I wanted to write this post on New Year's Eve, but then the day dawned and I changed my mind because I didn't really feel like doing much of anything, much less thinking as far back as 10 years to figure out where I've been and how I've ended up where I am now!
But I did promise
last year that I would do a review of the last 10 years with this year's New Year's post.
I'm not sure how I'd sum up the past 10 years. So much has happened and my life has taken so many interesting and unexpected turns...
2001
* Turned 21
* Walked out of an abusive relationship and hooked up with my then-boss, now husband.
* Fell pregnant
* Broke the news of my impending motherhood to my own mother - one of the most memorable conversations of my life!
2002
* Decided to get my driver's license, as my gynae advised I could no longer ride pillion on David's Guzzi
* Failed the driver's test twice on the same day
* Got my first car - which David was busy buying for me while I failed my driver's test. It was a 1975 Alfa Romeo GTV 2.0
* Gave birth to my first child and then
* Fell pregnant again 4 weeks later
2003
* Moved into a flat with David's ex-girlfriend
* Got married on 8 February
* Moved out of the flat and into David's parents' house
* Gave birth to my second child
* Moved out of David's parents' house and into a rented place of our own
2004
* David accepted a job offer in Saudi Arabia on a 1 year contract. The kids and I were initially going to stay in SA for that year, but he then renegotiated and landed up in Dubai instead
* Spent 4 months living with David's parents with my kids, while David made the arrangements for us to join him in Dubai
* Moved to Dubai, arriving on the first day of Ramadan - 15 October - to a temperature of 48 degrees Celsius at 05:30!
* Spent our first Christmas abroad
2005
* Inherited what was left of the trust fund my father had left us when he died, bought my first laptop.
* Got my first job in Dubai as receptionist/assistant to a colourful Polish veterinarian
* Resigned midway through the year due to personal disagreements with Dr. Matt's "business partner" and returned to SA with hubby & kids for a month's holiday
* Got a job with A1 Grand Prix Head Office upon our return to Dubai
* Received our one and only South African visitor for the duration of our sojourn in Dubai - none other than David's ex-girlfriend!
2006
* Looked into getting a boob job. Met with the surgeon, went through all the consultations, etc. and then spent the money registering at UNISA instead
* Got retrenched for the first time
* Found another job and carried on studying, working, etc.
* Completed my first year of university through UNISA
2007
* Received an offer out of the blue from a bigshot PR agency
* Travelled on business to Singapore, Tunisia, London and Paris, all in the same year
* Stayed on in Dubai for a couple of months when David's employment contract ended and he flew back to SA with the kids
* Talked the PR firm I worked for into keeping me on from SA before returning to join David and the kids
2008
* Continued working from home for the PR agency in Dubai, flying over from time to time
* Discovered during one of my trips to Dubai that I was pregnant again
* Quit smoking for good
* Gave birth to my
third child* Got retrenched for the second time
2009
* Started working from home on a freelance basis
* Took a temp job and was reminded why I HATE working for a boss
* Became seriously broke but discovered a softer side to myself
* Successfully breastfed my 3rd baby up to the age of 8 months
* Fell pregnant again
* Took my kids out of school toward the end of the year & started homeschooling
* Went into premature labour due to a severe bladder infection that had spread to my kidneys
2010
* Continued homeschooling
*
Gave birth naturally, drug-free, at home, to a 3.6kg breech baby who appeared not to have made it at first, but turned out just fine*
Caught someone else's baby when she went into labour a couple of weeks early and the emergency services failed to get to her on time.
* Started up a little screen printing business from home
* Agreed to help out at the company David works for, for a short while and ended up staying on for four months. I will be going full time as from 1 Feb, the aim being for me to establish and get the marketing department running smoothly before heading off on my own mission again...
And that is the (very short) version of my life over the past 10 years. Truth be told, there's just too much that's happened in all that time and looking at this I can see that there is a great deal I have refrained from sharing on my blog. For the moment, that's just going to have to be okay, although I do toy with the idea, from time to time, of putting it all in a book... Would certainly be a more interesting read than the odd bit of musing here on the blog!
As for what's in store for 2011, I'm not going to burden myself with the guilt of failed resolutions for this year. I have set a very few very specific goals for myself, though, and am already hard at work to achieve them.
In the meantime, life continues to whizz by in a blur and I find myself struggling to accept that we're already pretty much half way through the first month of the year!
So far, it's already been quite a rough ride, with my old pal, Murphy,
making things interesting, as always. We've already had two trips to the emergency room, with Jack, in the middle of a case of measles, smacking his pip on the ledge in the shower and showing us his scull on Thursday night, then giving it another bump against a chair on Friday and setting it bleeding again. James then followed suit with the measles and Michael also developed a stomach ailment of some sort, just for good measure...
In spite of things, though, I've gotten the year off to a fairly positive start and I'm pretty sure that I'll get to where I'm going, somehow. After all, the only way out is through.
