2014 in Review

The potential for rapid change is always amazing to me. A winning lottery ticket or a car careening into oncoming traffic can forever change the course of someone’s life. While this past year didn’t hold anything nearly that drastic, it was a year of upheaval. It began with despondency, was filled with uncertainty, but fortunately ended in hopeful resolution.

Last January, I was in the doldrums of my professional career. I was stuck in a teaching job I abhorred, but was still struggling to admit that I needed out. Now, 2015 dawns with a new career outside of the classroom, in an administrative position at Harvard. Between then and now: finishing up my last year of middle school; trying to balance my teaching job with a new job search; making ends meet with menial temp work for 5 months; spending my free time applying to -and getting rejected from- hundreds of jobs… and finally, after 9 months of searching, landing the full time gig where I am now.

Of course, my professional life was not the only thing that was gestating over the course of last year, as I am currently 3 weeks away from welcoming my first child into the world. This also is something that I couldn’t have predicted last January. Our baby wasn’t unexpected for lack of trying; after years of loss and countless disappointing doctor’s visits, I began to wonder if fatherhood was in my future at all. So, seeing how hope was in short supply this time last year, it is amazing that now I spend my evenings mapping out little kicks inside my wife’s belly.

2014 started out as the culmination of three very difficult years in which stress and anxiety was the predominant tone. 2015 seems to begin with a different color palette altogether.