Gindi Vincent

The Dish on Career, Fashion, Faith, and Family

Gindi

One Year After The Bell

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That’s me. Today. 

My six month oncologist visit happened to fall today.

One year after my last radiation treatment. 

March 31st. 

It happened to be just before Easter weekend last year. Lots of analogies running through my head.

It’s been a bear of a week. (More on that tomorrow.)

I’ve been all upside down and inside out and it was all totally unrelated to this.

My friend asked me last month if I’d write to mark this anniversary. I wasn’t sure.

I went back and read what I wrote six months after the surgery.  On August 4th.

The side effects are largely gone. No more itching, thankfully. My range of motion on the right side is back.

But I’m having hot flashes from the Tamoxifen. And weight gain. I’m really heavy right now and uncomfortable about it most of the time.

My breasts are scarred up and I don’t like to see them. I’m super thankful I have them, mind you, but they’re a constant reminder.

I’m grateful. Regularly. 

I’m amazed that the cancer was caught early, cut out in the surgery and I didn’t need chemotherapy.

I guess I’ve wondered how to live in the in between. 

Part of what I’ve been doing is stepping back from my relationship with Christ.

It’s probably why I haven’t written. 

I don’t know how to say that. 

I’m not leaving the faith or anything, but I’ve sort of stepped into a selfish cycle.

Isn’t that terrible? 

After all of the goodness of God and others, I’ve been pretty self focused the past four or five months.

I’ve focused on my kids and on my job and on spending money and lots of things surrounding me and mine, but not so much on what God wants me to do next.

This tension has cropped up between sacrificing everything because God has been so incredibly faithful despite my faithlessness (the whole Samuel’s mother giving him back to God idea) and squeezing everything into this life possible because who knows when it will end. Whether or not it’s what God wants. 

It’s the ugliest part of how I’ve been processing. 

So I don’t have a rainbows and sunshine anniversary post. 

I’m struggling but I’m also okay. 

The doctor said everything looked good today and I was utterly thankful for that.

I can pray every day, which I do, and thank God, which I do, but still not live in a space where God wants me to be.

I tried to write a final line to this post a dozen different ways. To wrap this up neatly. I kept deleting them. Because everything sounded trite and untrue. I don’t know what’s next. But maybe I’ll come back here again.

Say Hello and Wave Goodbye

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It’s inevitable.

With each new door that opens, you leave the last room behind as you walk through.

I just left a room. A chapter. An era.

For nine years, I worked at a global energy company. I joined after 14 years in private practice. I moved to the position because I had toddler triplets and didn’t feel I could juggle the demands of business development and the billable hour while being a present mom. We’d waited so long to have a family, I didn’t want to miss out on watching them grow.

I was incredibly fortunate in that I had a great nine years. I served in different roles, including this last one of over four and a half years where I got to serve as the lawyer for a massive joint venture project. Cooler than even the work, which was really cool, were the people. These clients have been the most incredible ones of my career. They became dear friends and made my day-to-day work an absolute dream.

I loved coming to work. I loved what I did and who I got to hang out with.

That all made the walking through the open door harder.

I basically want to hold on to everyone forever. Add all the new people but keep all the old ones too. That can get tricky after multiple career changes and moves.

Before COVID hit last year, I started thinking about whether it made sense to move. But COVID hit, and all that went on the back burner.

At the end of 2020, I dusted off those thoughts. But cancer hit, and all that went back on the back burner.

So when I finished radiation and celebrated Easter, I started asking God if it was time to go. There were three things I was looking for (in addition to all the basics like wonderful people, competitive comp, etc.): a leadership role, a diverse industry, and closer to home.

The only job I interviewed for had all three.

I will go from a 33 mile commute, one way, to a one and half mile commute. I know, I drove it yesterday to specifically measure my commute home.

I will be doing a lot of different things, but it will be more technology focused. And… I will have the chance to serve as the Assistant General Counsel with lots of opportunity for career growth.

This last one wasn’t about the title. As you know, I’m incredibly passionate about leadership and diversity and development and corporate culture. I wanted a seat at the table because I wanted to invest this into a corporate law department.

However, all that excitement about the opportunity didn’t make the goodbye any easier.

Last week was hard. Amazing clients threw me some farewell parties and we got to swap our funny stories from our adventure together. I received kind notes and generous words. And I hugged a bunch of people and tried not to cry.

