So can I just say, THANK GOD 2005 is almost over! This has not been the best of years, for many people. The end of last year and the beginning of this saw the tsunami and the loss of unfathomalbe amounts or lives and areas.
January was a stresser due to some unforeseen yet preventable factors affecting Joshua’s business. February saw us get screwed by the non-profit we had worked for for the past two years. The result of that in March was that our budget was cut by one-third. In April, my dad had bypass surgery in Illinois and my brother and sister and I found ourselves visiting Urbana-Champaign facing one of our worst fears (praise God everything went well and Dad is back better than ever).
In May, Judah turned two, my sister got married and Judah was a flower girl for the first time. The air conditioning on the Honda went out — the cost to fix it would have been $1500, so we said no. In June, we had a crisis erupt among friends resutling in us taking someone in for three weeks. We also were forced to move out of our apartment due to finances (see February and March). In July, we celebrated our third anniversary while Judah was at Nana and Papa’s - away for the first time for a whole weekend. Mopsy died that week and my grandmother died a few weeks later. August, we decided to pay of four debt in six months and move to San Francisco, and we celebrated Joshua’s 27th birthday. The GUlf Coast experienced the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. The storm affected me, having lived in Biloxi for the better part of a year and hearing what had happened in that area.
In September we celebrated my birthday by taking Joshua’s parents up on an offer to go to Galveston for Labor Day weekend to relieve the stress of the last few months. On the way down we had a close call when a tire on the tracker blew out, sending us spinning on two wheels across two lanes, the shoulder, the median, and the access road, to come to a stop facing traffic, upright, and with only one bruise as an injury. After that, we had a good time full of sand castles, sun, margaritas and visiting with our good friend Adam. In September, Rita struck the Gulf Coast again.
In October, we went to Houston for Doxology, and to Glorieta for the Emergent Gathering. Judah and I went camping with LGBC. My dad started dating Patti. An earthquake struck Pakistan, killing 70,000 people and leaving hundreds of thousands homeless and facing the winter. Judah was Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz for Halloween and I went as Holy Shit, complete with all brown getup and makeup, a halo and wings. The Honda died and we sold it to a mechanic for $500.
In November, we celebrated Thanksgiving with Joshua’s family at his aunt and uncle’s lakehouse. In December, we celebrated my Dad’s birthday, found out we were pregnant, welcomed Jacob into the world, and had Christmas with my family.
Judah’s become a greater joy each day we spend with her. Our friends grow more precious to us and we realize how close they will stick with us through it all as well. We’ve had some really shitty things happen where it seemed like it would never end, causing me to wonder just what exactly God wanted from me, but the year has ended on a more positive note than I thought.
I still have to say that 2006 is highly anticipated in the Rudd household.
Stay safe out there tonight, kids. Avoid the freeways like the plague - that’s where all the drunk drivers are.