We are approaching December, so it is time for Hallmark Christmas movies now. Melanie records them and all and spends each evening watching one. Generally they have the same formula that repeats. Yesterday she watched one that was interesting where someone asked for one small change and it had a ripple effect. I have often looked back and wondered how small decisions here and there shaped who I am now. In the movie he wanted to be more successful and by the end what he realized was family was the most important thing. This is something that has always been important to me and my wife is super close to her family. Growing up I had lots of houses that treated me as family. Some of these relationships have died down a bit over the years, but for the most part they have sustained. I am still close to a lot of the students and people I shared a lab with during my days in academia. I still talk to a lot of people from the hospital even though it has been 3 years since I left there. The people that have left my current work place I have kept in touch with.
As I have said before, the thing that drives me the most is creative freedom to work how I want. I will take less money if that is provided me. I also will take any job if we are in desperate need of money. There have been periods where Mel and I did not know how we were going to make ends meet. It was never super bad as we had savings, we were never worried and were confident that things were going to work out. After I was let go from the hospital I had recruiters reaching out to me wanting me to move to accept positions. During this time I would ask for ridiculous salaries and looking back I am quite glad I did that. One of the positions was at an airline with the perks of free flights for me and my immediate family. With that position I do not think that we would have moved and I would just go back and forth. The onset of Covid-19 resulted in a huge decrease in flights and I would have lost my position quickly. In my current position I still get sent messages asking if I am interested in pursuing other opportunities. I love my team and have no interest at the moment. In my current situation I am able to work when I can and we have adjusted my workload and responsibilities so I can handle it. For as long as I can remember I tend to be one of the first ones in and one of the last to leave. That is not necessarily a good thing and something that I try to tell my team not to do. In academia I would go into the lab prior to 6am to start some of the experiments as some of them took 12 hours to run. I would leave around midnight or 1am and start the cycle again. Sometimes I would wake up in the middle of the night and start working because an idea popped in my head. At the hospital I would be at work between 6 and 7 and stay until 4 to 5. I do that at my current job still but with this year I struggle and start closer to 7 now and try and finish by 5.
Growing up we moved to where my parents live now and when I was still young my parents asked me if I wanted to move to the south end. It was quite nice of them to ask looking back. The opinion of a 10 year old should not have such an impact. I am not sure if I would ask my kids whether they wanted to move or not. I think I would just do it. I said no at the time and we did not move. I always wondered how things would be different. The reason Xavier is a goalie is because as a kid I always ended up playing goalie. My best friend played competitive hockey and we pretty much played hockey every day. He was quite good. My equipment is in the house and as a kid Xavier would play with my mask for a while or watch me play on occasion. If my best friend was not a forward who wanted to play hockey everyday I wonder if I would have pursued that. Xavier has some of the same traits as me, but I had more of a flair for the dramatic and far more confidence than he has.
Within my own family there is minor drama here and there that we try and stay out of. A lot of the people in my generation try to stay out of the drama from the older generation and we have been pretty successful with it. One thing I do believe is that family is not just blood but whom you surround yourself with.
Q