Now that the goodbyes have concluded, I drove away from my work campus last Friday at lunch with no work computer, badge, cell phone, or email, I’m ready.

I feel really ready.

So I’m running all my last minute errands today because tomorrow I’m going to be a new hire. With a fresh backpack and water bottle, ready to tackle the world. I get to meet new people and learn new things and I LOVE learning new things. I’m sure I’ll feel inexperienced and nervous too, because a lot of this is going to be new. But I’ll grow and stretch and test out a key tenet of my faith: My grace is sufficient for you for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

I’m excited to say hello now that I’ve waved goodbye.

Christmas 2021

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What. A. Year!

Seriously. I don’t even know where to start.

I started by reading last year’s letter. You know, I’ve been writing Christmas letters since my senior year of college. There are still some of you who get our Christmas cards that remember those old letters that would come on Christmas-y paper tucked into an old fashioned card (before photo cards).

That first letter went out in 1990. So here we are, a full three decades into this tradition. I’ve missed a couple because of kid chaos, but overall I’ve been pretty good.

I’m sure I have them all somewhere. I’d love to see if ever there has been a year as wild as this one.

You all know well this year started off with two big Cs. I had just received the cancer diagnosis when a week into the New Year every single member of our family was diagnosed with COVID. Except me. Which was an absolute miracle because it meant my lumpectomy did not have to be delayed! Bray got really sick, and still doesn’t have his sense of smell back. The kids were fine but it meant homeschooling for several weeks right before surgery.

The surgery and month’s long radiation were successful and I rang the bell right before Easter weekend! Thank you all for your prayers and support during this time.

All the while the kids played spring sports (the boys playing on a wonderfully fun team, the Astros, for spring baseball and little bit playing Grace softball) and Bray and I juggled really busy jobs.

No sooner did sports end than we had a fifth grade GRADUATION on our hands and I could hardly believe we were going to have middle schoolers this year! I basically stopped writing for months after cancer so I don’t really have a record of all these precious moments at the end of elementary school. I think I’d burned up all my words.

A gorgeous family vacation to Bar Harbor, and a little reminiscing of where we spent our honeymoon, brought me back to life and gave me words again. We had an amazing trip, full of lobster, boating, Acadia National Park, and downtime together.

Beyond that, I don’t remember much over the summer. We did get to celebrate Bray turning the big 5-0 with at a party at our house. And we finally got to see my dad and stepmom, twice!, after two years apart because of the pandemic. The kids were obsessed with the farm and the horses and the baby may become an outdoor survivalist.

The summer flew. So fast that suddenly we had 6th graders. Middle school. Sheesh. The boys played on the school football team and little bit ran cross country. Just over a month later, we were celebrating the trio’s 12th birthday. I also got a clean bill of health from MD Anderson (no check ups for a year!).

Now we’re nearing the end of the first semester and two of the three are playing basketball, while the baby decided to sit this sport out. The eldest is playing the trumpet in band and little bit is also training for cheer team tryouts.

And since it wouldn’t be a Vincent Christmas letter without a bombshell at the end, there is more big news this year. After a wonderful nine years at ExxonMobil, I’ve accepted a position as Assistant General Counsel for a business division of Honeywell. I learned so much and grew as a lawyer tremendously while at EM, and now I’m excited about this new opportunity in my career. As the icing on top, I will go from a 33 mile one way to commute to work to a ONE mile commute. God is good.

While this year held much good for us, we know so many are still suffering because of the pandemic and other losses. I pray we can encourage one another and hold each other up during these really challenging times. I don’t know what we would do without the support and encouragement of our community.

From the Vincents to you, we wish you a very Merry Christmas and a 2022 filled with great joy.

Four Weekends: No. 4

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You made it! I feel like Grover in the Monster at the End of the Book! You made it all the way to the last of the four weekends away!

Weekend one – celebrating the kids.

Weekend two – family time.

Weekend three – girls trip.

Weekend four – family friends.

That’s right, today we’re talking about the gift of family friends.

You may have gathered if you’ve read me over the years that Bray and I are VERY different. Country/city. Politics. Free time. Hobbies.

All different.

What weaves us together other than love and attraction which we still thankfully have 16 years in is common values. Faith. Family. Morals.

