My 10 most memorable moments from the past decade

Since the "10 Most ____ of the Past Decade" are all the rage now, I thought I would give you my top 10. I didn't win any Oscars or Nobel Peace Prizes, but I still have some vivid memories.

Number 10 - Sitting in the MDU war room on New Year's Eve 2000 waiting for the Y2K Bug to crash the nation's electric grid. Of course, it didn't happen, but if it had, I was there to handle the press calls from the media. Instead, we ate snacks and left shortly after the new decade began with lights never flickering...even once.

Number 9 - In June 2006, Belinda and I joined her parents, some of her aunts and some of her sisters and their husbands on a weeklong cruise through the Alaskan "Inside Passage Way." This was a lot of fun, but it was dampened by an impending death. See Number 2.

Number 8 - Graduation from high school of our two sons. Derek graduated in 2006 and Scott in 2008. Both times I had to clean out the garage, haul tables and chairs from the church as we hosted graduation open houses. The garage may never be that clean again.

Number 7 - October 1, 2002, I began a new job with the Lignite Energy Council when I was 42. It was great because I was back in the energy industry and public relations after a nearly year hiatus. See Number 1.

Number 6 - April 5, 2009, when we got a call from our sister-in-law Sharon Doll early on a Sunday morning telling us that our neice Janelle Scheitlin was being air-lifted from Glendive to Bismarck following a terrible auto accident. Janelle was in a coma for five weeks and either a Bismarck or Mandan hospital for a few more weeks, but she is now a senior in high school in Glendive.

Number 5 - September 11, 2001, I was called by a fellow MDU co-worker George MacDonald to go to the TV studio in the basement of the Schuchart Building and look at what had just happened to one of the World Trade Center towers. As we were watching, a second plane hit the neighboring tower and the "War on Terror" was officially underway. To add to the stress, the MDU President Martin White and a small contingency of other employees were in New York at the time for financial briefings on Wall Street. Also my boss, Cathi Christopherson, was in Washington, D.C., at meetings not far from the Pentagon that was also hit by a plane.

Number 4 - July 2006, when my father flew in a private plane with his kitty Nibby and me from Roundup to Mandan to begin a new chapter in his life with my family. My family along with Todd and Darcy Schulte were bringing dad's belongings to Mandan in a U-Haul. None of us knew if this arrangement was going to work, but we knew that he couldn't live alone. He was too old to teach to clean and cook. See Number 2.

Number 3 - July 18, 2009, a triumphant return to Roundup along with my dad and family for a great family reunion at my cousin Dennis Anderson's, which was followed by a return to the Solberg Cabins along the north fork of the Musselshell River near Martinsdale. It felt like old times again. And it made me realize how much I had missed seeing my cousins, aunts and uncles who I had grown up with in Roundup.

Number 2 - June 2006, the death of my mother, Evelyn Grace Van Dyke, at the age of 82. She had been suffering for a couple of years with congestive heart failure. In February, she asked to be put on hospice and the family rallied around her in her final years and months on earth. She was a lovely, loving mother and is greatly missed by her husband, children and grandchildren.

Number 1 - October 2001, unfortunately, the most memorable day in the decade was on a Monday when I found out I lost my job at MDU. At the time, I was the corporate communications manager and had just returned from a media relations seminar in Houston, Texas. That weekend, we went to Dickinson to visit Todd and Darcy and went golfing. Never did I suspect that on Monday afternoon, I would be released from the company that I had given my heart and soul to for 16 years. The reason given was reorganization of the department. Luckily, however, our house was paid for, and our cars were, too. Within three months I was working for the Bismarck Tribune as its education reporter and within a year I was working for the Lignite Energy Council. But it was a very traumatic and emotional time. I'm so grateful for a supportive family and for my friends who meant so much to me when I needed their love and trust the most.

Alright...that's my 10 most memorable moments of the past decade. What say you? What were your memorable monents?