The Finale

I made it. I took care of a human being for 9 whole weeks: From the 4th of July until Labor Day. Here I am 62 days and 49 posts after writing my first one and I feel many things. First, I feel a big sense of accomplishment. I must admit I was scared, I was heading into the unknown and completely out of my comfort zone. I also added an extra challenge which was writing this blog. I do think that, in the end, it really helped me to stay motivated and focused. Every time something bad or tough would happen I would think "at least this will make a good story for the blog" and that somehow put things in perspective.

Second, I feel grateful for having had this opportunity. I am grateful for having a job that provided this benefit that many people do not have. I am grateful to my friends, family and maybe some complete strangers that came in day after day curious about what happened next in this eventful summer. But, mostly I am grateful to my wife Alegna for her unconditional support and behind the scenes work that made things easier. To Lucas for making the summer interesting with his many occurrences and adorable naughtiness. And to the great Matias, the big smiley baby that was born to be the only person with the patience and good nature to forgive all of my many hiccups as a parent. Without his personality and good behavior I would not have been able to enjoy this summer as much as I have.

Finally, I feel a little uncertainty about what the future holds. Tomorrow, we will start a new routine. Matias is starting daycare, I am going back to work. So many questions come into my mind: Will I ever get to work on time? Can I actually afford daycare for two kids? How tired are we both going to be when we get home from work? But, here is one of the advantages that I think us immigrants have. We have been through so much uncertainty and sometimes so far out of our comfort zone that we kind of lose the fear of the new. I am certain that we are going to be fine. It is going to take some time to get used to it, but we'll be fine.

This has been by far the post I have struggled the most to write. I had promised it for Friday and I had not been late on any of the other posts. The excuse I kept giving myself was that I wasn't home. I was out of town, but I had written posts every day when I was in Florida. Is it something deeper? Is it fear that once I hit publish this part of my life will be over forever? As I said on my previous post, this has been the best summer of my life, but on the other hand, I can't wait to get back to work and gain some structure. I will be having predictable days again, days that will not depend or completely change because of a wailing sound. I'm sure I'm going to miss it a lot though.

So goodbye! This is really the final post. I have been asked to do weekly or monthly updates but I know that it is never going to happen. Part of the reason I was able to post daily was because it required discipline to sit down every day and write something. If I had done it weekly, I would have abandoned this blog a long time ago. I would have kept saying, yeah tomorrow I'll write my post, and that tomorrow would have never come.

Thank you again to all the readers. Seeing those site visit numbers go up every time I wrote a new post kept me going. You don't know how much it meant to me. And to future Lucas and Matias, I hope that someday when you are older you get to enjoy reading some or all of these posts. If you are reading this and you are anywhere near me, please go give me a hug and a kiss. That is all I will ever ask of you, the rest: all of your triumphs and failures belong to you. I will never dare to take credit for any of them. I love you.

The Highlights

So the end is near. Next week is my last week of bonding with Matias. After that I will be returning to work and he will be starting daycare. What this means for my plans with this blog is that there are only 6 posts left after this one. One each week day next week by me and on Friday two posts: one by Alegna and one by me. For this post I wanted to do something different.

First, I wanted to thank you, the reader. If you are reading this post you are one of the few faithful that has lasted for almost two months. I know sometimes it wasn't as interesting, but every day I made the effort to post a little something because I kept seeing people coming back. If it wasn't for you I would have given up. Blogger provides stats for your blog. You can see how many people have been reading your posts and where these people come from. I was surprised that about 200 people started reading my first few posts. I didn't expect that to last, and it didn't but I'm pretty happy that I am at a stable 50 to 60 people reading my new posts every day. I feel fortunate to have 50 people that are interested in me and my family enough to spend a couple of minutes reading something that I wrote.

I have also been surprised about the worldwide reach of this blog. I was expecting most of my readers to come from either the US or Venezuela. I know people in many European and Latin American countries too. But when I look at the top ten countries all time reading my blog I was surprised to find Ireland and Japan for example. Here is the top ten if you are curious:

1. US
2. Venezuela
3. Canada
4. UK
5. Spain
6. Ireland
7. Costa Rica
8. Germany
9. Italy
10. Japan

Finally, I wanted to make this post a little interactive. If you are reading this go ahead and comment below what your favorite post was or just say hi or whatever comes to your mind. I will take the time to personally thank each one of you. My favorite posts to write were: The Serenity Now, The Vinciguerra Boys, The Seven, The Visa, The Revenge and The Airport. 

What did I watch?

Sisters: An early Brian De Palma film that was clearly made as a tribute to Hitchcock. It is a good thriller with some good acting. I really liked the split screen he uses for some scenes to show what is happening at the same time in two different places. The dream sequence was good too.