you just never know.  you don't.  when a friend calls you asking for advice...you may be the 3rd or 4th or 8th person to hear the dilemma.  it's what we women do..."troubles talk", they call it in all the books.  Men call it hen parties.  we talk it out.  we hug it out.  we come to conclusions as best we can, and move on decisions as they need to be moved on.  and an inkling from this conversation may join up with a spark from that conversation, and become a full-on sparkle by the time it reaches the 4th conversation.  it's what we do, we women.  we mend, we take a piece of this and add it to a piece of that and make a whole cloth.  we patch the thin spots...the holes.  we take the old and make it usable again.  and we do it by talking...by learning from those we've gathered around us like a cloak.  those that haven't tired of the endless swirl until a conclusion is reached...those that have stood in the fulcrum before, or maybe are in the midst of their own swirling reality and are happy to step up/step out for a few minutes/hours/days, in order to perhaps learn from the women they are holding, or perhaps just to hold them.  I have a conclusion.  i have a set course.  at long last.  and i will share it with you as soon as the ink dries.  until then, please know that there has never been a person who appreciates you more than i do these past months...that i fully recognize how exhausting it must have been to be near my swirling heart, and how brave and steadfast you have been.  "thank you" - seems way too little. there needs to be a new word invented. how about "friend?"