May 16th, 2024 May used to be my favorite month, and now it’s the hardest. It’s not fair, which is perfect because my dad spent my childhood preparing and then reminding me that life would never be. I was born on the first of May, she was born on the last, and her day —Continue reading “May”
Tag Archives: Sadness
When we meet again in the dark
May 1st, 2024 It’s natural to reflect on your birthday. It’s natural to daydream about your earliest moments, lying on coarse carpet, following the sunlight as it sings through the tiny glass prism your mom hung in the window, leaving stains of every color in the palm of your hand; it’s natural to anxiously dwellContinue reading “When we meet again in the dark”
Lefse
December 23rd, 2023 No matter where I turn, I can’t escape the refrain, delivered with a deep sigh: “It doesn’t feel like Christmas this year.” I try to empathize with the observer; I attempt to comfort them by telling them that it’s just the weather. It’s the rain. It’s the lack of snow. It’s theContinue reading “Lefse”
Push: But you really need to listen to me, because I’m telling you the truth, I mean this, I’m okay! (Trust me.)
November 28th, 2023 “I am not fine. I don’t know how to tell people that, but I’m not. I also don’t see the benefit in being honest about it, because I don’t see a way that it will help me feel fine. If everyone knew how to feel that way, then we just would, wouldn’tContinue reading “Push: But you really need to listen to me, because I’m telling you the truth, I mean this, I’m okay! (Trust me.)”
3
October 16th, 2023 Three years ago today, my mom decided to go on a forever trip. Due to her terribly dark sense of humor, she didn’t send a text to let me know, or even say good bye. The good news, though, is that after going through these thousand days or so, I don’t evenContinue reading “3”
Flip: I Wish I Was Special
October 8th, 2023 Flip is, ultimately, about a sad, lonely boy. Liam is the opposite of my ego. He’s also the lyrics of a Radiohead song: kind of a creep, and kind of a weirdo. I’ve never had to personally differentiate myself from a character so much; I think it’s because Flip (and its sequels)Continue reading “Flip: I Wish I Was Special”
The Weirdos, Part II: The Sketch
August 11th, 2023 I love Abigail “Axis” Coire — aka The Sketch, though she’s never referred to by that name in Volume I — so much, for so many reasons, but one of the strongest is her complexity. The irony of this is not lost on me, because she began as a single question: “Wouldn’tContinue reading “The Weirdos, Part II: The Sketch”
The Words I Needed Then
July 31st, 2023 Today is the last day of Brushfire month, which means I can shut up about it for a little while now. I tell people that I don’t write for an audience, and that is generally true; I don’t sit down and think of a target person, their age or gender or preferencesContinue reading “The Words I Needed Then”
Bad Brains + Bad Hearts
July 1st, 2023 The world lately has me feeling a kind of sick, and I’ve been having to remind myself of a lesson I learned early in sobriety. When I got better, my first instinct was to help everyone else get better, too. It’s not a bad instinct, but it’s a naïve one, and itContinue reading “Bad Brains + Bad Hearts”
Cold World: Building a house you can live in as is, with doors and stairways to expand up, down, or sideways
June 30th, 2023 Everything about Cold World was, for me, too big to contain in one story — whether I ever decide to write any of those other stories or not. I knew that I wanted to tell a complete, specific tale: this chapter of Calef’s life as he explores the power of understanding, throughContinue reading “Cold World: Building a house you can live in as is, with doors and stairways to expand up, down, or sideways”
The Den 