@~Christina, I do hope your daughter's town is mostly spared any destruction from the hurricane. Good luck to you getting the job(s) you've applied for. And thanks for the update on Sunflower. I hope her time away is restorative.

At this time, I'm just focusing on what I need to do to get to the next point in my life. A very rough stressor has inflicted my close circle, during the course of this. Someone is very ill and scared. I feel a sadness not to be closer to them to provide more support, and yet the distance also serves as a buffer from the reality (and therefore pain), to a small degree. One thing that's always been particularly painful for me is knowing a loved one is frightened. I've seen this far too often these past 20 years, and will surely see it more than once again in the future.