I’m tempted to write that I’ve just noticed that my last post here was one year ago today, but I have been keenly aware of that fact for, well, a year. After just managing to limp along with the updating for several months, I had a semi-major blog disaster that involved all manner of technological know-how–which I do not, myself, possess–to resolve even partially, and I found that I had entirely lost the ability to sit down and write out a post. It wasn’t the malfunction that made me stop, but it was a sort of tipping point. I’ve been telling myself, though, that if I let things go for longer than a year that I’ve truly given up on the blog, and that’s not something I want to do.

Last year, meaning 2017, was a rough one in very many ways. Probably the very worst for me, emotionally, was that we lost three pets last year, dogs Asbjørn and Lucy, and cat Prins Bertil. All of them were elderly, and only Prins Bertil’s demise came unexpectedly, but each loss came as a shock for us. We’d had all of them since before any of the three younger kids was born, and being without them has taken some getting used to, to say the least. I did get another dog, Fingal Olsson, shortly after Asbjørn died last February, because I saw the writing on the wall and couldn’t risk finding myself dog-less, but I have more than once questioned the wisdom of that decision. Actually now, on the other side of the terrible, terrible puppy months, I see that it was not a mistake after all, but I’d be lying if I said that our newest family member didn’t give me more stress than comfort for a good long time. I still haven’t sorted out my picture-posting situation, but if you’re interested, you can check out his Instagram here. He really is a good boy.

Another big change for us is that our middle child came out to us as transgender nearly two years ago, and publicly in April of last year. He legally changed his name from Petra Isadora to Ezra Daniel Isador last summer, and has been fully living as a boy since then. While this is not a bad thing, it has of course been an adjustment for all of us, and Ezra himself has been struggling quite significantly with depression and anxiety, partly due to gender dysphoria issues and partly due to a genetic predisposition to psychological issues (we’ve long acknowledged in my family of origin that there’s a strong current of crazy in our gene pool). Apart from internal issues, the transition for Ezra has gone remarkably smoothly and we’ve met nothing but support and helpfulness from family, friends, school, and doctors, for which I am incredibly thankful. Still, there’s no denying that it’s turbulent.

There have been other, smaller things, too, that have kept me away from the keyboard, but I won’t go into those now (or perhaps ever, honestly). None of it is really more than the hourly/daily/weekly/monthly stress of managing a large family, two demanding jobs, and a puppy with the energy of ten dogs. But that, too, passes.