January 2013:

January was a tough month as I was still dealing with the passing of my mother and getting ready for the arrival of my son. For New Years Eve I made my resolutions for eating healthier, losing weight, and going towards a more vegetarian and free-range diet. We spent New Years Eve with my daughter in Miami, then toured our way back up the East coast home towards Columbia. We stopped into Pompono Beach to visit my Aunt and Uncle, but they were ill and we hadn’t made arrangements ahead of time to see them so I felt awkward just dropping by (lost their numbers and my mom was the caretaker of family contacts) – so we drove by their house and headed north. Once back home settled back into the daily routine, went to work at Fort Jackson developing Ipad tutorials for soldiers in Physical Health, Skeletal Anatomy, and Muscle Anatomy. Had a great team I was working with and a superior manager.

Around the 5th Kay, my former secretary for Tree Leaves and Leafworks from 20 years ago, our group’s librarian, and co-leader who I hadn’t seen for ages until last fall, came by for a visit to us on her way back home from Florida. We went out for fine Indian cuisine and did a Ghost Tour of Columbia run by some fundamentalist Christian outfit. We did capture some ghostly images of soldier’s feet walking across a so-claimed haunted bridge.

Most of January was spent doing the 8 to 5 shifts at Fort Jackson Military Base every Monday to Friday. Good pay, good benefits, and good medical for the upcoming pregnancy. It was crazy how warm Columbia and South Carolina was over the holidays and Winter. Not a cold day. We could go to the beach whenever we wanted and it was never too cold for me to go swimming. (Others disagreed) The bugs, humidity, and climate however was a completely different story. We weren’t really happy in South Carolina as per environment and culture so was anxious to leave after our son was born and we were safely able to. It was nice to year-round have barbecues on our patio.

Each weekend though after a long week’s grind we did go out and explore the realms that were South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia – as those infected with wanderlust, it was our destiny. Most weekends in January were spent walking along the river and walking in local parks. We did manage to get to Myrtle Beach for the first time as we found great off-season deals to the resort that was mostly closed down. We did get to see quite a bit nonetheless and had the beaches to ourselves for the most part.

We’d have to say tourism aside, it was one of our favorite places in South Carolina next to Charleston. There were amusing things to do there at least. Wonderworks was very interesting art and science exhibit / theme park.

Feeding the fish at the piers in the freshwater lakes was crazy with the catfish who all mobbed together to form a surface of fish with eager mouths for a kernel of corn or fish food.

The rest of january involved some spiritual contemplation of how life was to change and where things would be in the next few months, where we’d move to, what we’d do, and the actions to take to follow our dreams and destiny.

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Year in Review: [ January ] [ February ] [ March ] [ April ] [ May ] [ June ] [ July ] [ August ] [ September ] [ October ] [ November ] [ December ]