Thursday, March 12, 2015

March 12, 2015– Spring is on its way!

Well as I sit here writing this blog, I am at home by myself with Timmie and Maverick.  Brian has headed off to Florida with Breanne and the girls to meet up with James as he is finishing off his camp week.  I am so thankful the weather here is finally going above 0 although walking the dogs is not the best considering all the wet and dirt they pick up on their under-belly which then gets dragged into the house and the house seems filthy.  So some of my time this week will be to do a bit of spring cleaning.  The faster this snow melts the better. 

So much has happened since I last wrote in my blog, we have seen Levi grow to now 8 lb 2 oz!  He is now almost 4 months old but corrected age is 6 weeks.  He had his first smile last week and he is just so precious.  Unfortunately for Jenn and David, he is quite colicky so Jenn doesn’t get much sleep and she is so looking forward to him growing out of this colicky phase.  He certainly is more aware now of things around him and loves to lay on his play-mat looking at all the toys dangling around him and he occasionally bats them with his fists. 

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Here is the most recent picture I had on my phone.  David had done an indoor triathlon event a couple of weeks ago and Levi was there cheering him on!

Since I last wrote, we have all celebrated our birthdays – Brian first, David, Breanne, my dad, my brother Bob and myself and last but not least is Jenn who celebrates her birthday on Sunday.  This year Brian turned the big 7-0!! We celebrated in style going to Toronto for the weekend and took in the theatre, stayed at the Royal York and really enjoyed ourselves.  We also took the train instead of driving and that was just the best decision ever! No traffic to worry about and no construction delays.  We get off the train right at the Royal York – it was great!

The saddest thing that has happened to me this past week is that after a 30 year work relationship with St. Joseph’s Health Centre (Toronto) and my business, it is coming to an end.  I was called by the hospital to come for a meeting which was arranged this past Monday.  I knew the meeting was either going to be a good or bad one; on one hand I was hoping for an extension of another 5 year contract with the hospital but unfortunately the meeting was to tell me that because of technology, they had already signed a contract with one of the biggest Dictation/Transcription Companies in North America – Nuance.  They had decided that they would be terminating their in-house dictation platform and going with a company that could provide them Dictation and Transcription Services.  I cannot provide a Dictation platform, so I certainly understood their decision-making.  Although it was a hard blow to take from my point of view, I also realized that I have been lucky to have had this account for over 30 years and all good things do come to an end.  My biggest obstacle was to tell all 15 of my transcriptionists that within a 3-6 month period, our services were no longer required BUT Nuance of course would take us all on as transcriptionists to work on this account so it was just a matter of a transition to move to them when the time comes (although will be with a huge decrease in pay).  All my girls were very understanding and pretty well all of them will be moving over to Nuance when the change takes place including me and Breanne.  I thought about retiring completely but I’m still not quite ready for that yet.  I consider myself semi-retired but I do like to bring in some money (since I like to spend it!) and also keep myself busy. 

It is funny how things happen though.  I was of course feeling quite down about the whole thing but as I was driving over to Jenn and David’s yesterday to visit with Jenn and Levi; a radio announcer was giving little tidbits of information as they do between playing music and one that hit me smack in the face was this.  When you feel you have been rejected; you are not actually being rejected, it is life’s way of telling you it is time to go in another direction.  That little tidbit of information just totally cheered me up and I immediately felt better and last night I had the best sleep ever.  I feel a weight has actually been lifted off my shoulders and I no longer have to worry about my business anymore.  I can just live life to the fullest with my husband, my children, my grandchildren, my brothers and dad.  That is what is important in life – our relationships with our loved ones! 

Spring is on its way and I have a lot to be thankful for!!