It really was an amazingly odd year, I don’t even know where to start.

I’ll leave the Big Picture stuff to other people. It’s been talked about, discussed, analysed, dissected, already, so no need for me to chip in on those subjects.

For me this year was about:

  • Becoming a parent
  • Not working for most of the year
  • Living with the in-laws for almost six months
  • Moving back to our place, then out of our place and into a rental one
  • Micro.blog

Parenthood

It’s amazing. Yes. And tiresome. Yes.

We have no idea what we’re doing, and it seems we knew everything about it before becoming parents. How mistaken we were! When tinyMovieStar was born we felt a new version of us was also just coming to life. We’ve grown, together, and it’s been amazing. Words fail me, but we are blown away every day by something she does, we ‘Awwww’ and ‘Ohhhhh’ every few minutes.

I’m also feeling, at once, like the sweeper car on a bicycle ride, and the front car on a F1 race. Prepping stuff for movieStar, and cleaning up after her. Never felt so tired, and yet I wake up every day wanting to do it all over again.

Sometimes it’s overwhelming, so we try to take it one step at a time. Not thinking too much about the future, how she’ll turn out, if we will screw everything up,…
So far, so good. She looks pretty happy, we’re also very pleased with the way things are progressing.

Work

As parenthood takes up a great part of the day (all of it!), the cancelled jobs I had due to the pandemic actually ended up being a plus, if I can put it that way.
I was able to spend most of the year at home, with both girls, and I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to enjoy this as much if I had a job. The government offered the tiniest of help (I would say ridiculous), but we’re fortunate movieStar has a proper job, with decent benefits. Also counting as lucky the generous help my parents provided. I was able to get by thanks to them.

Also first time I missed the old job at the paper. We’d grown accustomed to being on the road a lot since I quit, and spending a few months a year on the island. We missed both of those and, as most people around the world, are a bit tired of being stuck in one place.

After decades of covering news, and getting out of that business, I failed to miss it until now. Being at home while the biggest story of the decade unfolded outside made me miss the old days, of being on top of things. With no island and no travel to keep me entertained, it was bound to happen.

The end of the year turned out to be a surprise, a lot of work. Pros and cons but, by now, I’m pretty grateful it happened.

Living arrangements

We spent almost half the year living with movieStar’s parents, who were kind enough to offer us their home. When the pandemic struck we feared we’d be overwhelmed by it and the new baby, so that came as a very welcome offer. We had a support team for as long as we needed, and it was a blessing.

When we felt we could handle things on our own we moved back into the city, but soon realised our home would be small to house the three of us. movieStar started looking for a place that would be suitable, and she found it! I expected to stay at our place for a little longer, but babies do take up a lot of space. We moved.

Micro.blog

When we moved out of the city, before tinyMovieStar was born, I looked for a new home online, and by god I found it! It’s been a while since I’ve been so happy with the internet. The community never ceases to amaze me, it’s a wonderful place, one I hope will last. I’ve had great conversations, found amazing shows to watch, discovered wonderful apps, and, above all that, the best group of people one can find online.

All in all, for me, it was a great year. I know everyone is expecting 2021 to be the good one, the one that will get us over the mess that 2020 was, but I’m pretty pleased with how it turned out.