Reflecting on the small moments that made 2019 unforgettable
It’s only when you pause and look back that you realise how many memories were packed into a single year. There were overseas family trips across a few countries, getting back into surfing and skateboarding as life eased up a bit and the kids got older, plus a few bigger life moments and upgrades in between. Nothing dramatic on its own, but together it added up to a year that felt pretty full.
I’ve always found life is made up of small moments at the intersections of everyday life. Connections, conversations, shared experiences, and the little adventures in between.
Family & friends
- First day of school: Ali and I walked Charlie to his first day at school. He waved back at us with a big smile, like it was just another day. It felt like only yesterday he was learning to walk, and suddenly he was heading off into school life in a uniform and backpack that looked half his size.
- Skateboarding: Jumped back on the board and started going to skate parks with the kids around Wellington. It wasn’t about getting good again, more just hanging out and watching their confidence grow. Got a SmoothStar surf skateboard for dryland surf training, perfect for practising turns in between school runs. I knew it was time to get a haircut and find my next job when I found myself skateboarding alone at the empty skatepark while my kids were at school right next door.
- Combined family holiday: We rented a beach house in Golden Bay, New Zealand, with friends. This place was insane, baby piano, private beach, kayaks, and a massive fruit orchard. I made the mistake of telling Molly to go find us some bananas, not realising she didn’t get the joke and that bananas don’t actually grow in the area. She came back about an hour later with nectarines, apples and pears, saying she’d looked everywhere and couldn’t find any bananas. I felt so bad that I grabbed one from the fruit bowl and hid it up a tree for her to find. No schedule or timelines meant the nine of us could make the most of hanging out during the day, then catching up around the outdoor fire pit once the kids were asleep.
- Bought a new house: Our last place was around 80 square metres, with Ali and me, two kids, and a dog, we were definitely starting to feel the squeeze. So we signed on for a new house, a land, plan and build package, currently being built, with a move-in date of late 2020. Little did we know what was waiting for us, and the rest of the world, just around the corner.
Travel & experiences
- Six countries with two kids: Singapore, England, Wales, the Netherlands, Norway, Australia. Our family flew to Norway for Rob & Rachel’s wedding, Rachel being my wife Ali’s sister. Travelling with kids changes the rhythm completely. Early mornings and long days, never really knowing what the day was going to throw at you, with different time zones and cultures. Mostly awesome, but sometimes it felt very much like parenting in a different country.
- Michelin-star restaurant: Somehow we managed to talk our way into a Michelin-star restaurant in Norway. Got lucky being in the right place at the right time, it was their off-season, and they’d just opened up for the day and said we could come in.
- Surfing an artificial wave: A perfectly shaped wave in the middle of Wales that feels slightly out of place when you first see it. Adventure Parc Snowdonia was something I’d been looking forward to for a while. Surfing a wave pool takes a bit of figuring out, especially with rented boards and gear, so it always takes a little while to dial in. The waves break differently from what I’m used to, but once I got the hang of it, I managed to catch a handful of great ones.
- Surfing sand dunes: From artificial waves to massive sand dunes. We borrowed the kids’ bodyboards to take down the dunes at Castlepoint, about a 2.5-hour drive from Wellington. Super steep, with almost neck-breaking drops at certain speeds and angles. Coming down at full speed, trying to find my feet and ride it like a surfboard halfway down, only to wipe out and end up covered in sand. Then dusting myself off and climbing straight back up to do it again.
Music & coffee
- TOOL released Fear Inoculum: After a 13-year wait since their last album in 2006, Fear Inoculum finally dropped on Spotify, along with their entire back catalogue, previously unavailable on any streaming platform. It dethroned Taylor Swift’s Lover from No. 1 on the Billboard 200, much to the confusion of her fans. I get it, plenty of them hadn’t been born, or weren’t old enough to notice, when TOOL released their last album. Seeing TOOL live in Auckland with Ali the following year, right before the world got turned upside down by COVID, was amazing.
- Cold brew & vodka: A buddy knew I loved coffee and vodka, so he picked up a bottle for us to try. It’s made from redistilled NZ whey vodka mixed with organic cold brew coffee, delivering an intense, non-syrupy espresso kick with notes of dark chocolate and vanilla. In case you’re a tasting notes nerd. Unexpectedly good.
- Espresso machine purchase: Maxed out the credit cards to buy a Rocket Espresso (Mozzafiato Evoluzione R) to celebrate my 40th birthday, yep, turned 40. I’d actually become a qualified barista (City & Guilds International Award in Barista Skills) back in 2016. I was between contracts at the time, and a one-day course felt too short while two weeks was more time and money than I wanted to spend, so three days was the perfect middle ground. As you’ve probably figured out for yourself, this was a long-term strategic move to convince my non-coffee-drinking wife that this was an essential purchase.
Work & life
- Four-day work week: Having an extra day up my sleeve meant more time to surf, spend time with the family, and study. It also gave me the freedom to work on some ideas and side projects I’d been thinking about for a while. Because I was contracting, I could take the school holidays off instead of putting the kids into holiday programs, so we got to hang out and explore Wellington together.
- Back into surfing: When I was working at Dave Clark, I met an awesome designer called Diego, who surfed too. Talking to him made me realise I wasn’t getting out on the water nearly as much as I wanted to. Before surf cams and apps, that meant rearranging pick-ups and drop-offs, making deals and promises with the devil, and still turning up to find the beach flat as a pancake. The board I’d bought a couple of years earlier to try to get back into it was gathering dust in the garage as a result. Now you can keep an eye on the surf from your desk, which makes it so much easier to actually get out more.
- Regular workouts: Five to six sessions a week became a steady background rhythm. Nothing extreme, just enough consistency to keep everything balanced without needing much thought. I made a little life hack out of it too: paying myself the price of a coffee, $4, for every 30 minutes of exercise, choosing the activity based on energy levels, mood and injuries. That’s added up to more than $1,000 over the years.
- Great design teams: I was lucky enough to work across multidisciplinary design teams: Dave Clark, DAN and ANZ. Different environments, industries and problem domains, each one taught me something new. Worked with passionate people, picked up new skills, and made friendships with people I’m still in contact with today.
- UX certified: I’ve been doing UX design for a while and thought it would be a good idea to get some UX industry-recognised certificates behind me. Back in 2016, I thought about getting a degree in user experience design, but after a single paper, I found the material was outdated and I could teach myself online for a fraction of the cost. It was an expensive lesson to learn I didn’t need a degree to be good at design. For the record, I got an A for that paper, so tell anyone who asks that I was a straight-A student at university. Online learning seems to suit my neurodivergent learning style, it’s how I’ve learnt most of what I know about design.
Looking back on 2019
2019 wasn’t defined by one thing. It was starting school, a wedding in Norway, a wave in Wales, dunes at Castlepoint, a skateboard at 40, and a bottle of vodka someone thought I’d enjoy. None of it happened separately, it was all tangled up with work, routines, and everything else life was doing at the same time.
Sometimes a small nudge made a massive impact. Diego mentioning he surfed too was enough to get me back in the water after years of barely finding the time. Charlie waving at us with a big smile on his first day was enough to remind me how fast all of this moves. And a throwaway joke about finding bananas in Golden Bay somehow turned into one of the best memories of the whole trip, Molly coming back an hour later with nectarines and apples instead, utterly determined.
Looking back, none of it felt small at the time, and it still doesn’t. It’s just the year.
