1) The Job: I ended up changing agencies in mid-December last year and going to work for the local Sheriff's Office in the county where I live. It was not an easy decision and I had already turned down 2 previous offers from them. Basically, things were not going well at the city police department and I felt like I needed to make a change. I heard of another opening with the Sheriff's Office and called the Patrol Commander about a job. Well, one thing led to another and I ended up getting the job. Since moving from a small city PD to a county Sheriff's Office, I'm amazed by the differences. First of all is the territory. I went from a small city of approximately 8 square miles with a small bit of interstate to a rural county of 370+ square miles. I can literally ride for 12 hours and never see the office unless I arrest someone or need gas. I'm still adjusting to the differences but having some good success and making good arrests. The big thing is that my partner is not as aggressive as I am at patrolling and trying to find criminals. That has hindered me from making as many cases as I probably could have.
The other big thing with work is the upcoming Sheriff's election. The Sheriff who hired me has announced that he will not be seeking re-election and that has caused the candidates to come out of the woodwork. So far we have a total of 5 candidates in the race and the deadline for qualifying is May 1st. We have a total of three people from the Sheriff's Office who are running, including the Patrol Commander. The other 2 are Deputies who work days on my shift. They're both good guys but I don't think that they really have the experience to be Sheriff. However, my main goal is to have a job after the election is done. So I'm not endorsing any candidates in public. My wife knows my thoughts on who I'm planning on voting for but that's it. They all have pros and cons for them as Sheriff. I'm just planning on riding it out and seeing how things fall out after the election.
2) Family: My marriage is doing well and I think it's a lot better with me being close to home all the time. I'm still working nights but working in the county I live in allows me to come home and tuck the family into bed at night before I go back out to patrol. My wife is doing well in her job as the Nurse Manager for the ER at our local hospital and my son is growing like crazy. He actually sang a solo piece at the Easter program at his school a couple of weeks ago and did really well.
My wife actually announced that she was pregnant shortly before I changed jobs. Unfortunately she lost the baby right around Christmas and it's been difficult for her to handle the emotional fallout from that. I was at work the night she passed the fetus but thankfully I was able to be at home with her and didn't have any calls. Since then she's said that she wants to continue trying for another baby and I'm fine with that. I think we'll continue just living our lives and not stressing about making a baby. She got incredibly stressed out TRYING to get pregnant that it was driving the both of us crazy. I got her to just relax and enjoy our time together, sure enough she got pregnant. We'll see if it happens again, but my stepson's wife just announced that she is pregnant and my wife did not take the news well. She said she was jealous but that she realized she was over 40 now and that things didn't go as easily as they did when she was younger. I would love to have another child with her but I understand that it may not happen. I love her more than life itself and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I would love to have a little girl but my son is such a blessing that I'm at peace with the idea of not having another child. At this point I'm just trying to be the best husband and father that I can be.
3) Finances: We have been steadily on this pattern of reducing our expenses and living within our means for the past couple of years. This really hasn't changed much except that we refinanced the house again last year and further reduced our mortgage payment. All of our vehicles are paid for and all this work has resulted in our ability to enjoy what we have. We don't have to work all the time and we can still put money into savings. This resulted in our taking a week's vacation to Florida last October and spending a week at the beach. We rented a house not far from the beach and spent a week laying out on the beach and spending time with friends. Our lives are good right now and I'm not interested in doing anything to upset that.
That's about all I feel like discussing for right now. I'm trying to get back into the habit of regular posting so that there won't be these long absences. Of course I'm the only one reading this mess so I guess it really doesn't matter.
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