Fear on Own The Leap

The One I Sent First

Tue, 09 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The dog and I did the loop at 6:15. Thirty-five minutes, same route. I did not rehearse anything, which was unfamiliar in a way I am still thinking about. For five days I walked that loop running the opener, the second paragraph, the one word I kept changing and changing back. Yesterday morning I hit send. This morning I just walked.

I checked my phone before I left the house. No response. Twenty-two hours in. I was not expecting one. I keep reminding myself of this. I am going to keep reminding myself.

The Third Monday

Mon, 08 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The dog and I did the loop at 6:15. I ran the opener the whole way, which I’ve been doing since Thursday, so I’ve been at this five days and I’ve stopped practicing and started pacing. I walked up the driveway and thought: you have now rehearsed this more than you have rehearsed anything in four years. You know the subject line. You know the word in the second paragraph you will change and then change back.

What the Subject Line Is

Sat, 06 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I sat down Saturday morning to write the email.

Not to send it. I am aware of the gap between those two things and I have been living in it for two weeks. But I thought: you can at least write a draft. You can open a compose window and see what it says. The calls are not calls you have to make from the office. Start there.

I opened a compose window and typed the name. One of the four non-contingent contacts, someone I have known for 12 years, a relationship I built on my own before I ever worked at this company. She runs operations at a mid-size software company, recently promoted to VP, the kind of role where you are suddenly responsible for renewals at a volume you have never managed before. I know exactly what problem she is having, or going to have. I have watched this problem develop in seven different organizations.

What Belongs to the Badge

Fri, 05 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I was on a call Tuesday. Another quarterly business review, the kind I have run enough times that I no longer need the agenda to know what I will say and when. Seven people on it, including a junior account manager who had done solid work. At the twenty-minute mark, she said something smart. An observation about the client’s procurement cycle that nobody had connected yet, accurate and specific, the kind of pattern that takes two or three years to learn to see.

Ready Is Not the Same as Going

Thu, 04 Jun 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The clearance arrived Tuesday.

Not permission. I know the difference and I keep saying so because I think I need to keep saying it. Legal clearance. The attorney’s opinion, not a guarantee, is that both contingent names fall outside what a court would likely interpret as solicitation under my agreement, provided I reach out after I have actually resigned. The missing exhibit cuts in my favor. I asked eight questions and got answers to seven. The ninth still does not have words.

Working Backwards from November

Wed, 20 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The questions still haven’t come.

I don’t know if Doug is being generous or strategic, but it’s Tuesday and he has not asked any of them. He made dinner last night. We talked about Max’s lacrosse tournament and whether Zoe’s college counselor is actually helpful or just expensive, and we watched forty minutes of television and went to bed. Normal in every direction.

I keep waiting for the conversation to resume and it keeps not resuming. This is starting to feel like its own kind of pressure. Like a held note.

The Part I Left Out

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

It’s Monday. Doug made coffee. I came downstairs, he handed me mine, asked how I slept, I said fine, which was true, and that was most of breakfast.

I was expecting more. The next installment of the conversation we’d started Sunday night, maybe. His questions arriving, one at a time, the way I’d been bracing for. What I got was a normal Monday morning, which I think was a kindness he was extending and I was too sleep-deprived to receive properly at 7am.