Spaces

Dec 6, 2023–As I grow wiser, I believe more and more that art and beauty lie within the spaces between. Graphic designers refer to it as “white space.” Given a 3-inch by 4-inch ad border, for example, amateurs tend to cram it with images and copy. Experienced...

Simple Gifts

Nov 29, 2023–Gift giving creates such a quandary. What can you possibly buy for someone that they can’t get for themselves? I’m not talking about kids or grandmas, those are easy. For kids, get toys. For grannies, pick up anything from Cracker Barrel. It’s those other...

Reframing your brain

Nov 15, 2023–My 8-year-old grand taught me a life lesson on the way to her dental appointment. She couldn’t wait. Like most of you, going to the dentist is right up there with getting tased while standing in a puddle of stagnant water. So I asked her why she was...

Tyranny of the Sneeze

Oct 25, 2023–The next time I sneeze, don’t bless me. That universal reaction to what is essentially an involuntary intimate act disturbs me. Those two simple words–Bless You–while a loving benediction in other contexts, when used after a snot-spraying convulsion...

You do not exist

Oct 18, 2023–You are not who you think you are. You are who everyone else thinks you are. Like every fictional character, Bart Simpson does not exist. He is simply the aggregation of traits thought up by a committee of writers and artists. They have produced 750+...

In praise of editing

Oct 11, 2023–Anyone who writes does so in dread of editors. Rearrange my words that I have so expertly placed on paper? How dare you! However, I have come to realize that ruthless editing–in all aspects of life–is what makes it, if not more interesting, at least more...

Preparing vs Producing

Sept 27, 2023–While completing yet another task that you never seem stop needing to do, it struck me how little time we spend actually doing the task, versus preparing to do said task. If it were a pie chart, the part spent doing the task would be the size of the...