I've had a long-standing tradition of writing a year-in-review Christmas letter for my cards. Started before I met my lovely bride. Since meeting and dating her, had a lot more stuff to write about.
People on the Christmas card get first dibs, but here it is now.
Merry Christmas and a happy new year.
Friends and family,
Once more unto the breach, dear friends. Once more.
Yes ... the letter at Christmas. We are come to it again.
I’m doing better than last year, at which time I wrote the letter on Christmas Eve. Still, we are days from it.
The year in review for the Guilfoyles has some highs, some highers and a couple of not lows, but not greats.
I remain a copy editor and page designer working in Hickory, N.C., designing newspaper pages for the Florence, S.C., group of papers since October of 2010. That sets a milestone for me. Twice before I had worked in North Carolina, and the longest of those jobs lasted just seven months. The other just three. So in two prior jobs, I had not managed to work a full year in North Carolina. I’ve been at it more than two years now.
It remains a nice job, but it’s a LONG commute with terrible hours. But it keeps me in newspapers until I can figure out a better long term move.
I won three design awards in the S.C. Press Association annual contest, including a first place, so I’ve still “got it.”
Patricia is now firmly ensconced in the Diocese of Charlotte N.C. She is the editor of the Catholic News Herald. She is considered pretty valuable, though sometimes I don’t think she realizes how much. But I see the way some folks react to her and what they say to her. I don’t say it often enough, but I’m pretty proud of her. She actually, just days before, got a pretty major scoop on a story related to the HHS mandate. Her web reporter says her story became the primary source for it on the Google. Maybe on the entire Internets.
Her website is really taking off, thanks to the redesign she did, and the reporter she hired. Her other reporter twice went overseas, one time on pilgrimage and another time on an “ad limina” visit our bishop made with others to visit the pope.
One of the biggest things for both of us professionally brought something we never thought could happen -- we worked together, somewhat. She got a credential for her paper to cover the Democratic National Convention, which was held in Charlotte this year. In her preparations, she wanted someone who is, unfortunately for his eternal soul, more of a reporter than a Catholic, but Catholic nonetheless. And so I freelanced to cover the convention.
She wrote some stories as well, and we tried to get the Catholic take on issues as locked in stone as abortion and contraception but others with more common ground such as immigration and health care.
I had take time off from my regular job to do this project for her, but I loved it. I have links to all my stories on my blog (address below) but I summed the whole experience up in my essay, “How I spent my summer vacation.” I spent it working. But it was a huge event to cover, and I wrote a ton of stories in a short period of time. Spending a lot more time doing just editing and design, I sometimes wonder if I can still do the reporting that I love so much. This proved I can.
Normally I just write to comply with AP Style, but this time Patricia and the rest of her staff had some extra work making sure that what I wrote also confirmed the catechism.
I wrote a couple of other stories from some S.C. papers, took a few pictures here or there. I live tweeted and took Internet video, the most interesting an interview with a woman, a man and a polar bear. You read that right. It’s on my blog.
On the health front, I had surgery on my right eye in April and was out of work for about a month convalescing. Got to watch “The West Wing” on DVD. All of them. And I was stir crazy after a week. The right eye still has a stitch in it, but the vision is much better. That, coupled with a new special contact lens for my left eye led to my seeing a meteor, HUGE one, on my way back home in December. A Geminid meteor. Never seen one really before. It was amazing.
Now with all the career junk out of the way, we turn to the most important topic of our family life. We have to say that sometimes it seems like our days just run together and we don’t get to do much. But then we look back and realize it has been a pretty amazing year for our son, Stephen Christopher. He has been on a few adventures with Mommy, and he has embarked on new chapters.
He is now 6, if you can believe it. He got a party from his aunties and uncle in Spartanburg, then one with a few friends here.
He “graduated” from his pre-school, Field of Dreams, and started kindergarten in September.
His teacher, Mrs. Knox, remarks frequently how bright he is.
Another adventure for him was a recent trip he took with his mommy. In July, he went down to Florida to visit his cousins, Grandma and Grandpa Larson and aunt and uncle.
But a couple weeks back, he made the same trip, but this time he rode down on an Amtrak train. The hours of the train trip are not great, leaving Columbia at like 1 a.m. to arrive in Palatka, south of Grandpa’s house, around 8 a.m. And coming back, it’s leave at 10ish to arrive at 4 a.m. But it removes a lot of worry I have about them driving. It also is about the same cost as it would be paying for gasoline down and back. He enjoyed it.
Patricia is really good about framing trips like that as adventures, and he responds well to them.
She also took him to the mountains to go panning for gold and jewels. He got some really shiny ... rocks. But they are treasures to him.
As I wrote last year, he continues to amaze us, all the time. On top of everything else, he is basically a sweet, sweet kid.
Harry and Annie are doing well, though Harry continues to get a little bit more cranky, a little bit more lazy every day.
We know we haven’t been around or been in touch as much as we could. We are doing well, but our life is just non-stop hectic most days, so that when we get some free time together, we just generally want to do something quick and easy and together. But never doubt our affection.
Have a merry Christmas. (Email still the best way to reach me. I check it every day.)
We love you.
Stephen, Patricia, Stephen Christopher, Harry and Annie
December 20, 2012
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