Holiday Greetings from the Middle

As our second Christmas season in "the middle" comes to a close, upon reflection, I would say our lives have changed and remained the same over the past year. Much as I suppose most peoples' have, unless you live an extraordinarily exciting existence or have been befallen by something unfortunate.

In the "change" column falls a new position for Dana as a marketing communications manager with a regional health insurance company. It is bittersweet, of course, as it tangibly heralds the end of our 19-year business. If you've had a business as long as we had, you know it's tough to let it go. We think back to our beginnings in a spare bedroom through hiring our first designer, to travels around the country, and even internationally, serving clients. And then, back to working at the kitchen table. It's a lot like a life, I suppose. You start small, then grow, have "children", go places and see things until one day you end up spending most of your time back home. It's been a good change for him, though. It's not good for a people-person to be isolated for long. He's thriving.

I'm still working at the agency that brought me to Illinois. For me, the biggest lesson after working for myself for so long is navigating workplace personalities. Fortunately, I got to take a break on my very first cruise, a trip with my cousin for one of her milestone birthdays. I think we got more than most on this three-day journey to the Bahamas with rain and high seas then sunshine and smooth sailing. We had a blast. The jury is still out as to whether I'm a cruise fan or not. But, at least another check on the bucket list.

Griffin is now driving. As anyone who's gone through this experience knows, there are few things stranger than sitting in the passenger seat while your baby takes the wheel. What a metaphor! I thank God for his cautious nature - he drives like an old lady (maybe because his teacher was an old man). He's got some best buddies and they "play together" on Xbox Live. I remember when that phrase described having fun in the same room together. We are preparing to prepare for college and the clock is ticking louder in my ears each month. And even though we miss the smaller class sizes of our rural Colorado school and the opportunities to participate in more sports, attending a very challenging school seems to be a good trade off. Only time will tell.

Zoe became a teen this year. School comes easily to her (disorganization not withstanding) but choosing a direction and sticking with it, not so much. I just keep telling myself this is the time of discovering who you are, what you're good at and what you enjoy most. She's off soccer and onto basketball - she got to train this summer with the University of Illinois women's team and her 7th grade Bulldogs team went to the state championship. A mixed blessing because now any other activity (such as the ballet and lyrical classes I paid registration fees for) pale by comparison. Sigh. This too shall pass (right? Right?).

A sad change was saying goodbye to our not-so-old friend Henry. Our lab developed degenerative nerve disease in his hind quarters and, by the end, was barely able to stand. He was nine, which is young for his breed; then again, his predecessor Mojo lived to be 15. Poor Henry - he got the short end of the average. We also adopted out our two show rabbits as 4H seems to be a distant memory. We are now down to one feisty cat.

Though I'd made a previous trip, the rest of the family got their first dose of Chicago - Portillo's, Lou Malnatti's and Navy Pier. Another change: Our address. Again. It's a larger place and we could end up buying it, once we sell the Colorado house which is finally on the market. I'm ready to quit putting things in and out of boxes.

Because sometimes, especially in the midst of big life changes, you need things to stay the same, we spent spring break traveling back to Colorado to reconnect with old friends, hot springs, fly fishing and chair lifts. Over Labor Day we again went to Lake Michigan, riding crazy big surf and absorbing the particular charm of Southeastern Michigan. And, as we did last year, we have the mom-in-law here for Christmas. But this time, she's staying the winter. It's nice to have real time with someone we have lived far from for too long.

So, as we sweep up the needles from the store-bought Christmas tree every few minutes - and remember our years trudging through knee deep snow to cut a fresh tree in the national forest - we give thanks for a year during which we further settled into the middle while still experiencing new adventures. And really, whatever address graces your Christmas cards, life in the middle isn't such a bad place to be. All our best for 2012.

Photo by Christina Rutz.

You can never go back.

In the summer of 2010, when we moved from our peaceful, picturesque town in Colorado to the micro-urban environs of Champaign, Illinois I promised my kids we would return for spring break. Not that it did a whole lot to stem the pointed silences I was being treated to by the sulky teen, but I certainly had to pull everything out of my parental bag of tricks to make the move as tolerable as possible. And so, when March arrived and winter was beginning to cede its grip on our new Midwestern home, we packed up the thermal socks, boots and ski goggles and headed back west.

