2003 -- it was a very good year


Well, it was a year anyways. I was going to do one of those newspaper-y style wrap-ups, like the Best & Worst thing they do in The Parade every year. I love that. Or the breakdown the paper usually does of all the major goings on from every month.

The trouble is that my life isn't really all that exciting. And I could go over the "best" things and there would be lots of gushing about getting engaged and how much I just loves my Daddy... And I do, but even I know that gets old and it's not like he's got a blog out there talking about how great I am every other day. And no, my ego is NOT big enough already!

The thing that I think though, repeatedly, is that I'm lucky. Lucky to have had a fairly uneventful year and still wind up feeling fairly content at the end of it. Lots fatter, lots poorer, but still lucky.

Sidenote: had a meeting with one of the directors today to discuss the new management re-design project. The shortest version is that they're doing a restructure of all of the managers jobs so that they can in turn focus more on helping out us peons on the floor and help make our lives better. The directors are meeting with just a few people from each skill group and my director recommended me as a good candidate for this chat. I was mildly honored, as I should have been. (Once a corporate suck-up...) So, we're in this meeting and talking off the subject somewhat (what, you Heather? Off the subject? NO!) and got to talking about how there have been SO many changes this year and how it's just been crazy. I said that it was obviously harder on the more tenured folks because they had grown more accustomed to how things were, whereas new people don't know WHAT to expect so if things just start changing all the time -- that's what we come to expect. We were changing our lives just by starting new jobs anyways. Apparently, there was a segment on NPR just this morning (I've really got to figure out which station that is) on a similar subject line... The short of THAT was that companies are trying to figure out a way to reward employees for doing a good job without creating an environment of entitlement to those benefits...

And here's where we get back to my year end wrap... The entitlement. The dictionary gives a secondary definition as "To furnish with a right or claim to something" and I guess this can take on a negative connotation when those rights are assumed and not earned. I never want to feel as though I am entitled to the good fortune I have had. I am not. I work, not HARD, but I do work for those things. That's why I do veer down these paths so often of waxing rhapsodic about how lucky I feel for the things I have in my life. I am lucky, I am blessed. I frequently have glimpses into how things could have gone in another direction. I try to be cognizant of that always and that is what keeps me on my toes. I have no rights or claims on happiness -- the simplest big or little thing could easily take away my house of cards and I try to keep that in my mind. I choose to be happy, but happy doesn't always choose to be me!

So, 2003 was the year we got engaged and the year I went back to school (and don't forget got an A!) and started blogging and had close friends move away and made new friends and the year I refinanced my mortgage and finally got rid of the last tie to my exhusband and discovered wine... I can't think of anything else, but it was a very good year.

Hope to continue with good fortunes into 2004 and wishing the same for y'all.

love & kisses,
HP