The past 5 months have been a whirlwind. The trajectory of our life went entirely in a different direction than we could have anticipated. It all started with Jolene getting hurt.

Back in August the four of us went to Hawaii. We’ve been to Hawaii 8 times now. This time while walking at the Hilton Resort on the Big Island, Jolene stumbled on a step that was unlit. For the last 3 days she was on crutches, unable to put any weight on it. The silver lining, we got to skip the lines at the airport.

When we got back home Jolene was out of work over month, nearly two. Since she was unable to move it for so long, she applied for a Nurse Manager position at Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital. She was given the job and was able to use her scooter crutch for a few weeks as she healed.

Also, since Jolene couldn’t drive her Mazda 3 stick anymore, we decided to use our saved money to purchase a Chevy Silverado 1500. We’ve always wanted a blue truck, so at least something came of it. The pickup gets the same gas mileage as her Mazda, so she now gets to drive it to work.

Hemet Church

While this was going on I started going to the Hemet Seventh-day Adventist Church. Jolene had been going for the past two years. I had only been going off and on. Jolene is a director of the Adventurer Club there. So occasionally I helped out on campouts and music.

When Jolene got hurt she couldn’t drive. So I drove her and the kids every week. So I began to help out with the media team. Each week I started helping out with capturing video for their Hemet SDA Youtube Channel.

Each week we got better and better. I’ve designed many websites in the past. Hemet Church had an old website that was out of date. So I took over the creation of a new website. That included creating a new logo, and setting up a Google Ad Grants Account since they are a nonprofit. After hundreds of hours investing time in it, I believe it can finally sustain itself.

We then got involved with their Pathfinder Club. After 16 years I started playing the guitar again. So I started teaching a Guitar Honor their to 11 students.

After that we began helping out on Wednesdays passing out food for their Community Services. I ended up filming a short promotional video for them.

If you had asked me back in July what I would be doing, I would have never guessed that it would be doing this. Going back to church let alone Hemet Church was not on my mind. I went from not attending to driving 100 mph with no safety harness. Now we’ve got to figure out moderation so that we don’t burn ourselves out.

My wife’s near broken ankle may be what led us to Hemet Church. Now we need to find the balance between life, work and church. If we don’t, we will burnt out again and return to our old ways.

Over a year ago I started a goal of paying off my student loans. After about six months I made a decent sized dent. Then covid-19 hit. Amidst the confusion and uncertainty of this pandemic, we decided to hold tight to our money. Until we didn’t. Half of my student loans went into deferment. Bailout after bailout from the federal government, and with the money we scrimped together we saved the money to payoff my student loans in one year. Then a epiphany hit.

For over 10 years my wife and I have been paying into an endless black hole of student loans. While in college we accumulated nearly $200,000 in student loans. 10 years after starting to pay our loans back I still have $54,000 to pay off. Last month I had $57,028 remaining. We still have 15 years remaining before the rest is payed, assuming I paid the mimim. I no longer plan to pay the minimum. My plan is to pay them off in 3 years.

It’s been a fairly long time since I posted on this site.  I have a bunch of posts that I need to upload at some point in the future, but until then I have an announcement.  I started another site that is dedicated to another one of my hobbies.  You can find my new site at Bear Coral.   For over 10 years Jolene and I have traveled.  Throughout our various locations of travel, we have scuba dived around 50 times.  Each time we dove, I felt the urge to bring the underwater world to my home.  So, for a while now I have been dabbling in the saltwater aquarium hobby.

Today was a big milestone for Braeden.  He took his first steps unassisted.  Jolene was washing some dishes.  Braeden was pushing one of his toys he got for his birthday.  He pushed it just far enough away that he took his first step towards it without holding onto anything.  Jolene missed it.  About a half hour later while in the living room he was standing.  Jolene was next to him and he took a couple more steps on his own.

Yesterday Johanna and I were talking about Braeden turning one today. She said, “so Braeden will no longer be…..” I completed here sentence as she paused with the word “zero.” Braeden is officially no longer zero, and today has turned one year old.  His age will no longer be an accumulation of months, but years.  This past year flew by so quickly.

Over the past 10 years post college my faith in humanity has been deteriorating.  Pastors who you would assume would do great things, do the opposite.  Friends you think are friends, well often are not.  Family who you would think would have your back, would rather destroy you.  My world view has been destroyed by those close to me, as well as those from afar.

When I was a child the number one thing I wanted to was travel.  Now that I am old enough to afford traveling, we try as often as we can to see the world.  Having children does make it a little more difficult.  This trip we decided to go somewhere different, the US Virgin Islands.

If you live in southern California, you know the kind of heat we can get. This summer is no different. We don’t have a pool, so Jolene wanted to get something the kids could play in that would be adequate enough. She opted to buy a blow up pool.  Ever since the box arrived in the mail, Johanna has been talking about it every 10 minutes.  I told her she had to wait for Jolene to be off work.  So today was the big day to blow it up.

It feels like yesterday when we had Johanna watch fireworks for the first time at Jolene’s uncle’s home. Fast forward 6 years for Independence Day Braeden got his first dose of fireworks. We went to Jolene’s grandparents’ home to watch the fireworks. Luckily they live close enough to a big fireworks display.  We can just watch them from their backyard.  Afterwords we lit some of our own.