There's a story Tom Petty told that I'm fond of telling myself and anyone within earshot, of when he and the Heartbreakers were recording what, IMO, is their greatest and most underappreciated album (1999's ECHO; might write a thing about it), and in the middle of recording one song, Petty stopped them, and said "I wrote a better song" while they were recording so they moved on and recorded this new song which was, indeed, spectacular (Track five, "Swingin'").

Anyhow: how it relates: I had written a whole thing about career / life plateaus and how I couldn't figure my way out of it but ended up figuring at least something to help me through it so I stopped writing the former piece, wrote and sent the email, and am now writing this to tell you / myself that I did just that.

And also an excuse to write about Tom Petty which I need to do more of.