2014 Year-end Survey in Safety Net

What did you do in 2014 that you’d never done before?
~ Worked in a call center, had real friends in the same city as me as an adult, was a pallbearer, wrote an obituary, passed a kidney stone, bought a car, drove a rental car, wrecked a rental car, bought something on eBay, sold something on eBay, quit a job without giving notice…busy year.

Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
~ 2014 didn’t turn out the way anyone in my family anticipated. So no. My goals for 2015 is to have a better year than 2014.

Did anyone close to you give birth?
~ My youngest sister had a baby girl a week before Thanksgiving. She’s tiny, but absolutely adorable.

Did anyone close to you die?
~ Dear god where do I begin. My grandfather passed away on April 16. He used to joke that only two things in life are certain, death and taxes. I guess it’s appropriate that he died on tax day. We buried him on my birthday. The day of the funeral his brother (the last of the 5 siblings) also passed. My brother had already not been feeling great off and on for about a month. We spent the last half of June and the first part of July in the hospital with him. He was put into hospice on August 4th and passed on August 26th. I always knew losing him was going to be hard, but I could have never imagined what the past few month would be like. My great grandma passed away the end of September out in California. The funeral was the first day of my new job. I still feel awful for not being there, but even if it hadn’t been that day, I hadn’t been working for the better part of 4 months and couldn’t afford a plane ticket. And finally, a few weeks ago a friend who was also one of my trainers at the call center, was found dead in his apartment. He’d been having health problems but I didn’t know that. It was just one more thing to add to my oh-so-wonderful year.

What countries did you visit?
~ Just the US. it’s probably good I didn’t go anywhere.

Where did you go on vacation?
~ Branson with my dad. Originally the plan was to take my brother too, but he was ill.

What would you like to have in 2015 that you lacked in 2014?
~ I would love to have friends again. I left them all behind when I moved back closer to family and have yet to make a single one. I spend a lot of time with family, but we still don’t have a place to live (we’re staying with my grandparents) so I spend most of my time driving to and from work. I work with a bunch of chauvinistic jerks now, so I don’t even have coworkers to joke around with. Financial stability would be nice. Things were going well for awhile but have really been up in the air since we moved. More than anything, I would like some emotional stability. The roller coaster that has been this past year is just exhausting.

What date from 2014 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
~ August 26th, the day I lost my brother and best friend.

What was your biggest achievement of the year?
~ Surviving.

What was your biggest failure or regret?
~ Not asking enough questions when my brother was on hospice. There are so many things we would have done differently if we had known what was going on. All the times I didn’t go see him when I got off work because I was “too tired.” So many regrets.

Did you suffer illness or injury?
~ Kidney stones and the kidney infection I got on top of the stones was by far the worst. I thought I knew pain before with my shoulder and migraines. Ohhh no. Most people say it’s comparable to having a baby. Some women say it’s worse. All I know is that it’s not something I care to ever repeat. Two trips to the ER in two days was quite sufficient.

What was the best thing you bought?
~ My car.

Whose behavior merited celebration?
~ My cousins have been absolutely amazing. My mom’s cousin has been a nurse for many, many years and came down to stay with us in my brother’s room the first few nights he was on hospice. They’ve opened their home to us and on nights that we work early the next morning, my mom or I will stay there (it’s a half hour closer than my grandparents’ farm). They made sure we had somewhere to go for Thanksgiving and Christmas and not just sitting alone. Her (my mom’s cousin) sister and her husband live in Minneapolis and own a big party rental business. They drove all the way down to Omaha with one of their big trucks to help us move. I know they would do more if we were closer, but that alone saved us a substancial amount of money. My brother’s best friend stayed with us as long as he could while he was on hospice. He’s a teacher and ultimately had to get back. He and his wife also live in the same city we work in and they have invited us to stay if the weather is ever bad. He has also come out to the grocery store we work at to talk to us even though it’s all the way across the city. We call and text from time to time to check on each other. He was like a brother to me growing up. There have been so many other people who have gone out of their way to try to make things easier for us. The manager of the meat department (one of the few nice guys I work with) got my mom a job and had never even met her. It’s nice to see that there are some people out there that still care.

Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
~ The chauvinistic jerks that I work with. My dad’s wife.

Where did most of your money go?
~ Car, medical bills, student loans, car repairs (although I suppose that will be 2015 technically).

What did you get really, really, really excited about?
~ My car.

What song will always remind you of 2014?
~ “Habits” by Tove Lo, “Ghost” by Ella Henderson

Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
~ Definitely sadder

ii. thinner or fatter?
~ About the same

iii. richer or poorer?
~ I would probably be about the same id I didn’t have to spend so much on gas.

What do you wish you’d done more of?
~ Hanging out with my brother.

What do you wish you’d done less of?
~ Taking VTO at the call center. I could have used the money now.

How did you spend Christmas?
~ With my sister and her little family.

Did you fall in love in 2014?
~ No, but the potential was there I think.

How many one-night stands?
~ None really. I used a file cabinet in our apartment for a night stand. Now I’m using a rocking chair.

What was your favourite TV program?
~ My cousins got me hooked on Scorpion and Stalker. I also finally watched the original Star Trek series with much amusement. My favorites that are currently running are still Castle and NCIS. And of course The Big Bang Theory.

Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
~ Not really. I probably like my dad’s wife a little less. Oh, wait. Her daughter. She thought it was ok to announce on Facebook that my brother had passed when we had barely started calling family. My youngest sister found out on Facebook. She’s never had anything to do with us, she just wanted attention. Then at the funeral she decided it was ok to sit in the front row with her husband and her two daughters next to her mom while my sister and her husband and son had to sit in the second row. My sister should have been up front with parents and grandparents and me.

Who is someone you will probably never see again after this year?
~ Do I really need to answer this? Well other than the obvious, I guess there are probably a few from the call center I won’t see again.

What was the best book(s) you read?
~ I read And the Mountains Echoed (Khaled Hosseini), way too soon after my brother passed. I made the mistake of reading another book from a different Cussler series, so then I had to read all of them. I now own three of his series. I read The Help. That was really good.

What was your greatest musical discovery?
~ I don’t think I really had one this year. I spent most of my year in my car.

What did you want and get?
~ A new car.

What did you want and not get?
~ My brother to get better. There were so many things we were going to do.

What was your favorite film of this year?
~ The only movies from this year that I really saw were The Lego Movie and Heaven is for Real. Both were movies we watched in Jason’s room so they were a bit tainted.

What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
~ I turned 30 and I was a pallbearer at my grandfather’s funeral.

What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
~ One less funeral.

How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2014?
~ Office casual followed by a butcher coat.

What kept you sane?
~ Family, friends and my dogs.

Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
~ Elyes Gabel, who plays Walter, the head geek, in Scorpion.

Who did you miss?
~ The recently departed, my friends I left behind, the guys from the meat crew at my old store (seriously, how do a bunch of guys in a town of 5000 not have an issue, but a bunch of guys in a small city of 166,000 can be so awful?).

Who was the best new person you met?
~ The mom of a high school kid who visited my brother ever week for a class and kept coming even after the class ended. He was so inspired by my brother that he is now going to school for biomedical engineering. She was an amazing woman. She brought us home cooked meals a couple of nights a week and became a good friend for my mom and was a great source of encouragement for all of us. She also gave great hugs. :) There is also a retired woman who works part time in the meat department who knows all too well what it’s like to have family with a terminal illness and she’s been my refuge when I’m surrounded by jerks. She’s not afraid to tell them to back off.

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2014:
~ It can ALWAYS get worse.

Tell us something you’ve learned about yourself :
~ It was my brother giving me purpose and direction for so many years. Without him, I really have no idea what I’m doing.

If you could relive any day from 2014, which would it be and why?
~ Only if I can relive it knowing what I know now. August 4th. It’s the day we my brother on hospice. If we would have known they were increasing the dosage of his pain meds and anxiety meds when they started scheduling them (instead of just as needed), we would have never agreed. Yes it was already a long three weeks and other than drawing it out more, the final outcome would have been the same. But at least he could have been awake more in the beginning. By the time we realized how high the dosage was, it was too late to back it down.

Did any of your predictions for the future come true in 2014?
~ How do you plan life?

What was the funniest thing that happened to you this year?
~ Christmas eve I hit a deer on my way to work. I’m fine, my car not so much. While it’s getting fixed, I have a rental. Yesterday my rental was rear ended while I was on my way to work. Now I realize this isn’t funny. However everyone at work has been teasing me mercilessly. I, naturally, have to join in because it’s gotten to the point this year that all you can do is laugh or cry, so you might as well laugh. They’ve all made sure that I’m ok before the mocking begins, so I guess if this is what it takes for them to finally accept a female meat cutter, so be it. If all this seems too morbid, how about the empty fortune cookie I got the other day? Because even Chinese fortune cookies have given up on me this year.

What was the worst thing that happened to you this year?
~ Too many deaths.

What was the best thing that happened this year?
~ Finding out my deductible was a lot lower than what I thought it was.

What was the hardest thing you did this year?
~ Bury my brother.

A new food that you were introduced to:
~ Real sushi.

What traditions were started?
~ Visiting the cemetery on my brother’s birthday and having cake.

What traditions were broken?
~ So, so many.

Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
~ “I’ve got to stay high
all the time
to keep you off my mind.” Or “I keep going to the river to pray
Cause I need something that can wash out the pain
And at most I’m sleeping all these demons away
But your ghost the ghost of you it keeps me awake.”

Did you save any Chinese fortune cookie fortunes from this year, what do they say?
~ Only if you count the empty cookie.

What is something you have vowed to never do again?
~ Take a loved one for granted.

Headlines in the news from this year that you’ll remember most :
~ Robin Williams. He was my favorite actor for years. Plus we were watching tv in my brother’s room when the special report came on.

In 2014, what did you realize you had previously taken for granted?
~ Time. And internet.

Are there any memorable slogans/sayings that describe and/or are from this year?
~ Not really.

What will you be doing this New Years’ Eve?
~ I’m actually off work New Year’s eve and day, but I’m doing nothing. I have no friends here and I’m a bit afraid to drive anywhere right now!

Where were you last New Years’ Day (2014)?
~ I really don’t remember. I know I wasn’t working because I was still in training. I’m guessing I spent the day with my brother?

And on that note, I’d like to give a hearty f*ck you and good riddance to 2014.

Last updated October 05, 2015