“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” Zora Neale Hurston
and i dare say this year was a bit of both. was recently accused by my nearest and dearest of hiding behind an illusion of a perfect life. uh, my life is far from perfect but the gory bits don't make for very good reading. also, there's enough sadness in the world, why add to the maelstrom? but i do see where they're coming from and value their take on things. so in the interest of honesty, this year was not without its challenges but so glad to be on the other side of things now.
thematically - before this degenerates into a poorly-disguised list of the holidays we've taken (guilty!), it's been a year of getting comfortable with uncertainty. i'm the sort of person who needs advance warning because i take more time to get used to changes. being with the mister has certainly changed that and i can be spontaneous if he gives me enough notice. not having visibility nor knowing where he / i / we will be in 6, 12, 18 etc months never fails to send me into a tizzy. but this year has been fraught with uncertainty and i've slowly grown to let go and let God. it's a deepening trust and strengthening faith, one i sort of let slide the previous years. it's been a time of investing in relationships and i've enjoyed every moment with family and friends. as life gets more busy, it's about making time and not excuses, about prioritising those important and not letting that get lost in the daily blur. i'm constantly grateful for a coterie of girlfriends who are only an anguished text away with tea and sympathy (usually virtual!) at the ready. hope that i, too, have been that to them and given as good as i've gotten. also appreciative that family is in good health, being in healthcare and seeing illness on a daily basis, i'm reminded at every turn that it's not something to take for granted because it's never a given. am cautiously optimistic about the year ahead, it's a phrase we've used much more in recent weeks, and can finally say with certainty that something great is about to happen.
thematically - before this degenerates into a poorly-disguised list of the holidays we've taken (guilty!), it's been a year of getting comfortable with uncertainty. i'm the sort of person who needs advance warning because i take more time to get used to changes. being with the mister has certainly changed that and i can be spontaneous if he gives me enough notice. not having visibility nor knowing where he / i / we will be in 6, 12, 18 etc months never fails to send me into a tizzy. but this year has been fraught with uncertainty and i've slowly grown to let go and let God. it's a deepening trust and strengthening faith, one i sort of let slide the previous years. it's been a time of investing in relationships and i've enjoyed every moment with family and friends. as life gets more busy, it's about making time and not excuses, about prioritising those important and not letting that get lost in the daily blur. i'm constantly grateful for a coterie of girlfriends who are only an anguished text away with tea and sympathy (usually virtual!) at the ready. hope that i, too, have been that to them and given as good as i've gotten. also appreciative that family is in good health, being in healthcare and seeing illness on a daily basis, i'm reminded at every turn that it's not something to take for granted because it's never a given. am cautiously optimistic about the year ahead, it's a phrase we've used much more in recent weeks, and can finally say with certainty that something great is about to happen.
we ended 2014 in the atacama desert overlooking geyser del tatio, the world's highest geyser, then saw new year's in in santiago. through much scheming and many a cunning plan, i managed to line up my fourth year placements in central london. was pleased as punch to be in zone one for the entire year because i don't like commuting. i mean, who does?! also, it's not often the stars align for convenience of medsch travel so i was gonna enjoy it while it lasted. being able to walk to work was a godsend and one i did not take for granted. speaking of God, the mister and i attended a marriage course (okok, we half attended it because we're so bad at consistency haha) but it was good and i'd recommend it to anyone. couples need to be married for more than two years before being able to sign up but they seemed pretty chilled out about it, marriage wasn't a pre-requisite either which struck me as unusual for a 'marriage course' but hey, props for being inclusive. we didn't attend a marriage prep course before tying the knot because he was finishing up in singers and i was a freshie. also the nice icelandic reverend who married us met us the day before the wedding and wasn't about to insist we'd attended a course then. better late than never? we were a bit mean though, sitting at the back and making bets on which couples would cry / storm out during the session. bad teos! but the mister's mean streak is one of the things i find most attractive about him, because being nice is never enough, and i don't want to be saddled with some pushover for life. it was also a bit scary that we signed up to improve our marriage because hey, it's a work in progress. we're far from perfect and strong marriages are intentional. but uhoh it was actually also for couples in trouble??? oops. cue occasional awkward silence. on the plus side, we played the student card and got a highly subsidised rate! be still, my parsimonious heart. the mister called me out for robbing the church. i see it as redistribution. attitude to money - also on the course agenda...
the mister spent a bit of time in NYC for class this year and when he was away i jumped at the chance for some solo travel, hopping over to barcelona for sunshine and tapas, although not in that order. we also went back to singers in march for my cousin's wedding, and he stayed on to represent at our good friends' too. lost a dear family member about the same time and the mister represented at that while i had to go back to school. went walking by the cliffs during the funeral and saw a rainbow, which was a nice touch, then had some sake in remembrance.
