I knew at an early age that I didn't want to work in the local steel mill, become a farm worker, or enlist in the military — the careers that many of my classmates in my small rural high school chose. They were all fine pursuits, but I figured out that my interests lie elsewhere.... Continue Reading →
Mad Scientist at work, excuse the mess!
I stalk around my room, like a mad scientist, talking and grunting to myself in a gibberish that's hard for anyone else to understand. I'm surrounded by a lab full of beakers and various half-started projects. When I sit down at my laptop, I type out two or three sentences, read what I've written and... Continue Reading →
100 Things I Love: Let’s try this again
Last April, I noticed several other bloggers, including Kari from A Grace Full of Life, write about a few of their favorite things — 100 of them to be exact — and decided to come up with my own list. I had such a good time the first time, I figured it'd be fun to... Continue Reading →
Making up my own rules
Late in the 1985 movie Back to the Future, Christopher Lloyd's character Dr. Emmett Brown tells Marty that things have changed. "Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads." I thought of that scene recently when fellow blogger Vicki Atkinson wrote about her love of the ellipsis. I too like the ellipsis, but I have my... Continue Reading →
An embarrassing day at the lake
(A version of this short story first ran in July 2016.) I had a friend in college who had something like this happen to him in junior high school. I guess it didn't work out too badly for him: He ended up marrying the girl. My short story has its share of sentimental fluff, but... Continue Reading →
Know your audience
I looked over at my father, pale and eyes closed on his bed, in the Intensive Care Unit in the local hospital. He had an oxygen mask up to his face and tubes running from his chest and arms to various machines beside him. I stared a long time at him before looking up at... Continue Reading →
Putting a bully in his place
The baseball came out of the pitcher's hand like a rocket. A blur of white looked like it was headed straight toward my helmet, but then curved down and away at the last minute. I swung forcefully, but I was comically late. The pitcher, a teammate of mine named Jay (name changed), broke out into... Continue Reading →
A teenage killer
(A version of this short story first ran in 2016.) The challenge with any writing is to tell a good story. I wrote this piece of short fiction a few years ago for a writing class to see if I could write — not as an adult male — but as someone else. You be... Continue Reading →
Looking for my readers
Oh, where did my readers go? I look at my WordPress statistics for the first half of the year and some of the numbers have declined. I say to myself in my best Cat in the Hat voice, minus Dr. Seuss' poetic rhythm, rhyming, and alliteration, of course, because I'm horrible at figuring out what... Continue Reading →

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