Karie is out of town for the next three days. She is in Salt Lake City for her brother Paul's wedding tomorrow. So I have a few minutes on my hands as I allow the girls to watch more TV than is good for them.
20 years ago I:
1. Was also ten years old.
2. Lived in Arlington, Texas.
3. Loved to play with G.I. Joes, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Transformers.
4. Was heavily involved in Cub Scouts.
5. Was just discovering pop music as I would hide under the covers at night and listen to a top forty count down on a Walkman. I still get flashbacks of lying under the covers with the head phones on when I hear certain 80's songs.
Ten Years Ago I:
1. Was Twenty Years old.
2. Had just surpassed the one year mark on my mission to Los Angeles, Ca.
3. I actually burned a "white" shirt that was more yellow than white from a year's worth of exposure to the L.A. smog. (For those who don't know, it is a tradition in some missions to burn a worn out article of clothing at certain time milestones: a tie at six months, a shirt at a year, etc...
4. Was in the Los Angeles Stake zone, Wilshire ward. Our area covered the entire downtown Los Angeles area.
5. I was either a district leader with Elder Jackson as my companion or a zone leader with Elder Paje as my companion, I don't remember the exact timing, but the transfer was right around this time.
5 years ago I:
1. was 25 years old.
2. was living in Sacramento, Ca. (I had to cheat and look at Karie's post).
3. was anticipating the arrival of our first child, and still trying to get the fish smell out of our apartment. (That's a story for another day).
4. was working as a "Target Protection Specialist" a.k.a. a security guard for a Target store.
5. was the second counselor in the elders quorum presidency.
6. was getting the first ideas in my head that maybe I'd rather go back to graduate school than spend the rest of my life wearing a pretend police uniform.
7. enjoying laundry days, because we would go over to Vlad's house to do laundry I would spend the time playing NCAA football on his PlayStation2.
3 years ago I:
1. had just finished moving all of our stuff out of our apartment and into Brother Brown's house.
2. Was working at Kindercare as the school age teacher and reading tutor.
3. was registering for my first semester of classes at ASU.
4. was serving as the Varsity team coach, and was helping plan the boy's high adventure trip that I wasn't going to go on, because they were going to be gone over Karie's due date with Afton.
5. was blissfully unaware of what I was getting into by starting school again.
So far this year I:
1. Have also turned 30 years old, but a good six months after my lovely wife.
2. Finished my second semester in a row of 15 hours of graduate classes and internship.
2. Finished a 6oo hour internship as an oncology counselor, which I loved!
3. Graduated with a Master's degree in counseling.
4. Passed two different national cumulative exams for counseling.
5. Was named a nationally certified counselor, which sounds really nice, but means nothing without a state license, which is a much longer process.
6. Arranged a pirate party for my wife, despite my own aversion to theme parties.
7. Found myself working at Kindercare again, but only until my license is approved and I can start a counseling job.
Yesterday I:
1. started my work day at 6am which involved stopping and cleaning up a bloody nose and teaching 7 year olds how to play Yahtzee.
2. went grocery shopping with the family.
3. tried to make some networking contacts in an effort to find myself a job.
4. played catch with Afton.
5. stayed up until midnight just because I knew I didn't have to be to work this morning!
Today I will:
1. try to make a list of things to do with the girls today and tomorrow so they won't miss their mom too much.
2. make sour cream chicken casserole for dinner.
3. attempt to talk Annika and Afton into a nap so that they can watch fireworks tonight.
4. spend the day being eternally grateful that I was born and live in the United States of America.
5. Probably watch the Olympic swimming trials with Annika, because she seems to love the Olympic sports. (She hates football and baseball, but gets really interested in gymnastics and track)
Tomorrow I will:
1. sleep in as long as the girls will allow me.
2. watch a baseball game.
3. perhaps take the girls to the park before it gets too hot.
4. take the girls out to lunch.
5. realize how grateful I am to have Karie as a partner and wish that she were at home to help me.
In the next year I will:
1. find a job that I will be willing to refer to as a career.
2. move my family into a larger living space thanks to my new career.
3. make a trip to visit my parents and see my sister's new house.
4. help celebrate Afton's 3rd birthday and Annika's 5th.
5. buy myself a new TV.
6. gain new and interesting experience as I start my new calling as an assistant ward finance clerk.
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