5 am

The house is as quiet as it ever gets at 5 am. A darkly-lit vacuum where the only sound that can be heard is the coffeemaker if I remembered to set it the night before. Not even when they were little did our kids get up this early. My wife doesn’t get up until 6:30 […]

Take A Walk

I was never much of a runner. Or, a runner at all. As a kid in gym I was usually the last to finish the mile, with the exception of one or two others in class. I never completely stopped running, but I would slow to a jog or speed walk while holding my side […]

If All Else Fails, Be Kind

I’ve learned something over the last few months, and that is that people can be good. It’s much easier to see differences; political, religious, ideological, social, and just automatically build a protective shell between you and them. I’ve done it. It’s natural to protect yourself from those you view as the “enemy”. Some folks can […]

Hello From Wherever This Is

Hey. Yeah, I’ve been a little absent this week. Call it mental fatigue, preoccupation, or just a lack of hard drive space in the brain to sit and write, I just haven’t been in the right place to expound on albums or tell more Midwest tales of growing up. Sometimes things happen and you start […]

Weird Things On Shelves Are What Life Is

Been awhile since I’ve sat down to just empty the old brain of all the clutter that’s accumulated. Have I been too busy for the mental upkeep? I don’t know, maybe. I doubt that, though. Even at my most time-lacking moments I’ve made space to sit and click and clack on the keyboard to release […]

I love You, But Don’t Invite Me To Anything

There comes a time in one’s life when you’ve got to take stock of those “responsibilities” we put on ourselves in regards to staying in contact with family, friends, and acquaintances. When we’re younger it’s instilled in us by our parents that family is family. There’s a function, you should go. So we go, whether […]

Is This Long Covid?(Or Am I Just Sad?)

I’ve been in a bit of a rut, lately. Ever since that bout of Covid a little over a month ago I just haven’t felt, well, normal. There are days when I feel okay. I started to go to the Y a week afterwards and got in two days before I tapped out. Just wasn’t […]

My First (Electric) Guitar

It was December of 1987 and I was looking down the barrel of my 14th birthday. By that point I’d been playing guitar for a year and change(first lesson was August of 1986.) Of course I wanted to start out with an electric guitar. It wasn’t like I’d been inspired by acoustic troubadours and the […]

A Very Loud, Quiet House

I took last Friday off from work. Felt I needed a day away from that place and its mild mania. Felt I needed a day to myself at home listening to music, working on something creative, shampooing the carpets…anything but being at work. These last 9, almost 10 weeks of nonstop motion and movement at […]

Fine, Art.

I started drawing and painting in earnest a little over a year ago. It started with a picture I painted in watercolors on a postcard made from watercolor paper. Then a birthday card for my son where I drew Trent Reznor singing a special birthday version of “Head Like A Hole”. It was a last […]