Resound11 Prompt 1: One Word

I posted for 31 days last December using the Reverb10 prompts. While the original creators of those prompts are not doing them this year, another person has stepped up and I'm going to follow along. I really enjoyed reflecting on my year last year and hope to have a similar fun experience this year. Without further ado the first prompt:

What is one word to describe your 2011? Why does that word sum up your year?

A lot like last year, I'd be willing to bet a lot of these posts are going to be focused on being a dad because it's probably still the biggest thing going on in my life right now. My wife is due with our second child at the end of January so 2012 is going to be similar as well.

One word to describe 2011 for me is discovery. It was a year of discovery for my entire family, as well as a year of personal discovery for myself. While this is true every year, it felt especially true this year.

My daughter Abigail entered 2011 as a 8 month old infant, and is emerging from 2011 as a 20 month old toddler. The difference between those two points, as I'm sure those of you with children know, is HUGE. She is in full-on discovery mode right now and that has been fun to watch and experience.

Watching her discover what makes the world tick, the common language that we employ, and proper behaviors in the right context has been really interesting. Her brain is just absorbing and picking up all these new things, and doing a pretty good job of it. It's amazing how quickly they go from drooling baby to curious toddler that picks up on more things, understands conversations, and starts formulating words to express her feelings.

My personal discovery has revolved mostly around my career and job, and my wife and I have continued to explorer where we want to go with our lives. There's been a number of events that have occurred with my job and career that have caused me to pause and re-evaluate what I really want to do in the long term and that's been filled with discovery on several different fronts, a process that is ongoing and will continue into 2012.

Reverb 10 - Day 31 - Core Story

Core story. What central story is at the core of you, and how do you share it with the world?

I am a father, a husband, and a friend. I try to balance all of these things, but the father/husband part took precedence this year. These things give me purpose in my life. I haven't always had a lot of purpose in my post-college adult life, I've gone through periods where I didn't feel it as much. But I've never felt it more strongly than this year.

I noticed a couple of days ago on Twitter that many people were complaining about 2010 being a bad year for them. I can say nothing but the opposite, it was a great year, one of my best. I'm very happy with my life right now and having a purpose and living towards achieving that purpose is one of the big reasons why that is the case.

Of the three things, being a father is the newest adventure for me, and it's one that I look forward to continuing in the years to come. My daughter is a great joy. She is a wonderful young lady, already so full of happiness and smiles from an early age. I love seeing her grow and develop and being there for her when she's having a bad day (and she does).

I love my beautiful wife dearly and being married to her has been a great thing in my life. She is my best-friend, my life partner, my closest companion, and the person I spend the most time with. She knows me very well - we've been together 10 years, married for 5. Not all of that time has been flowers and sunshine between us, but the last year has been really magical in our marriage. Being able to share the joy of parenting with her has only strengthened us as a couple. My wife knows my strong suits and quirks very well, and she also knows what I don't like. We complement each other amazing well.

I've had a lot of friends over the years and people have come and gone, but the core group of people in my life at this time are great. All of them are very understanding about the demands my family places on me at the present time and I really appreciate that (some of them have their own family demands too!). I want to be better about reaching out to people to see how they are doing - it is admittedly something I'm terrible at lately, but may things continue to be great in the coming years with my friends.

2010 was a great year and I look forward to a 2011 filled with just as much fun, awesomeness, love and understanding.

2010 Wrapup

A brief interlude from the rest of repeat nation 2010 Reverb 2010 to bring you this, my 2010 wrapup. I used to post these on my Livejournal but figured more people would catch it here nowadays.

Hat tip to Chele and Jenni for bringing this up, as they usually do.

1. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before?

Had a baby (and everything centered around it)
Cooked Thanksgiving dinner from scratch
Saw an outdoor MLB game in Minnesota (Target Field - Twins)


2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions and will you make more for next year?
I didn't do any last year, but some are floating around for next year. Not enough to commit to it, but loosely, I need to lose some weight and reign in the spending.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Well, besides us, we had many friends that gave birth - Mandy and Tom, Jim and Colleen, Rebecca and Julian, Katie's cousin Kirsten, Bridget and Tom, and I'm sure there's others I'm forgetting. Most of these babies made it to our house for our housewarming party too. Great fun.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No. But lots of my friends and co-workers seem to have had this in their families.

5. What countries did you visit?
Nowhere else. I traveled once by plane this year, a just completed trip to North Carolina. Babies, you know.

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
Can't think of too much, but more of a social life would be nice. Using opportunities to get out of the house.

7. What dates from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
April 29-birth of my daughter
July 4th - my birthday and fun baseball game at Target field with awesome seats.
December 11 - Crazy Blizzard!

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Becoming a father, and making good strides in my career.

