We Have an Issue: Welcome to the Stress Issue

Illustration by Zeke Barbaro / Getty Images

A couple months back, I pulled onto I-35 for my weekly trip up north to see family and immediately began leaking tears. Nothing too intense, just a steady drip for a full 40 minutes, and it came out of nowhere. So I asked myself, since there was nobody else to ask: Why the hell am I crying?

I sorta already knew the answer – it's just stress, dummy – but I wanted to better understand what was going on in my body and what I might do to better cope. And here's the nifty thing about being the editor of a newspaper: When a question occurs to you, one you think may interest your readers too, then you ask some talented reporters to get on the case.

So here we are fashioning a whole issue around the thing that keeps us up at night and jolts us awake in a cold sweat. The Chronicle has never done a Stress Issue before, and while it's our habit to stick "first annual" in front of every new special issue, I dearly hope a year from now we'll be publishing the "Isn't It Remarkable How Much Better and More Equitable and Just Plain Chill the World Is Now, Comparatively Speaking?" Issue instead. We shall see. For now, we're focusing our energy on this insane moment in time – one of intense, prolonged, and seemingly universally felt stress. Over the course of a dozen or so stories, we try to explain some of the science behind stress, talk to professionals about what they do to mitigate stress, and offer a host of suggestions for better stress management, some more unconventional than others. (Spoiler alert: werewolf dildos.)

You'd think all this talk about stress would make me grind my teeth even harder, but putting together this issue has been good for my soul. As my colleagues and I have swapped stories about what's working for us – woodworking, running, old-school letter writing, embroidery, Second Life, paint-by-number kits, and survivalist reality show binges, to name a few – and had frank conversations about how much we've struggled in our private lives, I know I've felt less alone. I hope our readers find similar solace and solidarity in these pages.

After 13 years in the position, our award-winning Art Director Jason Stout leaves the Chronicle this week to devote himself full time to his many artistic pursuits. There's really no overstating the magnitude of Jason's creative contributions to this paper. He's been an absolute wizard at taking tricky concepts and distilling them to their essence, and the work of our editorial staff would not have been as impactful without his inspired art direction. His artistry has set a tone for the paper and a standard of excellence. He's also a wonderful collaborator and a good friend. We're going to miss him terribly. He promises to keep popping up in our pages as a freelancer; his going away party, alas, will have to hold until sometime next year.

The only thing taking the sting out of Jason's departure is that his obvious successor has been sitting a few feet from him for a couple years now. Production Manager/all-around-stellar-human-being Zeke Barbaro's design work has already graced recent Hot Sauce Festival T-shirts, Austin Music Awards posters, and special issues (including this one), and we're all so excited to see him flourish in his new role.

Online This Week

Mobley and pup (by David Brendan Hall)

The Pictures Do the Talking Go to austinchronicle.com/photos to check out our latest photo galleries, including David Brendan Hall's tagalong with musician Mobley (and pup Kakashi!) on his curbside concert tour, John Anderson's shots from the Wildflower Center's annual Fortlandia interactive exhibit, and Jana Birchum's images from Sunday's community celebration of Evergreen Cemetery, a historically Black cemetery in East Austin, after the site was vandalized.