It’s late 2:20 to be more precise and I can’t sleep.  My medicine has basically stopped working so I have to stop taking it for a while until it starts working again.  I know it’s a cycle but I haven’t figured out any better way to at least enjoy some sleep.

Anyway, still got this darn virus.  Sore throat, congestion, everything but I am moving on with it.  Tomorrow I have voice lessons which should be interesting.  Maybe I will sing the belt songs better with a stuffed up nose!  It’s happened to me before.  I guess there is just a limit to how long you can keep you life on hold and ‘rest up’.

It is tax season so that is always a bit nuts.  I got my Dad’s taxes for his rental ready for the CPA today and spent about 12 hours going over books, and making 3 huge reservations/payments.  I made him some good money so no complaints from him about his oldest daughter! 🙂

My Dad had a neat thing happen today.  He had almost finished law school as a grad student but became disenchanted with it and distracted with other projects (mainly my sister, brother and I) as well as his own small business.  He knew he wasn’t going to be an attorney so he abandoned the attempt just a few papers before graduating.

Well, I believe my Dad was thinking of taking some business and german classes requested his transcript and turns out he actually did graduate but had never received his diploma.  It came in the mail today!  Pretty exciting right!  25 years in development! Congrats Dad!  A college diploma of any kind is a badge of honor that we fought the fight and achieved our goals, even if you don’t use them for your career.

I have to tell myself that because I don’t really use either of my degrees for my career.  Maybe a few things from my MBA but not really.  It does kind of boggle the mind that in nearly 20 years of education I never had one class on using excel, photoshop or word.  Add in quickbooks and the basic internet those programs take up 80% of my work life.

The truth is that almost everything I learned about my career was from a woman named Sandy who was my ‘office Mom’ for my first job.  She was the mother of the whole office and that’s not because she was old, she just has a nurturing personality that draws people to her.  It was a hard time in my life but she listened to every gripe and groan in the most understanding way.

She also patiently explained how to do different tasks, sometimes multiple times and helped me fix the mistakes, typos and incorrect 10k.  I am sure she would disagree but she is really responsible for most of my success if you can call it that in my work life.  I owe her a lot. Plus, she kept me from losing it so many times.

I’m really grateful my Dad and Sandy and so many others.

It’s easy to remember the impact of family but perhaps it is harder to recall the impact of more passing acquaintances like coworkers, wardmembers, neighbors but their effect can be eternal.  I believe that strongly.  Some of the strongest influences in my life are people I don’t see often like my mentor in college Dr. Holland or my young women’s leader Sister Potter.  They made an eternal difference.  Makes me wonder what kind of difference I am making?

It’s interesting because I was talking to my sister today about how grateful I am for swimming because it gives me a way to make new friends which is something I need in my life.  I have plenty of friends but yet I still need an avenue in my life to meet new people.  Some people don’t really need this newness like my sister Megan likes things to stay more stable and continuous.

Maybe part of the reason I need an outlet to new people is the desire to make a difference in as many people’s lives as I can and it is an urging I believe comes from God.  He needs me to keep channels open where he can use me to help all kinds of people, not just my closed circle of friends and family.  Not everyone is needed in that way but a comfort level among strangers has always been a gift of mine.

Yesterday I went to an open house for my old bishop of the YSA ward and I cried.  It is kind of the final string in my relationship to the old ward.  There are a few people but not many.  It makes me sad.  Plus, that bishop helped me through some of the hardest times of my life.  I will be forever grateful to him.  Makes me cry just thinking about it.

Anyway, this is more ramblings at 2 am.  In the end I just want to serve God even if it takes me 25 years to get the reward in the mail! (Go Dad!)