Personal
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Dolly Levi, You are a Damned Exasperating Woman
A few months ago, we were trying to settle on a movie to watch on a Saturday night. After perusing Disney+ for a few minutes, we settled on Hello, Dolly!. Ashley had seen the movie, but I had not. I was aware of the cultural significance of the musical and its reference in Wall•e, which has been a family favorite for years.
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Birdhouse
Twitter seems to be in trouble. I have to ask myself, “Why do you care?” I haven’t been an active user on the platform in over six years. When I made the deliberate choice to check out of Twitter, I made my account private, uninstalled the application from my phone, and abstained from posting to the site. I have considered deactivating my account over the years, but have resisted the urge. What if I want to resume using it? This is doubtful, especially in its current state.
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Stuff
We are currently having improvements made on our home. The drywall has needed repairs since we moved in. We neglected to have the work done before moving in due to the time commitment of finding someone to perform the work while managing a move at the same time. This is much needed maintenance and I will be happy once it is complete. However, the journey to that completion has been a slog.
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Separation Failures
Over the last eight months or so, I’ve had difficulty separating work from my personal life. I have been unable to disconnect, which has left me with a low level hum of anxiety as a constant companion. To be clear, I am not working all the time; rather, I just carry work with me without release, no empty space to occupy my thoughts when I’m off the clock. I have been unable to sit in the moment in my downtime, unable to just enjoy or relax.
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One Year
We recently celebrated Adelaide’s first birthday. It is simultaneously difficult to believe that she has already been with us for a full year and that there was ever a time that she was not with us. There have been some tough moments. However, this year has been quite fulfilling. We are now in that phase where she is developing her own personality and her own mannerisms. I love watching her progress. I adore her.
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Resolutions
I typically do not set resolutions for myself. I believe that most resolutions are destined to fail. However, Ashley promptly asked me what my resolutions were for the new year. After a year in which I mostly focused on “hanging on”, I decided it was probably a good idea to set resolutions for myself for 2021. Without further adieu, here are my resolutions for 2021, why I chose them, and how I plan on achieving them.
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Fading Childhood
Ashley was helping Max cast while fishing this weekend. As she went to cast, Max leaned forward. Instinctively, she released the fishing pole to catch him. The pole was flung into the water. I watched with dismay as his Lightning McQueen fishing pole slowly faded into the murky water. I briefly considered diving in after it, but noticed the line was still in the boat. I yelled for Ashley to hand me the line. As I started to pull in the line, I immediately realized I was simply pulling the line out of the reel; the catch mechanism had not been triggered and I was unspooling the line. I started to get anxious. Max started to cry. As Ashley consoled him, I carefully pulled the line up. I hoped the line was tied-off correctly and would not simply come completely unwound, leaving the pole to continue its descent. Finally, I could see the pole at the top of the water. I kept pulling, but could not get it to come up high enough out of the water to grab it from the boat. Panic was setting in. I knew the end of the line was coming. Thankfully, enough of the pole breached the surface and I was able to rescue the fishing pole from meeting a cold, wet resting place.
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The Winter Classic
I’ve been meaning to write this post since January. However, with Adelaide’s birth, followed by the pandemic, the abhorrent murder of George Floyd, and the inspiring Black Lives Matter protests, I have felt overwhelmed. My experiences and life seemed inconsequential. I have had the feeling that my blog does not contribute to the current world. Truthfully, it most likely does not.
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Video Games in Quarantine
We have tried to avoid allowing Max to use tablets, computers, or video games. Ashley and I were in agreement from the start: we did not like the idea of Max spending his time playing on a tablet or playing video games. We eventually made concessions for long trips (whether it be for car rides or air travel). Then came kindergarten, where use of tablets and computers became semi-frequent as our public school system adopted this technology for testing. It irked me, but I was not going to move Max to a new school over it.
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Backyard Camping
Max has been asking to go camping for awhile now. We waited a few weeks for good weather. This weekend was the best weather, overnight, that we could ask for: overnight lows would be in the 60s. Additionally, it would be dry. This was our weekend.
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