So, life did get in the way. Life, the universe, and everything (thank you, Douglas, will forever be grateful for those wonderful words). I’ve become a full-fledged, card-carrying nerd of the highest order. I speak in tech, I dream in binary, and most days, I work with the most talented and awe-inspiring people I’ve ever had the fortune to meet. Most days.

Other days, I have the frustration of the millions. Those days are not so great, leave me gasping for my own sense of sanity, and wondering why the fuck did I ever get out of bed today? Those days seem to be far-and-few-in-between more and more. Thankfully.

I love still living in NYC. I love that my daughter is off at college now. She keeps in touch as frequently as she can (gods bless her for her 20-minute calls that leave me breathless in their scope, width, and breadth). I always wait until after she hangs up to say, “I love you” because she once said to me, “you know, saying, I love you is manipulative”. So, I compromise. I love her dearly and can say it after she’s gone back to her adult life. I’m not so brave in not admitting I love her. She’s the highlight of my world every day. Maybe someday she’ll read these pages and know how incredibly proud of her I am. She went such a long way to come all the way back to herself. She stumbles and topples over only to pick herself up, brush herself off, and just get on with the business of living. She’s my hero some days. Other days, she’s just the best person I know. Every day, she’s still my daughter.

Life is progressing. It ebbs and flows along. Just screams into the wind hoping there isn’t a bee heading straight for its mouth as it gapes and gaws at the world. I am more buffeted by how life moves than how I move it. I’m quite happy with the way life is in the past few years. Ups, downs, sideways, back-and-forth, all the ways we move in the world, I’ve moved through them all. None as easily as up. I strive every day to do better than the day before. I don’t always succeed, but at least the passion for it isn’t gone. It, of course, is life. Life is lovely when you hold it in your hands and stroke it gently.

My favorite expression every day is “I love living indoors.” So many can’t say that and to me, everything after this fact is simply gravy. Not the smooth and perfect gravy from a packet, but the homemade kind that is lumpy and obscene and incredibly good. The best kind of gravy is definitely the kind that has lumps. How would we know we’re alive if we didn’t have lumps in our lives?