Ok. So it’s been a full year since I last posted on here. My apologies. Anyways, it’s hard to believe it’s been a full 18 months since my last chemotherapy treatment. But it’s given me plenty of time to reflect on what these last two years have been like. Two very formative years that I’ve learned a lot about myself and my beautiful wife, Sam. Because for as much as what I’ve been through, I feel like it’s been even harder on her. That’s something very few people know. But I feel comfortable sharing it now because she has come out on the other side even stronger, too. Words can’t do justice to how proud I am of Sam growing into a better woman through these trials, with me discovering inner-strengths in her I never knew existed. Hardships can do that to you.

And just when we put 2015 behind us, the first weeks of 2016 were just as hard. Those were the final weeks of the life of George Robertshaw, my grandfather, who lived a very long and very happy life. Still, it’s easy never easy saying goodbye – for now – to a loved one, especially one who had such a vibrant spirit.

Then Sam and I, renters since we married in 2010, went in search of our first home, and nearly made what would’ve been a costly mistake when we fell in love with a home. Looking past its many defects, we got it under agreement only for it to fall apart and lead us to pull out of the deal.

Looking back on it, God was looking out for us. Because weeks later we found a home across the Susquehanna River in Lancaster County that’s turned out to be the right choice. Even when we discovered our oil tank needed replacing and some patch work done to the roof on this home, God provided for us again when we were able to use the money we had set aside for the home in order to complete both projects down to the very dollar.

These last 24 hours have been filled with good news as well. Professionally, God has continued to allow me to use the skills He has blessed me with in order to be the messenger of some incredible stories. One of them was about a young junior high football coach who lost his ability to walk over the last year or so, with doctors unable to provide answers to his mysterious condition. Just yesterday, that same coach was seen walking without crutches at a new rehab facility that may have found some solutions to his health.

That story was one of six I entered into the Features Beat Reporting category for the 2017 Keystone awards – an annual competition among all the newspaper and print media folk in Pennsylvania. Those awards were just announced this afternoon. And for the second year in a row, I was awarded first place.

This development came just hours after my latest doctor’s appointment with my oncologist – following a round of blood work and a CT scan that I get done every six months – who gave me a clean bill of health, meaning I’m still cancer-free.

I wasn’t the only one to receive such good news. Through my job, I previously covered the York Catholic girls basketball team. And shortly after my bout with cancer, I learned that the York Catholic coach had a son, Chandler, who was in the midst of a battle with a similar lymphoma cancer. Chandler and I got to know each other through this connection, and met in person for the first time just a few weeks ago (see the above picture). It turns out Chandler and I now get our six-month checkups around the same time. And he also got a clean bill of health hours after I got mine.

I’d be lying, though, if I said everything has been looking up. Even while Sam and I found our first home, and even while God has led me to some incredible stories, I lost two young friends to cancer in 2016. And there have been bumps in the road in the dream of Sam and I to be parents, stemming back to what we went through in 2015. That’s a story for another day. One we’re not comfortable telling just yet. But even in those trials, God has proved, in little ways, He is still here and is still listening. And He always will be provided that we trust in him through life’s peaks and valleys. We’ve gotten through this much together. Certainly we’re strong enough now to handle whatever comes next.