Many, many times in my life I have read a passage that has spoken directly to my heart, exactly when I most needed it. Today was just such a day - this excerpt is from Alice Hoffman’s Incantation:

“If every life is a river, then it’s little wonder that we do not even notice the changes that occur until we are far out in the darkest sea. One day you look around and nothing is familiar, not even your own face.

My name once meant daughter, granddaughter, friend, sister, beloved. Now those words mean only what their letters spell out: Star in the night sky. Truth in the darkness.

I have crossed over to a place where I never thought I’d be. I am someone I would never have imagined. A secret. A dream. I am this, body and soul. Burn me. Drown me. Tell me lies. I will still be who I am.”

I will still be who I am.

We don’t own joy - it is a gift given in moments, to those open to receive it.

Be thankful, and be ready. That little boy with the rolling belly laugh at gymnastics? It doesn’t get any better than that - thank you.

OK, here we go! I registered for my first two classes at Wayne State University today, in pursuit of a master’s degree in library and information sciences.

Time to evolve, finally, and this feels like exactly the right direction. I stay connected with the world of kid lit, but am not looking ahead to years of the wild ups and downs of freelance writing. When I started my college career twenty-four years ago, I briefly flirted with the idea of a degree in technical writing, with the idea that I would love to write text books, but after I really looked hard at the daily life of that type of profession, I shied away and moved toward something more stable and predictable. At 17 years old, I knew that I was just not cut out for the capricious vagaries of life as a professional writer. And after five years of actually living it, I KNOW that I need a day job. Bad.

It should take me two years to complete this degree, if I go in the summers, too, and take a manageable 6 credits at a time. And of course, I’ll continue working during that time, so my writing days are far from over. I’d give it all up, though, for a part-time job at Barnes & Noble! Imagine it, all you tormented freelancers out there: you go in, you work, you leave, YOU’RE DONE. Boggles the mind.

In the mean time, I’ve got work through November, at least, and can start subbing as soon as that slows down. That terrifies me, now that it is actually a possibility, but that is a post for another day.