Goodbye 2018, onto 2019

It’s New Year’s Eve and I’m sitting in the Target parking lot with two sleeping kids while Liz shops. She’s buying extremely exciting shit like a trash can, microwave, and picture hanging materials for our new house. Yep, we are moving again. 

We have spent the last few days painfully moving everything we own from one house to the next. This is our 4th move in 11 years. We moved to our first home in Baltimore in 2007, 2013 to Arnold, Maryland, 2016 to California, and this transition…still in California and only 3 houses down from our current one. For the 2 moves prior to this one, one of us was pregnant. Although our last move was across the country it was fairly seamless. My company paid for it so everything was packed, boxed, and moved for us. We got onto an airplane and 10 days later had our stuff. 

This one has been a 2 woman operation. We hired a moving company for 3 hours to move all of our really heavy furniture but everything else has been us. It’s always mind boggling to me how people accumulate so much crap stuff. There are some things that mean a great deal to me. My dad’s oak sideboard, a framed map of Baltimore that Liz gave me when we first started dating, a painting my grandfather gifted me of an old Scottish castle, a map of Bald Head Island and the Frying Pan Shoals, my dad’s old racing helmet, and all the pictures of my family hanging on the walls. The rest of it could perish and I would not care. It’s just stuff and I’ve learned to let go in my old age. Ha. 

If nothing else…moving at the end of the year forces you to reflect on life more than you are already inclined to do at the end of a chapter. Tragedy struck families close to ours more times than I’d like to count. This summer my very good work friend and mentor died a few days after beginning treatment for blood cancer, a friend of my brother’s from back in Maryland was senselessly gunned down working on at a model home. He had a wife and two young kids and it seems the motive was to make money off of his laptop and cell phone. A friend of ours here in California lost her brother on December 20th. He was night surfing and they think he had a heart attack. He left behind two young kids and a wife as well. Even though I was not directly impacted by these deaths the pain of losing my own Dad in December just before Christmas is always just below the surface. My heart aches for these families that will never be the same.

And there have been peaks as well…a little boy in our community who was fighting for his life due to an e-coli related virus turned a corner and was released from the hospital. So many people donated blood or platelets in this boy’s honor that I have to believe that many lives were saved from those donations. Our best friend had her second baby, a little boy named Ryder. They are healthy and I can’t wait to meet him. So life is gut wrenching and beautiful all at once.

In 2018 we had our fair share of trials and tribulations…more health scares from Christian and still no solid answers. We had 2 surgeries between 3 kids in less than an 8 week span. Nothing prepares you for watching your child as he is wheeled away to the surgery table. Liz’s dads health took a turn for the worst. He was diagnosed with PSP (a much more rare and degenerative disease than Parkinson’s) and he is now in a nursing home for Veterans in Pennsylvania. My uncle was diagnosed with cancer. 

I have never been one to say good riddance to a year because it would feel strange to wish away the good that came with the bad. Although this year was close…there was still plenty of good. Christian started walking and running in 2018. He is talking up a storm and getting bigger and stronger every day. Gabe started Kindergarten and is literally crushing it. He’s working hard and is immersed in learning. I’ve always said the kid could cure cancer if we could just channel his energy. McKay is reading and loving first grade. We get compliments from teachers, coaches, and neighbors on what a kind, polite boy he is. It’s still one of the things that makes me most proud as a mom.

Liz got picked to be on a specialized unit on her team at work, which should make 2019 a more fulfilling year for her. I made it through my first year in HR and earned A-list or elite status in just about every travel rewards program I’m signed up for. I’m still debating whether that’s an accomplishment or depressing based on the amount I had to be away from my family to earn these rewards. We took two kick ass vacations…one to Mexico just the 5 of us and one to Bald Head with my sisters in law and their girls. I would kill for more time with them because I’m obsessed with the bond of cousins. 

For 2019 my biggest wish is for health…for my family immediate & extended. I want answers or a cure for Christian’s health conundrum. I wish for less travel for me. I want to be more connected to others and less attached to my phone and social media. I wish for more peace in the world and a less divided country. More love, more tolerance…and so much less hate.

Liz and I want to get out for more dates and get in shape again. McKay and Gabe resolved to learn to play the piano this year and watch lots of movies. Christian resolved to play at the park.

Happy New Year from the Biswolds. Thank you for your love and support this year. We felt it from near and far. Peace out 2018, thanks for the memories!