But because we are so different and because we have kids of both genders, it was really hard to find family friends. People where Bray connected with the husband, I connected with the wife, and the kids connected with each other.

When we came to our current school, the kids were in first grade, and we found family friends for the first time. Really dear and meaningful friendships which continue to this day. Some families have left and some have joined but I feel tremendously grateful for some core families with whom we adore spending time.

One of those precious families invited us out to their lake house on Canyon Lake. It’s a gorgeous lake in the Hill Country we hadn’t ever visited before. With all the activity of October, we weren’t sure we were going to make it, but luckily we did.

All we had to do was pack a bag and drive up. We threw some wine and appetizers in the car but the wife had meals all planned out. Casual and easy but delicious. The husband drove a super fun boat and the kids swam and tubed and surfed off the boat waves.

While the kids explored the area, the grown ups sat on the wrap around porch and drank coffee and visited in that decadent unhurried way. We laughed and unwound. We watched sports and played pickleball (I love it and am supremely awful) and had loud competitions on the vintage foosball table.

Even my husband, who would almost always prefer to be at the ranch or the farm, remarked on our way home what a fabulous time it was.

Adults don’t get to have long swaths of time to laugh and goof off and hear each other’s stories. We squeeze it in here or there over a drink or in between cheering for our kids team.

You know me. I don’t want to mess around with the small talk. I want to get into your STORY. Deep. All the gory details. This weekend was a gift of stories and history and joy.

We all felt lighter afterwards. And more connected. And most of all, grateful. Grateful for the families God has placed into our lives to enrich it and make it more colorful.

Each of these four weekends gave us something back. I’m so thankful we had each of them.

Four Weekends: No. 3

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Here we are, already at Weekend No. 3! I started this four weekend series with No. 1, celebrating the kids. Then yesterday covered No. 2, family time!

Today, I’m talking about a favorite topic: GIRLFRIENDS! Weekend No. 3 was a much needed, much overdue girls trip.

I won’t get into the details of how it totally came together last minute for me, or how a friend of mine invited me even though I didn’t know the other women on the trip.

What I will say is that it was absolutely perfect. Six women. All within about a decade in age (with me being the senior citizen). All working momma lawyers. But even more, deep women of faith, with great interests, varied musical tastes, and a love of wine and coffee.

These were my people.

The crazy thing is, this is the only weekend that would have even worked. October is mayhem with work and sports and birthdays. But early one Friday morning, I hopped on a flight using my frequent flyer miles, and zipped up to Northern California for a weekend in Sonoma, my favorite part of wine country.

I really think we could have plopped down anywhere though.

We ate great food, drank great wine, and had important conversations about careers and societal issues and parenting and love and faith and more.

I feel like the theme of each of these four posts is uninterrupted.

Life, most days, is a series of constant interruptions. This time was uninterrupted. We didn’t have to pick a restaurant our kids would enjoy. We didn’t have to run interference for a fight (with kids or clients). No eating in a hurry at our desk.

Nope. It was leisurely. All planned out. We just showed up at each stop. Ate, drank, laughed and talked. In long unhurried segments of time.

I woke up in the morning and took my coffee and phone outside to a massive backyard overlooking a vineyard. I put my favorite praise music on the phone and sat. Took deep breaths. Ingested the beauty. Absorbed the peace.

We don’t do this. Especially we working mommas. We’re notoriously terrible at this. We’ll go years without sitting still. Even today, writing this post, I am MAKING myself sit at my computer while the kids are out on a Sunday afternoon. I have a ton of things to do but I really want to write. Love to write.

But there’s no time. To take deep breaths. To have deep thoughts.

Then we went out. To great dinners (highly recommend The Girl and The Fig). To great vineyards (highly recommend Repris for the experience and Merry Edwards for the pinot). We listened to 90s country and sang songs I didn’t even know I knew. I laughed so much. I don’t laugh nearly as much as I used to and I’m going to work on that.

This weekend was a gift. At a time that could not have been more perfect. Right before a major life change. Right before the frenzied holiday season, full of goodness but also chaos.

The women were a gift. Each of them was interesting, thoughtful, beautiful, funny, insightful, gracious, and really pretty fabulous. We just got together again this week to catch up and celebrate our shipment of wine by cracking some open.

I did nothing to deserve such a gorgeous, joy-filled weekend away, but I’m overwhelmingly, unspeakable grateful for its coming.