2019 Wrap Up And Review

What a year.  I got my Ni Dan in September, had my 53rd birthday in October, which weirdly signaled my realization of my age, and over the course of the year I lost twenty pounds and have kept it off due to diet.  

In the end of the year, when I should be learning a bunch of Goju-Ryu stuff, I ended up getting waylaid by life.  

At work we started a massive project that meant 10 to 12 hour days, my wife and me started putting a bathroom in the basement (where I'm doing 99% of the work) and as the year started winding up my Mother started going down hill.

As I've mentioned my Mother in past posts, the horror of dementia finally came to a head last month when my Mom got a cold, but previous to that she started experiencing difficulty swallowing.  At a certain point she no longer took water and was able to wave off assistance.  She'd put into her medical requests to take no further assistance so she went down hill in about two days.  My wife was able to get there and hold her hand as she passed away and I was able to get there two days later.  The sense of normal sadness was replaced with relief for her and us.

On the flight home I was surrounded by sick people sneezing and guess what  - I got sick for the last week.  I haven't had that much difficulty throwing off a cold in ages.  So I missed another week of karate as a result.

Last night I finally went back with some sense of concern that I might not be ready to do the whole two hours.  I spent the first hour teaching Kyle Ni Pi Po so I wasn't worn out, but decided to go home early and hit the hay early.  

On a side note I got Sensei a karate clock for his garage.  It was nice to be back and get the laughs and get moving.