9. What was your biggest failure?
I don't like this question. The word failuresucks. Besides, it's all relative.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing too serious, I did have a bad cold in October/November that lead to some additional medical investigation, which showed nothing serious.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
iPhone 4. Hands down. Doesn't really ever leave my side for too long. Best gadget I've ever owned. I think Katie would agree with this for herself. I want to get the next gen iPad really bad. Damn Apple!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
My wife for being an amazing mother while holding down a full time job (and then some). My friends for being awesome and understanding.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Without being too specific, certain members of my family. Not so much appalled as depressed though.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Our house, stuff for Abigail and savings/investments. We did pretty good on the last one despite all the additional expense.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Starting to see the potential in what our house could be and realizing that it's good enough for us to live in for a while even as is. Living in Minneapolis is very exciting for numerous reasons and I'm still really excited about moving there more than a year later.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
Serious answer: The Cave by Mumford and Sons. Pretty much that entire album, in fact.
Funny Answer: Whip My Hair by Willow Smith (I had to look up who that was by)

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Happier
ii. thinner or fatter? about the same
iii. richer or poorer? richer in more ways than just monetary

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Staying organized, donating more time and money

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Being anxious and worrying about things I have little to no control over.

20. How did you be spending Christmas?
At my parents house in North Carolina. It was Abby's first out of state airplane trip and she did really well. We had a great time. And there was snow there. More than I cared to see.

21. Did you fall in love in 2010?
I fell more in love with my wife if that's possible and I fell in love with a beautiful baby girl named Abigail.

22. What was your favorite TV program?
Survivor: Heros vs Villians. Great stuff. Unfortunately, the followup, Nicaragua, was one of the worst ever.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year
I don't remember this question from previous years, but I'd say no. I don't really hate, I just forget about people. Easier that way.

24. What was the best book you read?
I didn't read that many this year, but I really liked In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. Really got me thinking about how I could eat better, cut processed crap out of my diet and inspired me to join a CSA.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery of 2010?
Mumford and Sons, hands down. Oh, and that I could actually tolerate MGMT when I was in certain moods and (gasp!) even enjoy it - had dismissed them earlier in their careers.

26. What did you want and get?
Iphone.

27. What did you want and not get?  
Lots of stuff, mostly gadgets and computer related

28. What was your favorite film of this year? 
Inception

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?  
I turned 32. We went to a Twins Game while my in-laws watched Abby. It was one of Katie's first times away from her for more than an hour or two.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Less snow. We got dumped on hard.


31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
About the same as it's been. Probably out-dated.

32. What kept you sane? 
My daughter and my wife


33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I don't really know. The Situation from Jersey Shore?


Kidding. I can't really think of anybody serious.

34. What political issue stirred you the most? 
Healthcare and the tax situation. And the fucking clown Republicans acting the fool. (and even sometimes the Dems doing the same, honestly).

35. Who did you miss?
Granddad Wyker. I always miss him. 


36. Who was the best new person you met? 
A couple of my co-workers that have been cool to work with.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010?'
It's not all about you, in fact, very little of it is about you.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.  

Baby beluga in the deep blue sea,
Swim so wild and you swim so free.
Heaven above and the sea below,
And a little white whale on the go.

 

Reverb 10 - Day 8 - Beautifully Different

Beautifully different. Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different - you'll find they're what make you beautiful.

OK, so the other day after I posted one of my Reverb 10 posts, I saw a comment on Twitter from someone that linked to me that people should support the men doing this because there aren't many of them. It didn't occur to me when I signed up for this that it might be the case, but in retrospect, this makes sense.

So here's the first topic where I had an adverse reaction upon reading - what the heck am I going to write here. No offense ladies, but this is kind of a chicky topic. I'm perfectly capable of writing about my feelings in public, but there's a line, and this comes close to it. Almost a little too kumbaya for me.

So after two paragraphs of protest, I'll tell you what I think. I think what makes me a unique person is my sense of humor, my analytical skills, and my easy going nature which gives me the ability to empathize and forgive easily.

I am kind of a joker - but I often have a very dry wit and can be really sarcastic. Sometimes I'm sarcastic to the point where people don't understand that I am being sarcastic. (usually on Twitter when there's often no context or tone). I like to make people laugh. A big thing with my daughter right now is getting her to laugh. She'll squeal, but ongoing laughter has mostly alluded me thus far, and this is one of my goals.

Analytically, I'm a good problem solver, and I'm geared well towards careers that involve a lot of analytical capability. In my personal life, I build complex budgets and debt snowball models which I'm constantly updated in Excel. I'm hoping to parlay this ability into building some things for my home - I keep watching This Old House and thinking - "I could do this" when they show various re-modeling tasks that I haven't previously conquered.

As far as my easy going nature goes, I think this really helps me from going to the loony bin and it's really how I stay leveled. My wife and I balance each other out - while her mind races, I'm able to put things out of mind and relax, and show her how to do this. I am really good at empathizing and seeing things from other people's point of views, sometimes almost to a fault.

So I don't know that these things are different from a lot of people, but they are my traits that I think set me apart. My competitive advantage, so-to-speak.