In my post-divorce life, so much of what once felt certain and safe is now up in the air.

By nature, I see the unknown as a positive—my default factory setting is Pollyanna. I’m all butterflies and unicorns, excited and hopeful. Still, it’s a little unsettling to be in my fifties without a clear path.

Did I mention I’m also jobless?

I was a writer in the IT industry for more than a decade. Unlike almost every other kind of writing, technical writing asks very little of your ego. No one person does everything, no one gets a byline, and no one wonders what they’re supposed to write about. There are new manuals, proposals, online help systems, and procedure documents staring at you every Monday morning.

So, while I can legitimately claim to be a writer, I have surprisingly little evidence.

The past few years have been one long stumble sequence. I’m finally at the point where it’s time to play it off with that weird little jog we all do after almost falling. I’ve spent countless hours thinking, mind mapping, planning, and iterating, trying to figure out where this path should lead. I’m trying on lots of hats. I feel the weight of my own expectations, the heat of self-judgment, and that asshole of an inner critic just smirking, watching, waiting. Everything feels stiff. Awkward. New.

This what-will-I-be-when-I-grow-up limbo should have ended decades ago, but here I am. I’m anxious to start, but not entirely sure where to go.

I’m working on essays, a book, and a screenplay. My focus is questionable. Sometimes I wonder if writing is just an elaborate form of procrastination—a way to avoid doing something more visible. From the outside, there’s no evidence that any work has happened at all.

No half-finished painting leaning against a wall.

No rolls of undeveloped film.

No sculpture slowly emerging from a block of stone.

So, imagine me gesturing wildly as I announce that thissssss (jazz hands point to the screen) will be my visible work – my website version of a neon, eight-foot-tall paper mâché brachiosaurus.

It’ll be messy and weird. Absolutely no one asked for it. It may end up incomplete or abandoned, at which point I’ll resent it for gathering dust while blocking a doorway.

Still, sharing my dinosaur feels like the next right step.

I don’t know what happens next. I don’t know if any of this works. I don’t even know if I’m particularly good at it yet.

But it exists out in the world.