I slept horribly last night, then fell asleep hard at dawn and bumbled through a funhouse of nasty dreams for the next two hours. So this morning I am groggy and unsettled, to say the least. Time seems to be prodding me with forks . . . an end-of-decade alert, perhaps.

Ten years ago, at the tail of 2009, I lived on 40 acres of old-growth forest in the middle of nowhere. I was 45 years old and had a 15-year-old and a 12-year-old at home. My dog was alive and my cat was unborn. I had just published Tracing Paradise. Here's what my blog looked like back then. I haven't brought myself to read it, but you can.

Now, a decade later, I am 55. My land is gone from me. My younger son graduates from college in a few months. My older son earns more money than his parents do. I read and write in a small house in a small city by the sea. In the intervening years I have published six more books. I have compiled at least two more unpublished poetry manuscripts and possibly an unpublished essay manuscript. In a few days I will meet with an archivist who wants to collect my papers. This is bizarre and unreal. How could I have produced all of those words?

Weirdly, I have accomplished, writing-wise, far more than I ever thought possible. Still, as expected, I remain unfamous and unstylish. My papers will get dusty in the archive, but, on the bright side, my kids won't have to clutter up their closets with my boxes of stuff.

Aging is a strange story.