we were meant to go to cinque terre over easter but work drama threw a spanner in our plans. thank goodness for insurance, got back every penny, and ended up across the channel instead. yay for a car and cheap eurotunnel. while i'm partial to the south of france having spent many happy summers with J and her fam in aix, the north has its charm and is growing on me. spent the spring bank holiday long weekend back singers with the mister's classmates who were en route to shanghai for an elective. any excuse to be home, really, and thoroughly enjoyed playing tour guide. also spent a weekend in stockholm in may, my home away from home and where i lived as an undergrad.
on the family front, our dear friends asked us to be godparents to their precious little bundle. this sent me into another tizzy because if i didn't want children of my own (for now) why would i shoulder extra responsibility??? but the mister was mature and sensible, suggesting a skype four-way (he was in NYC, i was in london, father-to-be in JKT and mother-to-be in sg!) for us to talk things over. our primary concern was/is our friendship so i didn't want to be an abysmal godparent, drop the ball and buang that relationship... hey, one never knows how these things can go! having drafted terms&conditions and sussed out expectations (they'd none, we'd plenty) we decided it was something we wanted to commit to because it's a lifelong responsibility. there was also a hairy moment when D&N and the mister were on holiday in croatia together and i tried to shove morbid thoughts outta my mind because if anything happened to the trio, i'd literally be left carrying the baby. paranoia, be gone!
on the family front, our dear friends asked us to be godparents to their precious little bundle. this sent me into another tizzy because if i didn't want children of my own (for now) why would i shoulder extra responsibility??? but the mister was mature and sensible, suggesting a skype four-way (he was in NYC, i was in london, father-to-be in JKT and mother-to-be in sg!) for us to talk things over. our primary concern was/is our friendship so i didn't want to be an abysmal godparent, drop the ball and buang that relationship... hey, one never knows how these things can go! having drafted terms&conditions and sussed out expectations (they'd none, we'd plenty) we decided it was something we wanted to commit to because it's a lifelong responsibility. there was also a hairy moment when D&N and the mister were on holiday in croatia together and i tried to shove morbid thoughts outta my mind because if anything happened to the trio, i'd literally be left carrying the baby. paranoia, be gone!
summer was a whirlwind! desperately wanted to go somewhere exotic for elective but felt best to be grown up and do it half in london and half in singers. to make up for the lack of excitement (actually, protein crystallography was plenty exciting and i loved my time at the lab!), did a speedy west coast tour in between elective periods for london and singers. flew to frisco then meandered down the coast (big sur, monterey, yosemite) to beverly hills for a wedding at greystone mansion before returning to singers via tokyo. did my elective in singers but skipped town on weekends, to KL for P's wedding and to visit J&A, then phuket over the national day long weekend then hosted J&A in singers. completed the last leg of globe circumvention (SIN-LHR) had some down time in london with a quick trip to paris (yay eurostar!) before hunkering down for final year, which has been fast and furious. if all goes well, final years in may and will be a doctor by june. here's hoping!
tell a lie, one week into final year and i was climbing the walls so the mister assuaged with a spontaneous trip to copenhagen with friends. in the midst of the three week mini nightmares that are our senior rotations (obgyn, general practice, paeds, psych), we also escaped to majorca for the weekend just because. before that, he ran his first marathon (NYC!) then spent some time in boston to see the fall colours before coming back to london. the junior doctors threatened to go on strike, which meant i'd the day off even though they didn't, and we snuck away to the lakes. when the mister was in NYC for his final eMBA class, my folks were in munich and i managed to wrangle a stolen weekend with them. bummed we spent christmas apart (them in singers, us in the dolomites) but a bonus 48h together was just what i needed.
so the hard stuff i was talking about earlier? the mister's got a new job! it's been some time coming and hm being the big nerds we are, we talked about life after lawsch on our first date. he wanted to be a consultant with X, and i wanted to be a doctor. then we both laughed at how ridiculous we were. more than eight years later and in an extraordinary turn of events, he's been offered a position at X. wish i could take credit and say that it was all planned and everything he's done since lawsch has led him there, but it wasn't. in fact, he'd forgotten all about it until the recruitment opportunity arose when X started visiting bschool. so in a way, he had to go there to get here, and through it all we see God's goodness and grace. if someone had told me at the beginning of the year that the mister would be an X consultant by october, i'd have thought they were out of their mind. because X is literally the hardest company to get into in the world. well, X and goldman. thank you, God.
2016 is going to be exciting! the mister's done really well and will graduate twice (once in NYC, one in london) while i hopefully pass finals and also graduate. the mister, overperforming and overshadowing me since 2007.
thank you for coming by, and for making your way through this self-indulgent post. i do love recounting the year and counting blessings big and small. wishing you good endings and better beginnings, merry christmas and a happy new year X
thank you for coming by, and for making your way through this self-indulgent post. i do love recounting the year and counting blessings big and small. wishing you good endings and better beginnings, merry christmas and a happy new year X
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