And how was your day? Mine was sort of interesting.

I think I got a few tongues wagging at work today. "Why?" you might ask.

Because I resigned from my job.

It's something I've been thinking about for a while. You know, you have a pregnant wife, and six kids to boot, and there tends to be something nagging in your head that says "Hey, it might be a good thing to be around more."

Or that could be the television. I'm not sure.

It's not that I didn't enjoy the things I've worked on. The Vietnam War Memorial dedication was arguably the single greatest event that ever took place in Pierre. It's not like I could ever top that. Honestly, the coordination and human effort of it dwarfed any political thing I've ever had my hands in. If anything, it provides a new frame of reference to what dedicated people can accomplish if they put their minds to a task.

All I know is that there's a PPjr and several daughters who need a father in their lives more than 2 1/2 days a week. Not to mention a Mrs. PP who'd like her husband around, and wasn't relishing starting a third year with the grind of a 200 mile weekly commute, AND a new baby.

It didn't help that this noon hour, my wife related to me the tale of how seriously my son was taking a lighthearted request to keep an eye on a baseball cap I re-sized and put on his head Saturday. Apparently, he was refusing to take it off at preschool (a voluntary parochial preschool BTW) because I had asked him to hang on to it for me until I got back the following weekend. And he was taking his responsibility rather seriously.

So, I walked away.

Yes, I've had the inevitable questions about "What's the big secret - what are you going to do?" from several people. Basically everyone who heard I did it.

Sorry. No big secret. No Machiavellian plans. No political campaign, or anything like it. I do have a part time opportunity with flexible hours, and I'll figure the rest out when I figure it out. I might start auctioning again. I might go get my real estate license. I might do both, or I might go get an evening job at Walmart. Or all three.

Who knows?

A close friend of mine who recently went through a sudden and unexpected divorce was waxing philosophically about his own experience as I was bouncing the idea of this off of him the other day. I was a bit nervous about the monetary end of it. From his own experience, he noted that the money stuff will work itself out. Some of it may be difficult, but in his experience, the most important thing about it was the family he had left.

As with my old college roommate's experiences, I'll figure out the money thing one way or another. But it was (and is) time for me to move on.

The upside to it, besides being in the same town as "the fam" is that I am freed up a bit. As for other fringe benefits, as one legislator put it to an acquaintance several months back:

"I can't wait until PP can say whatever he wants."

That's kind of a double edged sword. It's not like I censor myself much. I might have been viewed as a fool, but not a damned fool. Yes, I have a considerably higher degree of autonomy in what I say, and what I might critique. But, it's not like I've squelched myself in the past, either.

In the end, we'll probably have to just wait and see how it affects my topics and writing. Because I don't know myself at this point.

But at the very least, change is coming.

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.
~Anatole France