My wife and I got married in April 2017 when we were both 36; an age that still felt young in the elongated youth of 21st century norms. …

My wife has hijacked a mantra I say to myself before doing something uncomfortable. “Mongol Rally.” Conjuring up the memory of the almost 10,000-mile journey reminds me that — whatever I’m currently facing — I’ve done hard things. I will get through this. I say she hijacked it because while…

“I would move to Amsterdam in a heartbeat if I could,” grumbled the checkout lady at Whole Foods as she whipped a paper bag into shape. “Every shopper has to bag their own items there. In fact, it’s illegal for staff to do anything.” This was the tail end of…

One month in. Now’s about the time where a lot of us are hanging on to the ledge of our new year’s resolutions while the antagonist in our story (who, interestingly enough, is also us) is standing on our fingers hoping we’ll let go. How did this happen? Just four…

My “Top 10 Books I Read This Year” post in 2021 was one of my most popular, so I thought I’d bring back the list for this year’s reads (in no particular order). The 16 books that didn’t make the list are at the end of this post, including my…

It’s always astounding the amount of time I will spend not doing something creative I say I want to do. Upon that carousel of purgatory I often look for a movie analogy to shed light on why I’m bobbing up and down on a plastic horse to nowhere. Today, it’s…

David Sedaris’s new book Happy-Go-Lucky, has the commencement speech he gave at Oberlin College in 2018. It’s great (Transcript here). …

Searching for meaning (in life) is not the same thing as doing something meaningful (today). The former is a philosophical exercise, the latter is done through action. Here’s why. “Meaning” is a noun. Nouns are hefty. We put both proverbial and literal weight to nouns because we presume they are…

“Sending thoughts and prayers.” You know what’s the smoke & mirrors part of that sentence? The verb. “To send.” Because thoughts and prayers are non-tangible. They can’t be “sent.” You send packages, flowers, letters, aid, expertise, donations. Most importantly, when you send someone something it is solely for the purpose…