Blatherskite

Let’s just face it. 2008 sucked. Big time. And not just for me, it sucked for almost everyone I know. I am so ready to just move on. But first, I thought I would take a look back at the past year. Let’s look at the laundry list of suckage, if you will.

1. The bad news started in October of 2007, really. With the untimely death of my step-brother. I didn’t really talk about it here in detail and I won’t go into detail now because thinking about it makes me sad. It was really horrible. My aunt died a couple of weeks later when she went in to have surgery. That was also really awful, obviously.
2. The year started at the end January with “the great snowstorm of winter 2008” (hoo boy, if I knew then what I know now) When we came back from San Jose I was in shock at the amount of snow that was on the ground. I mean, the trees in our backyard were bent in half! At the time, I had never seen anything like it.  (As and aside, I can’t believe I took this picture a week later! It was already melting a week later? sigh.)
3. In February (actually on my dad’s birthday) I got hit by a car while I was crossing the street on my way to work. Thankfully, I was okay. I was banged up a bit but I was o.k. I have been kind of twitchy regarding cars and crossing streets and parking lots. When I am crossing at a crosswalk I do not cross until the cars have stopped. And when they are slowing down to stop I don’t even trust them. I make eye contact with the driver of the car and stare him down so I know he/she actually sees me crossing the street. In other words, I do not trust cars. Ever.
4. March was, relatively, uneventful (thank god) but, looking back, I really got tired of snow. I mean, it snowed on the first day of Spring! Stupid Mother Nature. Oh, and I turned 39. The last year of my thirties. which isn’t really a bad thing.
5. In May I had a REALLY creepy experience with my massage therapist which pisses me off to this day. In fact, I was telling someone about it this morning. The sad thing is that I would really love to see an massage therapist right now because my freaking back is freaking killing because of all of this mother effing show shoveling I’ve been doing but because of the bad experience I had with this moron I’m hesitant.
6. In June My kneecap popped out of its socket during a hike in the middle of a forest in Idaho. Also, I almost got hit by a car again while crossing an interestion to catch a bus.  Oh, and it fucking snowed. In June.
7. July included probably one of the worst days of my life. Again, can’t go into any details but it was not pretty.
8. In October my husband’s cousin passed away. He was not much older than me. We both felt really sad about it. He had his problems but I really liked the guy and felt really bad about his death.
9. October was also the month of The Sickness. I started getting a sore throat while working at the annual Spokane is Spelling spelling bee. I helped all of the kids get onto the stage and directed them off of the stage. When I think about how sick I got and how many kids I probably infected it makes me hang my head. poor kids. I ended up actually completely losing my voice. It was gone for about a week. I had to actually write notes to people because I literally could not talk. It was really weird.
10. November probably was the worst month of all. The Friday before Thanksgiving my step-dad had emergency brain surgery to remove a tumor the size of a golf ball from his frontal lobe. We found out he has lung cancer and that it had spread to his brain. I can’t imagine hearing about anything worse than that. The worst news I have ever gotten in my life. That weekend was filled with despair and worry, and then relief when he made it out of surgery o.k.
11. December? I have one word. Snow. omyfuckinggod the snow. And to think that this all started only two weeks ago. I read in an article that in December alone we have gotten almost 60 inches of snow just this month alone! And you have to realize, that this has only been in the last two weeks! Way back in January I had no idea what a lot of snow is. The past two weeks have been absolutely insane. It’s actually getting kind of frightening. There are roofs collapsing all over town, including one at a supermarket and one at a gym. It’s really not a good situation.

Of course, it hasn’t been all bad. There have been some good things:

1. I was in the media all over the place this year. Strangely, I didn’t really blog much about it. In January there was an article written about my mom and I regarding her watercolor painting and my photography. My picture was also in the paper to coincide with an aritcle about the Summer Reading Program. I was also in a little “commercial” for local public television that featured the library and how it helped students. And again I was in a commercial for a local television station’s “success by six” program in which I read a little bit of a picture book for a group of preschool kids. It was kind of fun being in the spotlight :). I actually had people come up to me saying, “I saw you on t.v.”
2. My photos were in a little gallery showing (well, at a coffee house in the middle of nowhere) along with my mom. I actually sold 3 pieces. That was a wonderful ego boost.
3. We went on some fun trips! We went to San Jose at the end of January, to Wallace Falls in June and Long Beach in March and August.
4. I’ve been really enjoying learning about the principles of Zen. It has actually helped me get through a lot of rough times this past year.
5. Obama won! This was such a huge relief. When I think about it I just feel a huge wave of relief roll over me. I know that he is going to be a fantastic president.

So what else is there to say? This has been a challenging year. I’m ready for something less dramatic in the upcoming months. Goodbye 2008!

Hope you all have a happy and safe new year!