We spent a day skiing, and another at Mt. Princeton Hot Springs (it is always amazing to me that you can get a tan in Colorado even when the temperatures are not all that bathing-suit friendly). Then, it was time to spend some quality time with old friends. Admittedly there were those who really haven't missed a beat, although we know they've missed us. Their lives are otherwise unchanged since we left. But others shared their plans to move on from the town as soon as degrees were completed, children graduated and so on. People with whom we shared a love of that valley, who shared our opinion of its Shangri-la like qualities were admitting the bloom might be coming off the rose. The economy can be very tough on a small town. My daughter, an avid downtown shopper remarked on how many stores had closed. Parents fretted over proposed budget cuts putting school athletics in jeopardy. Even my husband, whom I worried about almost as much as the teen in terms of adjusting to leaving said "you don't realize how small this place is until you leave it."

This is all to say perhaps leaving what you think of as the perfect home comes at just the right time for you. I have said sometimes you choose home and other times it chooses you. The past seven years have taught me that. I chose this lovely hamlet as home and it was just that for years. When the time came for us to move on, it was very difficult. Was something wrong with our choice? Was it even our doing that sent us there? Would we have ended up where we are now (which, it turns out, is terrific in a number of different ways) if we hadn't chosen to make Colorado our home? I certainly can't imagine coming to the Midwest from Dallas (with all due respect). I just don't think it would have happened.

The truth is, you can never go back. In order to move forward you can't look back. Maybe it's by design that when you go back, it's just never the same. It's smaller, with a different rythm, a tad worn around the edges. Because if you can't go back to my picturesque little town, who could go back anywhere?

On the drive home, the teen brought up looking forward to being back with new friends. If that doesn't prove my theory, nothing will.

Winter, Four Ways

As we begin to see a little melt off here in my new Midwestern home, I'm inspired to reflect a bit about winters I've spent in other places, at other times in my life. Here, winters are much like those in New York/New Jersey, where I lived for 25 years. But I haven't lived in that region for a long time so I've forgotten about things like dirty, ugly snow on the side of the roads and trying to walk anywhere when sidewalks are only 50 percent cleared, at best.

Here, then, are some reflections on winters past.

Thoughts about an impending snowstorm:

• East Coast—*%#@ my car will be snowplowed in. Again.
• Midwest—Maybe I should invest in that snow blower.
• Colorado—Righteous! Where's my snowboard?
• Dallas—What's a snow shovel?

On winter footwear:

• East Coast & Midwest—Thank God for fashionable boots.
• Colorado—Thank God for snowshoes.
• Dallas—Thank God for closed-toe pumps.

On keeping warm at home:

• East Coast & Midwest—Throw another log on the fire!
• Colorado—Load up that wood stove.
• Dallas—Where is that fireplace remote?

On what to do in the snow:

• East Coast & Midwest — Find a hill and go sledding.
• Colorado — Find a mountain and go skiing.
• Dallas — Find a laptop and go shopping.

Overheard on Groundhog Day:

• East Coast — That &^# rodent is never right.
• Midwest — Oh, that Punxsutawney Phil is just the cutest, dontcha know.
• Colorado — Who cares? It's sunny all year long here!
• Dallas — Let's book a flight to Cancun!

Maybe I'll have the pleasure of adding other places to this list before I reach my end. Let's just hope it's after the kids have flown the coop.

A new year. A new life.

By Dori, A Round Barn at the University of Illinois.

For most people a new year is symbolic of a new start. I know I always feel just a little bit like I'm beginning a do-over, every year, without fail. This year I, along with the rest of the family, am starting over in a new state, a new region for that matter. The Midwest.

I have no ties here. Well, none very recent (supposedly my granddad went to school in Independence, MO with Harry and Bess Truman). And I can't help but laugh when I think of how I got here. I kept forging westward. But the universe keeps pulling me back. I went to Texas, then moved back to New Jersey, where I grew up. I moved back to Texas and stayed awhile until discovering, and quickly relocating to Colorado. I didn't get to stay as long as I wanted too before I ended up in Illinois. What in the world is the world trying to tell me?

It's my own fault, really. I have wanderlust. It's not an easy quality to live with. I adore the idea of staying put, living in the same house for decades, welcoming children and grandchildren home. But I just can't do it. I want to wander. And that's not great for kids, really. I'm honestly not that bohemian to be able to pull that off with panache.

And so I've made up my mind to set down roots here. Really. I have a plan. After all, I've got kids to put through college and retirement savings to catch up on. So I have to hang up my wandering shoes for a while. But, still I dream. I think about the days when the kids have graduated (God willing) college and Dana and I retire. This is not a bad place to live. With, perhaps, some traveling when winter gets a little long or summer a bit too humid. If our state can stay solvent, that might actually be a plan. For now.