A Trickle of Random Thoughts

Every year since 2004, we’ve included a family picture for the Christmas Letter. This November, we suddenly realized that our older son was away at college, and we didn’t have a recent picture of all four of us together – so I resolved to write my letter after John got home from school on his birthday, December 15. We were late getting home Friday night and spent Saturday celebrating his birthday. Sunday, Karen developed a serious migraine, and we spent literally the entire week before Christmas on a round of hospital, clinic and doctor visits. So, my first chance to get a group picture of all of us was Christmas Eve after Church!

Karen’s our biggest news of the year – as I mentioned, she’s had increasing issues with migraines, and has been seeing a neurologist. December 21, she was finally diagnosed with Idiopathic Intercranial Hypertension – an unexplained increase in the pressure of her cerebral/spinal fluid. This is causing swelling and inflammation of her brain and especially her optic nerves. On January 2, she’ll be having a procedure to reduce the pressure inside her head, and she’s already started medication to keep it down. The is a “down” ending to an “up” year for her. Back in April, she was approached by Springfield Clinic to come work for them in their pediatric behavioral health department. She’s the only mental health provider exclusively dedicated to pediatric patients in the organization. She’s loving the new job and other than her health issues is doing well. She even has had a chance to be on TV (“Dealing with Holidays and Grief” on a Wellness Wednesday on our local ABC station), and as a video host on the Clinic’s Facebook page (a two-part video on Seasonal Depression).

John is giving us a little practice in being “empty nesters” – he spent most of two weeks last June traveling to Italy and Greece and left us in August to attend Illinois State University (which is JUST far enough to keep him from coming home all the time, but close enough that he can easily get here about once a month). He’s majoring in Political Science and Legal Studies. He has found a great roommate and already has a few professors that are serving as role models and mentors.

Joshua is a senior this year, and keeping us both busy and well-fed. He is a second-year culinary student at the Capitol Area Career Center – where he spends his mornings cooking and helping to run a snack bar. By the end of the school year, he’ll have 7 college credit hours, plus his food handler’s license. His career focus is shown in his senior pictures.

We made time last March for a Spring Break trip to Chicago to see a few museums and to let Joshua be fed by one of his culinary heroes.

After the monumental year that everyone else had, I’m glad to say my year has been calm and peaceful. I’ve taken on yet more responsibilities at the Illinois Department of Transportation. I’ve especially been involved in a major upgrade of our disaster recovery planning and in creating new standards for our technical documentation. They also have me working in an interagency group with vehicle crash data reporting. And I’m still serving as one of IDOT’s representatives to the US Department of Transpiration’s Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Administration planning council. Of course, we’re all kept very busy supporting existing software as well (my work group had 14 employees in 2011, when I started. We now have 5, plus a programmer we share with another group).

Next week, Karen and I will be having a quite dinner out to celebrate our 20^th Wedding Anniversary.

Our household wishes you a very Merry and belated Christmas and we hope the joys of the season have been found in abundance by each of you.

Patrick, Karen, John and Joshua