Happy New Year - Reflections and Resolutions

Ok, so another year has come and gone. This year has been particularly good for me personally. My wife and I had our first child a son and even though there were a ton of things I complained about (see this post) nothing really compares to the whole experience of becoming a parent for the first time. My wife Melissa and I have done our best to document each "first" in Patrick's life and will continue to do so in 2008.

So many times in my life on New Years Eve I have found myself toasting with others around midnight and hearing the familiar "Here's to a better year in ___ " Well I think I had a pretty good year this year. I quit smoking back in June (for my health and the health of the baby too) a habit that I have been struggling with for over 10 years and although that was not a resolution Per Se I still consider it an accomplishment. So I guess what I am saying is that not only was 2007 a pretty good year but now here I am staring at 2008 wondering how can I top this year?

What do I want to do better in 2008? I am not usually one to make New Years resolutions but that doesn't mean that they aren't useful. Off the top of my head (other than wanting to exercise more to lose the weight I put on when I quit smoking) most of the resolutions I would have probably involve my family. I want my wife and I to be there for my son's first steps (he can almost already walk - just doesn't have the balance yet). I want to make a trip to Florida this spring to see some good friends and get a chance to see one of my best friends' father whose cancer has returned again and it's not operable. I want to be able to relax and leave work at work and have home time to be with my family more in 2008. I also want to get more involved with our church and volunteer more time to help out with several things there as well.

Do those count as resolutions? What do you think? What kinds of resolutions or at least things that you want to do in the next year do you have? Give some comments and some feedback and leave your resoultions for making 2008 great...

-Shane (doc)

(One other thing that I hope Vin and I can accomplish with this blog is to start to write out the crazy story which has been our friendship over the past almost 20 years and all the crazy things that have happened to us - Look for those stories to start appearing here in 2008 archieved as "The Misadventures of Doc and the Mt. Cat.")