12 BOOKS I READ

I set a goal to read 10 and I was able to finish twelve.

• The best book, the most important book, was How to Be Antiracist by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi.

• Stamped from the Beginning, also from Dr. Kendi, should be required reading for juniors/seniors in high school.

• The shortest book was God and the Pandemic by N.T. Wright.

• Jimmy Carter’s A Full Life surprised me most, by learning about all he accomplished—before and after—his one-term presidency.

• Wendell Berry and Mary Oliver are essential guides.

• Nudge was okay, though I do like the concept of “choice architecture.”

• Tyler Johnson Was Here, written by Jay Coles who is on staff at our church, was the one piece of fiction I read this year and it was a great choice.

• Radical Candor, Lead Like a Human, and Reboot are all excellent, recommended leadership books.

• North, by vegan ultramarathoner Scott Jurek and his wife Jenny, was inspiring and his accomplishment unfathomable.

See more of my favorite books from previous years.

COMMUTE NO MORE

In March, I started working from home because the kids moved to e-learning. In August, I started a new job at Emplify, which has me working from home permanently now. (I love the work and being at home.)

One big impact of this? No more commute. While we still made some trips around the state this year, my mileage was way down. At the height of the spring “safer-at-home” phase, I tracked a mere 50 miles in a car during the month of April. That use to be half of my commute to/from Indy!

IN 2019, I totaled up…

• 19,960 miles traveled in a car (according to my phone/Google)

• Overall, I spent 528 hours, or 22 days in the car

IN 2020, I spent…

• 8,500 miles in a car (exact total TBD in January)

• Overall, I spent 354 hours, or 14.75 days in the car

4 STATES VISITED

I made two work trips (San Antonio and Virginia Beach) before Covid took over, and we made a family trip up to northern Michigan in the summer (a few extra red blips on the map are airports I traveled through.)

Other than that, we stayed in the Hoosier state. Down from 10 states last year, I’ll be looking to (hopefully, fingers crossed) get back to traveling in 2021.

Because of travel restrictions and general safety, our family saw canceled 2020 trips to Washington D.C. (Jack’s 5th-grade trip), North Cascades National Park (a guys’ backpacking trip), Denver (visiting family for Thanksgiving), and 15th anniversary trip to somewhere for Stacey and I.

6 INDIANA STATE PARKS

One way our family persevered through such an unusual year of social distancing and restrictions on gathering with friends and family was to get outdoors. I made quite a few solo trips to Mounds, and I made the most of some new lenses I bought for upping my photo game with my phone.

We bought a state park pass and traveled to new and familiar places.

• Mounds State Park (many trips)

• Ouabache State Park

• Fort Harrison State Park (with grandparents)

• Shades State Park (with friends)

• Chain O’ Lakes State Park (solo trip)

• Whitewater Memorial State Park

Podcasts Year in Review

This year, I did a more in-depth rundown on my favorite podcasts of the year. You can read the rundown of 25+ shows and more than 60 episodes that stuck with me and rose to the top this year.

Without a commute, I thought maybe I wouldn’t have listened to as much. But it turns out, you can take me out of the commute, but it only slowed me down—it couldn’t contain my podcast habits.

I also put out 16 podcast episodes, the first five episodes of a new show called “Making Church Work” with Fishhook, and then eleven episodes of a solo project called “Present” during the first month of the pandemic.

CAFFEINERY VISITS: 21

Of all the non-essential things I miss because of the pandemic, this is right up near the top.

Last year I visited 96 times. This year, just 21.

Even though they’ve opened back up for curbside service, I’ve only made it down a few times. I miss bumping into friends while I post up at a table for a few hours of work, the bustle of people coming and going, the friendly faces of people I’ve never talked to but saw there regularly.

And you can imagine, like so many other businesses, it’s been a hard year for them. We’ve hopefully helped to contribute to some sense of stability by ordering a few bags of coffee for ourselves, along with sending several bags out to friends and teachers at different times this year.

353,000 WORDS READ IN POCKET

It’s my go-to “save to read later” app. Using the mobile app and the Chrome browser extension, I save articles, posts, and videos to catch up on when I have some downtime. This is the 8th year in a row I’ve been in the top 5% of Pocket readers.

3,000,000 VIEWS ON UNSPLASH

In 2019, I started sharing some photos on the uber-popular free stock photo site, Unsplash. I put up 30 photos in 2019 and garnered around 725,000 views.

In 2020, I shared another 35 photos and saw more than 3 million new views! The first photo I ever uploaded, an aerial shot of the Rockies during a flight, has now broken past 1,000,000 views all on its own.

My profile: unsplash.com/@adambouse

GIVE IT AWAY

I wrote in my 2018 review about an idea around giving/donating:

A friend of mine wrote a book this year called, Where Am I Giving?, and made a great point: people regularly post when they buy a new car or house or phone, but why don’t we share when we give or donate just as openly? We’re probably worried about being seen as bragging or getting on our high horse. But what if we more openly talked about where and why we give our money, time, and resources? Detailing specific amounts probably isn’t wise (or necessary), but perhaps having a more open conversation in this area can spark us all to be more generous, to give more regularly, and to develop a more generous circle of friends and community.

I reflected more recently about the Jewish concepts of charity, which historically has been defined more as “a right thing to do.”

In light of this idea of talking more openly about where we give and what organizations we support, here is a list of places we’ve given financially in the last year.

(Along with using stimulus money we received, many of the gifts we’ve given to the places below in 2020 were $25 or less, but there are reasons why we’ve given each time and I do think there is something to the idea of sharing where we give leading to more giving).

• The Revolution (our local church), Reliant (missionary support), Serge (missionary support), Be the Match, Second Harvest Food Bank, YWCA of Central Indiana, Alzheimer’s Association, Habitat for Humanity, Equal Justice Initiative, Scrapcycle, The Ross Community Center, Prison Fellowship, The Creutzfeldt-Jakob Foundation, Blood ‘n Fire Ministries, Conner Prairie, The Clean Air Task Force, and Sanctuary Mental Health.