Dividing Line

[yourlibrarian]

2024 was a year of personal changes, both my own and my partner's. The happiest event was in October when I was finally able to see friends again, and we took a fall foliage road trip. (For anyone who is interested, all my nature pics have been posted in common_nature).

This photo was from the first night of the trip when we reached the first hotel. We spotted the Wienermobile in the parking lot. It seemed to be a sign that the trip would be both fun and would go (fairly) well in terms of plans and scheduling.

More than any other pic though, the following one marked my year. This is a photo from my 2024 calendar that I kept up for several months. I did so because I loved how this dog was so happy to be running free. As I counted down the months and weeks to my retirement, I kept waiting to experience this same enjoyment and relief.



I am happy to say that I have definitely felt the burden lift. While it has unfortunately gone hand in hand with a number of health issues, it's better to deal with them without the stress I'd been going through before.

As it happened, I'd already been planning my work departure before we got the other big news of the year. After months of tests, my partner was told he had a partial arterial blockage in a very bad location. He had to change his dietary habits immediately and engage in more exercise.



His work schedule has made the latter a challenge, but he took the prescription to reduce cholesterol, saturated fat and sugar very seriously. He gave up his beloved ice cream, joined me in eliminating sugar, and we cut the rest dramatically. Only a few months later his cholesterol level dropped by half, and without even trying he was losing weight.

The downside to this change is that it made it very difficult to eat out. We hardly do any takeout anymore and only from a few restaurants that have a relatively healthy dish on the menu. (As it happens, our only vegetarian and vegan places in town closed since the pandemic). It also meant that eating while traveling was very difficult too.

Although my partner never minded salads he didn't like eating a lot of them each week. That has now changed, and particularly during the summer we ate a lot of it. I tried out a variety of elements to keep things interesting. The above salad actually looked better than it tasted -- the pineapple just didn't work, but I later made a similar version without it but kept the mango and it was quite good.

All in all we felt lucky to have the year we did as friends lost parents and one of them has had a really dreadful year. I'm looking forward to some things in 2025 and am glad to be able to relax more.