Before I actually started writing this – I went back a year to see what I was writing about then, and December of years before.
I actually LOL’d.
Many of the things I was trying to figure out then, I am still trying to figure out now. But at the same time, as much as things have stayed the same – many things have changed.
A year ago,
We had just found out we were going to be grandparents, we lived in Edmonton, Alberta, and there was no end in sight for the journey with the military.
and now –
We have a grandson, we live just outside Halifax, Nova Scotia, and we know the date that I must be retired from the military by.
The biggest thing I notice on the social media feed recently is the “next year is gonna be……”.
I have mentioned in the past that I figured my world can’t go downhill from previous years, but I am not one of those people that makes resolutions or statements that really don’t withstand reality.
I have a friend who says that he makes a resolution to keep doing what he did last year, just try and do it better.
So, I want to do things more as a catch-up on the big milestones of 2018.
January saw the final 3 rounds of BCG treatments, and the start of the “monitoring” phase, which will last for the rest of my life. Discussions with the Doc were direct – with Bladder Cancer having a very high recurrence rate, it won’t become “if” it comes back, it becomes about “when” it comes back. Most patients don’t live long enough to see the Cancer return, as the median age of diagnosis is 73.
Within the last day or two of April, I got told there was some paperwork at the base for me, I went to pick it up the day before we flew to Halifax for the baby shower. It was my “disclosure package”. This was the information that they were using to make the big career make or break decision. I was given a few weeks to offer any additional information that I felt should be included in the decision making process.
I sent my response May 14th.
I had a reply in the first week of June.
I was to be medically released from the military, no later than 3 years from date it was signed in Ottawa.
About a week later, I received the posting message that directed me to move to the Halifax area to go back to work on a period of retention prior to release.
That was when the chaos started.
Get the house appraised, interview and select a realtor, get the house listed for sale, start finding out what the real estate market in Halifax was like, start all the many hoops to jump through that are necessary to move almost 80% of the distance across the continent.
It wasn’t the first time we have done a long move, but this one was accelerated in quite a manner in order to take advantage of the short summer “house selling” season.
July our grandson arrived, we flew out to meet him, and by the first week of August – had bought a house.
August was a whirlwind of goodbyes, visits, friends, and family.
The moving truck came, packed up our stuff and we hit the road Labour day weekend for a 10 day drive to the Atlantic ocean.
September was move in, unload, unpack, start going back to work.
October was busy chasing the many appointments and getting everything set up with the new support systems, meeting up with all the friendly connections, and just getting settled.
November was my first Cystoscopy in Halifax – it went well.
December was our first christmas back, and the first chance to actually relax for a few days.
Whew – there, everyone should be caught up now.
As mentioned, I haven’t really been one to make resolutions – I have too much change going on in my world right now to be able to predict what would actually happen anyway.
I have many other things starting next week – but I will be posting next week about all those things too.
In a parting thought – I want to leave you with something that just came across my feed today.
Tim Ferriss – might be a name some people know, I have mentioned him before that I follow his blog, listen to his podcast etc. Anyway, today a really interesting “year in review” post came out that I feel is worth sharing.
This blog post is worth a read. It is a different way of reviewing your past year, to make decisions (that I won’t call resolutions) that should ensure you have a great new year.
Well, as always – thanks for reading this far.
I know that I have rambled on and off topic for 4 years now (this is blog post #92), and I appreciate those that have joined me on this journey.
Be sure to subscribe, or check back in a couple weeks to hear about all the things that are on the rails for 2019.
– Rob
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