As parents, there have been times when we the years just whizzed past so fast - some we recollect with fondness while some bring with it a heaviness in the heart. 2019 has been a year with both.
Refitment to Indian Way of Life: When we moved back to India in 2018, settling in a young family (2 children aged 12 & 8) to the Indian way of life without losing the learnings over the years that we picked up from our other travels abroad (UK and France) was a challenge looming in front of us. We have always been adaptive in that way, but the good thing is that as a family, we also retained all that we loved from every culture that we happened to experience during our travel and still retaining the "Indianess" in us. The initial 6 months were very difficult but as 2019 began, the family settled in with each of us finding our comfort zone with our extended families and new-found friends, and neighbours.
Getting Back to Professional World: After resigning from my Technical Writing career (13 yrs back), I managed to stay connected with writing through my blog, volunteering and freelancing projects, wherever we relocated! This move back to India gave me connections with Alumni and friends through whom I have been able to find a part-time position in a start-up and explore the avenues of branding myself as a Consultant Content Developer, Career Counselor & Trainer/Tutor. This is a personal achievement that I am very proud of. Our parenting has been instrumental in bringing forth the instant adaptiveness from my children to this change of mine, my spouse's unwavering confidence in me, and my mother's close presence are a few things I am grateful to have to my advantage!
Quality Time with Family: 2019 saw many from our extended family visiting us at our home. Children got to spend quality time with their grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. The interactions that ensued - some were captured on a camera while some remain etched in our memories (a camera of its own kind). They also got to spend a few moments with their great grandmother before she went on her life's last journey.
Personal Fitness: Morning walks that started as an effort to control my obesity and a chance to have meaningful conversations with my spouse. Zumba came as an addition for better cardio training on the insistence of a friend, which surprisingly I have started enjoying. Weight training is a recent addition to muscle strength and toning. A hashtag that started as a fun conversation with my spouse has now become my mantra for fitness - #FitBy50.
Overall the year that went by had some great moments, some personal growth, some personal losses - a typical sine wave - with its crests and troughs. This year, I think, was a perfect example of what life is all about - yin-yang combination - the good in bad, and the bad in good going hand in hand - the transientness of happy and sad, success & failure, gain and loss - a content year in all. Guess I have finally grown up enough to understand this - of course reaching close to the milestone of 40 years of age I am sure, has nothing to do with it (wink).
Wishing you and your Family a Happy 2020. Keeping in mind the WhatsApp message that is making the rounds, do not forget to make it a habit to write the year as a four-digit representation instead of the usual 2 digits (I have been doing this for 2 decades now).
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