playing with my son. I have been trying to change my lifestyle to a healthier one. I don’t want to diet. I want to be healthy. Since my son was born I have lost 20 pounds. In the upcoming year I want to lose 20 more.
These are the big ticket items from the past year that have made it a standout year. There are other things that either need to be redoubled or just simple started in 2016 to make it an awesome year. I’ll visit with those tomorrow and see if I can find a way to add more hours to the day. But now I’m tick-rocking closer to the end of this year and can only Tim about how it has been an exceptional one.
Deadly Troubadour 