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The Neon Church

I am proud to announce the launch of The Neon Church, my monthly short story newsletter. It’s a brand new short story every month, delivered straight to your inbox thanks to Buttondown. 1 The inaugural issue is “No Questions Asked,” a violent, profane fever … →

July 25th, 2023 #fiction #personal #announcement

Defining “grace”

It’s scanning a trove of your high school and college papers without wincing each time. Part of being an actual adult—instead of yourself, but taller—isn’t forgiving yourself for the unobjectionable things you did when you were younger. It’s realizing you … →

February 13th, 2023 #personal

This tragedy did not happen to me

This tragedy did not happen to me. But its shadow falls on all of us. It darkens every school doorway. Every home. Every business, every gate. When I pick my children up in the afternoon. When I drop them off in the morning. When I lie awake in the middle of … →

May 26th, 2022 #personal

M1 MacBook Air

I called my wife a few weeks ago to tell her good news/bad news. The good news, all my stuff is backed up. (I got burned once in 2009 and vowed never to let that happen again.) The bad news, my MacBook didn’t like filtering a cup of coffee through its … →

June 4th, 2021 #personal

Decency

Last year, in July, I was at a big-box store with my daughter. We were traveling and it turns out Home Depot’s a good place to stop in the middle of a trip. You have to walk to the back of the store to get to the restroom, so you stretch your legs; and the … →

May 24th, 2021 #personal

The year in THE WIRE ROAD

2020 has been a rough one. Hell, there’s seven days left for it to really wreck us, so keep your guard up. The routine that got thoroughly disrupted was my writing routine. Starting in 2019, I got up every morning at 5:30 (weekends included), showered, … →

December 24th, 2020 #writing #personal #wire road

Overheard from the backseat

I had the kids with me last Saturday, and as we drove from dance class to lunch, Little Bird was playing with her superhero toys. This is what I overheard in one quiet stretch of road. “This is a bad idea, Batman.” “No, it’s not.” “We’re going to die!” “We’ll … →

October 9th, 2019 #personal #little bird

Progress

My wife pointed me to a literary magazine requesting short story submissions. I had a piece she thought would be perfect for the theme. I agreed, and I started looking for it. This led to converting a lot of my old writing to more current formats. Which also … →

April 13th, 2019 #writing #personal

Hello, Eben

I’m your dad. You’re brand new here. There are a lot of things I want to share with you. We’ll get to experience them with your sister, and your mom, and it’ll be a lot of fun. This isn’t the whole list—the list is pretty long—but we’ve got time to see it … →

November 5th, 2018 #personal

The seduction of maintenance

I like having my own website. There are a lot of systems humming away. And there’s even more involved in keeping up a local development environment. I use Homebrew on my Mac to operate an Apache server with PHP, mariaDB, and Composer. There’s a little frisson … →

January 11th, 2018 #personal

Fresh starts

The new year makes for the perfect time to consider yourself. Where you’ve been, what you want to accomplish. A lot of us make resolutions around this time. And a lot of us will note that most resolutions don’t last. “New year, new you,” the slogans go. But … →

January 2nd, 2017 #personal