And so, it begins.

I've returned to corporate America after seven years in yoga pants. I have a cube. I'm fully dressed and in a car by 7:30 am. I force myself to bed, Arianna-style, by 11 pm, even when my girl goes to bed at 10.

I'm fine with it.

Six months of unemployment taught me patience and tolerance and gratitude. The problems I face now are normal-people problems. When will I exercise? Clean my house? Help my girl with teenagerdom? Work on my novel? I plan and I calendar, but mostly I just enjoy being back in the land of the living.

Not waking up in a cold sweat.

Doing work I know is solid with a cheerful attitude that is not even fake because I have tasted the alternative.

I hope I never grow jaded again and I will always remember the alternative, which is staring down the face of uncertainty as your life savings quickly runs through your fingers for electricity and gas and groceries. And even these are First World problems.

I am back. I am editing PARKER CLEAVES again. I will resume my author newsletter. I will do my best at home and at work. And mostly I will remember to focus on the glorious fact that right now, nothing is wrong.