Dear Great Grandchildren, a Letter of Apology
Dear Great Grandchildren, I am writing this letter on the eleventh day of 2021 and already the year’s been horrifying. Just writing this letter is an act of [...]
My Greatest Accomplishment is Not an Accomplishment
I have achieved a lot in my life. Some of my achievements are small but each serves as a building block to the next. Some of my achievements [...]
The Tale of Two Birthdays
I remember two birthdays of equal and conflicting importance. When I turned fifty, I felt the world owed me a big ass party. I wasn’t willing to leave [...]
Fear Is Only Ear To Ear
I loathe cowardice; but I am afraid of heights. I experience self loathing every time I trek to anywhere above 5 thousand feet. But I do climb with [...]
Lisp Bigot: How my lisp turned me into a public speaker
“ He has a (pause) lisp, I think.” I have said this, one eye closed in concentration as I scrutinize the talking head I am observing on TV. [...]
Calvinists Can’t Meditate . . .?
I was raised by a couple of list driven Calvinists. They didn’t mean to be Calvinists; in fact they rejected Calvinism because it made them feel guilty. But [...]
Writers’ Golden Rule And Other Lessons I learned From My Launch
Every writer dreams of a book signing. It is payback for all the time spent writing in obscurity. It is the essence of being done with writing a [...]
Why I Write
Why I Write For me being a writer is organic and not a choice. The need to tell stories was in place long before I became aware of [...]
Summer Dying
“Summer, you can feel it dying.” This is the opening sentence to Jerry Spinelli’s Space Station Seventh Grade. I use it at the beginning of the school year [...]
Writing in a voice different from my own
I am heading my greatest fear off at the pass, fear of being called a fraud. It’s hard to be called a fraud when you write fiction. Fiction’s [...]
How I chose my cover.
American Family, my debut novel, is the story of two men, Richard Lawson and Michael Elson, struggling to gain custody of their biological daughter, Brady, who is in [...]