In Pottsville PA, we find a town that has been poured into the narrow crevice between two hills. The road snakes at the bottom of this crevice among houses stacked three stories high and sitting hip to hip. The front porches look like balconies as they rise above concrete walls rimming the sidewalks. Store fronts … Continue reading Road trip Happenstance
Review: The Professor’s House
By Willa Cather ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ I did not want this book to end. After the last book I read, it felt like I got this one finished in an afternoon. The story follows Professor St. Peter and his friendship with the mysterious Tom Outland. The story plays out on a few different levels. The professor is … Continue reading Review: The Professor’s House
Electric Blue Anxiety
When I get overwhelmed by life--- even the happy things!--- there comes a point in my creative process where the electric snapping of ideas dwindles to a soft glow. I've curated prompts for when these moments come, but occasionally the bits of dialogue or the opening lines just sort of swim in front of my … Continue reading Electric Blue Anxiety
The Nature of a Healthy Life
Now is the time of change--- hibernation. The trees shed their clothes and settle down to sleep, and perhaps their roots stir with thoughts and dreams of what's to come. They look forward to that quiet time--- the dormancy above which nature's harshness will blast--- they look forward to that time of rest and storing … Continue reading The Nature of a Healthy Life
My Friend, David
Looking in at the window, David can see his friend Emily standing on a stool pulled up next to her grandmother's kitchen counter. David is supposed to be on his way home with the soda and chips his step-mom demanded he retrieve for her. If he didn't get back in the time she thought he … Continue reading My Friend, David
Review: The Closing of the American Mind
by Allan Bloom ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ I sit here and wonder where to even begin. This book is a mammoth to digest, hard to categorize because it is so multilayered, and wonderfully and frighteningly brilliant on top of it all. Bloom wrote the book in the eighties, yet you feel as if he's looking through a window … Continue reading Review: The Closing of the American Mind
The Start of Something, Perhaps…?
It was a new house and yet an old house. It sat at the end of a dead end street beneath the spreading branches of an orange maple tree. It had a deep back yard that would be dappled with sunshine in the summer, four stories--- if one counted the basement and the finished attic--- … Continue reading The Start of Something, Perhaps…?
The Fruits of Labor
As many of you know, I've been working hard on my vision, not just of my writing, but of my life lately. Some of the fruits from that work now have the honor of being published in Foreshadow Magazine. My essay is included in their series for 2022 that focuses on faith and vocation. Please, … Continue reading The Fruits of Labor
Time for Change
I ran through a maelstrom this morning--- or at least, what felt like one. The wind shook the trees, and in the autumn-dark morning, the shadows from the streetlights danced and morphed. One strong gust tossed the top of a giant maple back upon itself and a stream of helicopter seeds fluttered high through the … Continue reading Time for Change
A Foggy Day
The fog closes in. It makes the world tight, brings it right up against your window. It drifts through your yard in waves of mist. It pools like cloudy streams of milk in the valley and the hollows of the hills. Red and orange trees peek up above its tide, but it mutes their vibrancy … Continue reading A Foggy Day
Seeking Prose 