It's been a few months. I keep waiting for an epiphany, some little spark of a something to write to you about, but instead there's just me, sitting on my porch, in the same holding pattern we've all been in (if we're lucky) since March. 

The arc of the story has yet to emerge. Or I have yet to find it, I guess.

Yesterday I spent several hours helping high school seniors craft college application essays, in a Zoom tutoring session run by 826LA. One essay in particular was hard to crack... In the space of 350 words, you can set up a personal challenge or a struggle, but then pretty quickly you need to come out the other side and demonstrate that you overcame it. That it made you stronger. Or something.

B was writing about a ballet class. She described how competitive it was, even for "beginners." How unfriendly the other girls were. How tough and withholding the teachers, inclined to devote their time to the more accomplished students. B was incensed about this. She quit before entering the intermediate class. When I asked her why she quit—searching for some college-essay-friendly reason other than, you know, that the whole thing sounded miserable—she recalled realizing, at age ten, that she'd never be strong enough or tall enough to be a professional ballerina. 

But this couldn't be her arc.

What did you learn from the experience? I asked. What was the silver lining?