Another Year Over

I failed at blogging weekly. I'm not going to say I didn't have time, that would be a cop out. What I will say is that I need to improve my time management skills and reprioritize a bit. That said, I intend for this post to be a sort of reflection of the past year, so perhaps from that those of you who are disappointed in the frequency of this blog will feel at least a bit of sympathy for me. Before I get into that, however, I would like to mention that I will be participating in a blog style round table discussion of Clausewitz' "On War". More details can be found here with the schedule and format of the discussion here. I hope I can contribute intelligently. With that, let's get right to the year in review or things I learned:

1. Fishing can be fun. I used to hate fishing. Sitting around for hours for a minute or two of excitement was never my thing. My father-in-law took us to Northern Minnesota this spring however and changed my mind. I've never caught so many fish. It may have just been that we were in the right place at the right time, but I think there is more to it. My father-in-law knows the lakes we were fishing, so he knew where the good spots were. He gets as impatient as I do, and perhaps more-so, so we moved if we didn't see any signs of activity. I also think that we happened to hit the lakes at a good time, but what do I know? I look forward to going back again soon, and I would be willing to give fishing in this area another look, though I'm not sure I'd want to eat what I caught around here.

2. If you really like your job, and care about what you do, doing what is best for the organisation comes before everything else, even preservation of said job. There were some rocky patches at the University this year, and some shake-ups in the department. It caused me to stand back and reflect. Knowing that there is not much upward mobility in my position, I could leave for something with more growth potential, keep my head down and go with the flow, or speak up and do what's right, even if no one else likes it. I decided option three was the best course. If I get fired for doing the right thing, so be it. It just puts back at option one. That sounds really dramatic. It wasn't as exciting as it looks, no heavy ethical issues or anything. I just don't want to get into a long, boring story that most people don't care about. Mat is not a hero.

3. It could always be worse, material objects don't mean much, it's your health that matters, grass is always greener... etc. I have relearned several of these truisms. probably the more important thing here is it's easy to get wrapped up in the day to day slogging and forget what's really important.

4. Grad school is hard. Individual classes may vary, but the commitment required is really tough. In addition to being a student, I was (and in most cases still am) an instructor, a husband, a home owner, a systems engineer/admin/manager/etc., a part time mechanic, a lousy friend, an avid gamer, and I'm sure some other things at various times that I've forgotten or lumped into other roles. These roles often overlapped, and sometimes conflicted, as each really required more time than I really had to devote to them, all things being equal. This is where the reprioritizing mentioned above comes in. If you are considering grad school, look at your commitments. If you are supported by your parents and have no real commitments, or you are single and work a day job, you'll probably be OK. If you have anything more than that on your plate... think through it. I thought I was prepared, and academically I still think I was, but if my wife were less understanding or my employees less tolerant of my mood swings and half-crazed mumbling, I'm not sure I would have made it through the semester. 

That's it. Four points. Did I learn more than this? Likely. But these are the major things that stick out to me right now. That said, I will attempt to make this blog more of a priority in the coming year. I hope everybody had a merry Christmas whether you celebrate it or not, and that any traditions you observe are happy. May next year be better than last year.