2019

Hello again dear reader! So last time we chatted I was a part-time teacher and the STAHD. That was neat! I remember that time fondly... So here's what's happened since then. Get ready for this crazy ride! Whew! Lost of exclamation points!

In June 2016 I found a full time middle school teaching gig for the 17-18 year, so I finished the school year and on the LAST DAY I got into a bike accident and broke my collarbone. HOLY SHITSNACKS IT HURT SO BAD. Even now in 2020 my shoulder will cramp up and if I'm wrestling with my kiddos and they bump the metal plate in my collarbone it's like I get shut off <USER ERROR>. But that's not all that happened during the best summer of my life (sarcasm) I managed to go to my reserve unit annual training in Hawaii, and then when we got back we (my wife and kids) went to Chicago for a family vacay. It was fun, besides the constant pain in my neck/back/shoulder/collar. But whatevs! So while doing all this travelling I managed to pick up Campylobacter. I'm sure there's lots of information on that fun little bug online but my experience with Mr. Lobacter was the 2 weeks before my new school year in a new building started was spent on the toilet and now I can't eat a ton of stuff that I LOVE. Garlic, onions, mushrooms, most pitted fruits, a lot of green veggies. If that sounds like the Irritable Bowel Syndrome diet, well, it is. The campylobacter killed a lot of my gut flora and fauna and now I have IBS. I hate it. I drank orange juice once and about DIED. YUCK!

Ok, so I'm at my middle school and then I happen to find a community band to conduct. OH. MY. GAWD. It was so much fun!!! They were such GREAT people! I also got accepted in my military career to be a warrant officer and work in logistics! WOW. SO MUCH HAPPENING. So 2018-2019 I'm now a reserve Warrant officer, middle school teacher with band and orchestra and ukulele (which was SO COOL!), a community band conductor so I got to start doing all my favorite band hits with a group of people that could play it, a Dad with two great kids, and I coached my son's baseball team!

What's that you say? What was the wife doing?? Oh. Well... One year she was at her dream high school choir teacher gig, then she got displaced to a middle school, then she got chased off of that job by a HUGELY toxic principal, then she taught community college and a little bug bit her... Then this last year I'm talking about 2018, her and I and our kids were for the first last and only time, all working in the same school district. Yay! She was teaching elementary general music. We were all on the same schedule and we had 2 full time incomes for the first time EVAR. WOOOOOO HOOOOO!!! Let's pay some BILLS! Let's raise kids and let's retire! What's that you say? Oh, right... I mentioned a bug. Well... yeah. About that. All this money making and stability and money making just wasn't cool with the wife. Yeah, she applied for a PhD program. The professors at this particular institution were ECSTATIC about what she was bringing to the table and she not only got a full ride, but she gets a stipend. They're going to PAY her to get her PhD at a pretty doggone decent music school. Aw shit. Also, that bill paying thing? Selling our house in Seattle (I loved that house) pays off all our debt. All of it. Student loans, cars, credit, everything. Shit.

So from February 2018 to now, as our Pandemic is ramping up (which I'll write about later because of all the free time I have for the moment), we: Came to Miami for the interview and got accepted, made the decision to move 3314 miles with 2 kids, I told all my people that I was super happy with (and they were happy with me!) that we were leaving, I got the last 3 months of the school year covered (And got my long term sub a job when he was done with my school kiddos), I did my 10 week Warrant officer Basic Course, we put our house up for sale, after WOBC I did my normal 2 week annual training (first AT not in a band!), we packed up our house (that had been on the market for 6 weeks by this point), and we moved to Miami, FL. I'll write a separate blog post about the trip, because I want to put the trip into my words, it was actually a fun road trip!

When we got here our now rental house was almost finished being cleaned and fixed. But not quite. This caused some unnecessary stress, but it's fine now (After 8 months or so of cleaning and fixing things). So now we're in Miami! We got the kids enrolled in school, and the wife settled in at her new fancy PhD program, we transferred my GI Bill and she started getting her stipend. What do I do now? How are we going to pay for all this??? OH I HAVE TO GET A JOB. Luckily, Miami-Dade County has a ridiculous shortage of teachers. Mostly because teaching in Florida is just stupid. Right to work my ass... but let's not get off topic now Deadcat42... I found the open schools, wrote some cover letters, and walked into the buildings with a cover letter and a resume and if the principal was available, I talked directly with them! I got offered a couple gigs this way, but ended up teaching band and orchestra at a high school .6 miles from the beaches that are on TV! WOAH. I mean, the school is a hawt mess, I'm the 5th band teacher in 5 years. They guys prior to me all lived a couple hours drive and they just could NOT sustain their commute, completely understandable! I have kids in the wrong classes, I don't have appropriate music, nobody remembers what a good band/orchestra is supposed to do, and the kids are used to slackin'. Not their fault, and they're coming around really fast, but it was a challenge to start, that's for sure!

So here it is. In the last 16 months we've both COMPLETELY changed our careers (two careers for me!), moved the furthest you could in the continental US, and started up in Miami, Florida. Since we've been here, we prepped for hurricane Dorian, taken students to their first concerts/festivals in YEARS, sold our Seattle house and are now debt free, and we've set up our routines with our family in a new and QUITE different culture and environment. We're all learning a TON.

Now a pandemic?! Wow. Uhm. Ok life. Thank you? I mean, considering all that's happened recently, this is the first time we've all had a chance to stop and take the time to emotionally and mentally recover from all these drastic changes, but did we have to do it THIS way?

Anyway... I miss my Seattle peeps, my family, my mountains.  I hope you're doing well reader.