Id always assumed that by 40 Id have at least a modicum of stability - a steady income, an established career, a bountiful fullness, like a pillow into which I could sink as I entered the second half of my life.

I do miss the excitement of seeing history up close, of having intimate knowledge, through direct experience, of what happens when people and governments clash, but I do not miss the danger or the constant displacement.

I sell my first book to Random House, a memoir of my years as a war photographer, for twice my NBC salary.

Born in 1966, I came of age at the dawn of a revolution. The past was gone; we would move on and get over it!

I am nothing if not rational about what is worthy of my anxiety and what is not, and I refuse to live my life as if a giant bus is just around the corner, waiting to crush me the minute I step off the curb.

Id always assumed that by 40 Id have at least a modicum of stability - a steady income, an established career, a bountiful fullness, like a pillow into which I could sink as I entered the second half of my life.

This is what sexism does best: it makes you feel crazy for desiring parity and hopeless about ever achieving it.