A few nights ago, my ex-husband told me he thinks I am self-absorbed. And honestly? I agree with him. I think people hear the phrase “self-absorbed woman” and immediately picture somebody vain. Somebody emotionally shallow. Somebody obsessed with attention, appearances, or making everything about themselves. That is not the version of self-absorbed I became. Mine…
Flash Sale Siren Songs & Other Financially Questionable Decisions This trip technically started because Great Wolf Lodge decided to personally tempt my impulsive tendencies. They ran one of those dangerous little flash sales where suddenly I could snag a room for $90 before taxes and fees, and honestly? At that price, my frontal lobe barely…
The Notebook Page That Sent Me Spiraling There is a particular kind of panic that settles into your chest when you start doing survival math at midnight. I am talking about calculator-glowing-on-your-face, staring-at-bank-accounts-like-they-personally-betrayed-you kind of math. The kind where every number somehow multiplies into three more problems. That was me the other night. I have…
Before we get into it, here’s how this post works. These lyrics are read without context—no backstory, no personal history, no explanation of who or what inspired them. Just the song as it exists on the page, the way a listener would hear it the first time through. After that, we’ll break open what’s actually…
Grief is often treated like an event—something that happens, something you respond to, something you eventually move past. A loss occurs, you feel it, you process it, and then, ideally, you come out the other side with a lesson neatly tucked into your pocket. That version of grief is comforting. It’s also incomplete. Grief is…
The Work That Doesn’t Clock Out There’s a specific kind of exhaustion that sleep doesn’t touch. It isn’t physical. It doesn’t come from movement you can point to. It comes from holding too many things in your head for too long, from constantly scanning ahead, from living one step in the future so nothing falls…
The Language Before Language Before we knew lyrics, before we understood meaning, before we could even form memories that stick—there was sound. Not music in the polished, Spotify sense. Not something you’d queue up or analyze. Something softer. Closer. More instinct than performance. A hum. My family didn’t just sing—we hummed. And that matters. Humming…
Sea Life Aquarium in Kansas City, Missouri 2022—where the tanks were glowing, the jellyfish were vibing, and I…was basically this duck. Bright on the outside, blue on the inside, plopped on a metaphorical plank because Dave decided to blow me off that day. Nothing like ocean ambience and a rubber duck to really highlight the…
Some songs don’t explode.They echo. Some songs don’t tell you what happened—they let you feel what’s missing. Before we get into it, here’s how this post works. These lyrics are read without context—no backstory, no personal history, no explanation of who or what inspired them. Just the song as it exists on the page, the…
Some songs don’t ask for permission to exist.Some songs show up exhausted, overstimulated, and still expected to function. Before we get into it, here’s how this post works. These lyrics are read without context—no backstory, no personal history, no explanation of who or what inspired them. Just the song as it exists on the page,…