Changes ... (y)uck.

Go download the song "Everywhere I Go," by Lissie. It's beautiful. I love it. I'm listening to it now.

I would also recommend anything at all by Matthew Ryan, but as I went back to insert this sentence his lovely "Some Streets Lead Nowhere" came on my playlist, so that's a good one to start with. It takes about 20 minutes to really get going, but it features pretty and evocative lines like "What I'm trying to say is I was afraid that you'd leave, so I slept with my failures and I started to grieve" ... so I'll forgive it.

Which is maybe why I find myself in this nostalgic place that usually leads nowhere but to a restless night's sleep and/or morning-after regret and toe-scuffing apologies.

Or it could be that Steven and I were watching the movie The Road, which, if you haven't seen it, don't. (Wow, this is a bossy post.)

We're only halfway through and I'm abjectly terrified that the kid's going to die. Even though the post-Apocalyptic world he and his dad are traveling is hardly a place I'd want to live. Bottom line, there's a little boy in the movie, and Steven made the comment that after you have kids it's harder to stomach movies in which kids are sick or hurting or in danger and whatnot.

It led to a conversation about our awesome Alexander Kirk, and how sweet he is, and how proud we are, and how he's starting freaking school next week. He's going to be fine, I know he is, but ... he's my baby. And it's a scary thing, this place in time when they have to let go of our hands and go it alone.

We all did it, though, right? And we're fine, most of us. And if anyone can do it, Alex can. That boy's got it all, and I have no idea where he got it, no offense to my wonderful husband or myself, but I thank God every day for blessing him so completely.

I guess I'll just miss that hand in mine.

Other reasons I'm indulging in my Playlist o' Melodrama?

Well, I quit my job on Friday. It's been something we've talked about and talked about until I almost broke my own staggering record for indecisiveness, but in the end it just made the most sense. Financially, logistically ... child-o-centrically.

I'm going to keep doing what I've been doing, essentially, which has been anything but sitting on my you-know-what in my pajamas all day long enjoying my UNPAID maternity leave. (Well, pajamas, so what?) I've been freelancing, and God willing the well won't run dry but if it does, I am secure in the knowledge that we will work it out.

The day I lost my job with perhaps the best group of people who've ever been thrown together to produce a magazine, I thought my heart would break and be swiftly followed by our bank account. Didn't happen that way. I dealt with it. I worked, I networked, I found work. And that taught me something about myself: that I can do it if I have to.

For this.



And for this.



And, at the end of the day, for me, too.

Now I'm closing out iTunes and going to bed. Night, all.