One If By Land, Two If By Sea

I'm really enjoying looking back on all that has happened recently. It's helped me to see how much I've changed and how far I've come. Now, I recognize the value of documenting important events in life while they are occurring, but sometimes when life feels overwhelming, like you're carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders, it's nice to take step back to catch your breath. October symbolizes when I started to breathe again.

Work allowed me to do one more event before focusing solely on one element of our marketing strategy, so off to New York and Boston I went. In New York, I caught up with a couple of friends from MBA school and my team quickly stopped at the 9/11 Memorial for a visit before our event that night. Then I went to Boston. I love Boston. I'd never been to Boston. I made arrangements to take that Thursday off and spend the day exploring. I need to go back. Too much to see and so little time. The reason for the short time is Friday I traveled to Rhode Island to see one of my dearest friends and spend some time at the beach. I love this family! They bring such joy into my life.

Boston Common

Freedom Trail

State House

North Church

Harvard Gates

John Adam's House

Ball Family

T and Mel

I caught an early flight home so I could meet up with my siblings for general conference at our family's cabin. On the flight back to Utah, I found a way to connect to General Conference and heard President Monson's announcement about the lowering of missionary ages. I wanted to jump up and tell the whole plane figuring some of those people HAD to be LDS. That weekend was exactly what I had hoped. Spiritual nourishment from the leaders of our church and emotional fulfillment from being with family.

Miracle at 35, 000 feet

Birthday celebrations between conference

This month also started my monthly trips to the Bay Area. My new friend let me stay at her place and arranged fun activities to help me meet other people. Sunday was spent trudging along the highway to Half Moon Bay. But these two made the trip entirely worth it. I look back on this October with fondness. Good things were beginning to happen.

Perry Family

New game. Chris lost.

Something's Changed

September 2012 marked changes in my life. First, I decided I wanted to try something different with my hair and had highlights put in. I spent the next two months trying to decide if I liked it. My hair was much lighter and reminiscent of life in high school, but I felt it wasn't me anymore. Debatable topic. Even now, I still go back and forth on whether I like it or not.

Blonde highlights and new friends at Lake Tahoe

A second change is I finally succumbed to attending another mid-singles event. I went to one last May and though it was held in one of my favorite places in the world, the CA beach, other events occurred that marred my experience. A friend of mine convinced me to stay with his group this time and I felt comfortable enough to attend knowing I had a couple of friends I could rely on when I got overwhelmed with the large masses of people surrounding me. I ended up having a great time at Lake Tahoe and enjoyed meeting new people. A group of us ended up going on a 10-mile hike to this lake and it was absolutely worth the hours spent trudging up the mountain. Stunning! Needless to say, I'm glad I found the courage to escape to Tahoe that weekend.

Hiking

Lake Tahoe

New friends at Lake Tahoe

My first interview flyback also happened in September. McAfee (in San Jose area) first contacted me while I was at Tahoe and I had a phone interview with the hiring manager there. A had another round of interviews, which began the trend of me ducking out to my car or to my sister's place to take these types of calls. When they wanted me to come out and meet the team, I was thrilled hoping this may be my next opportunity. I was able to swing this with my current job because the entire team was out of the office in San Francisco for Dreamforce. My boss promised I could attend this event but backed out of that stating I needed to be in the office. Not true. Just another excuse. So off to California I went and worked it out so I could stay the weekend. The interview was interesting. Though it was a good company and a great opportunity, I didn't want it. It was not the job for me, yet it would get me out of a situation I didn't want to be in. Additionally, I spent the weekend with friends at their ward campout and met an entirely new group of people that would change my life. The result of that weekend was I decided I didn't want the job, but I did want to spend time with my California friends. Thus began my monthly trips to the Bay Area for my social life.

My favorite Bay Area couple

One thing did remain constant during this: trips to the mountains and spending time with my family. I am very grateful for the love and support of my family during the next eighteen months. Not only because my parents were out of the country, but because I had many difficult decisions ahead of me and they provided the insight I needed to choose between the paths in front of me. The most worthwhile advice came from my 12-year-old nephew. Love the simple understanding of the youth.

Mayfield Canyon

Cheesing it up for the camera

Cabin time

Brigham City Temple open house

My nephew Max and me

Leaving on a Jet Plane

It's interesting to be writing about August 2012 now because that was the month my parents left on their 19-month mission to Mexico City. They were initially called as the Area Medical Advisor and Assistant for the entire area of Mexico, which meant all the missions in Mexico. Half way through their mission, they were re-assigned to the new Mexico City MTC as the medical director. My dad helped build the clinic at that site and my mom took care of the materials for the 200+ Latin and Anglo missionaries that arrived each week. Reflecting back to when they left reminds me how busy we were as we prepared for them to leave, how much my sister and I did to take care of their house and finances, and how much I missed them. We had also few going away gatherings and family fun before they left.

Leaving for Mexico City

At my nephew's baptism

Max and Me