#36 / Happy, Meaningful, and Rich
Hey y'all, We’ve had too many overcast days in a row. Normally I love this kind of brooding weather, but like anyone I don’t like to go too long without at...
#35 / The Spirit of the Depths
Hey y'all, Carl Jung made a distinction between “the spirit of the times” and “the spirit of the depths.” The spirit of the times is what is going on in the...
#34 / Rush Job
Hey everyone, Welcome to November! Goodbye to daylight savings time. Welcome, 4:30 PM darkness. Goodbye to... nope, I'm not going to jinx it. A friend asked...
#33 / It's Not Even Past
Hey everyone, It has been fun writing these newsletters every week, and I've been thinking more about how to expand my writing into doing longer pieces on a...
#32 / Don't Forget to Vote, Part 3
Hi everyone, We celebrated our eighth wedding anniversary this week! I’ve heard of the movie The Seven-Year Itch, but I didn’t know that there may be some...
#31 / Don't Forget To Vote, Part 2
I always knew two-day weekends were short, but they feel a lot shorter when your last “weekend” was 16 days long. Minnesota Northwoods Trip, Day 3 Tuesday...
#30 / Don't Forget To Vote
Hey y’all, I’m sure everyone is already aware of this, but I can confirm, once again, that vacations go by fast. Friday was the last day of our two weeks of...
#29 / Home Stretch
Hello from Wabasha, Minnesota! We are at the tail end of our week-long trip to the Minnesota Northwoods. This town is actually in the southwestern part of...
#28 / Out of Dodge
It’s happening! We are actually going out of town. We’ll be spending most of the next week in a cabin in northern Minnesota, near where the Boundary Waters...
#27 / Pollinator Edition
A writer friend kept mentioning the philosophy of Lichtenbergianism. Promising to help you utilize procrastination as a positive creative strategy, it...
#26 / Slow Your Roll
Hey everyone, What a relief! On Monday I went to my dermatologist first thing, to see about getting some answers to why I had itchy and painful red spots all...
#25 / Scratchin'
Hi everyone. Here’s what’s going on. So this is just going to be a quick update, because my skin’s kinda on fire right now. It’s not that I particularly want...
#24 / Rhythms of Life
Hey everyone, Fall is usually my favorite season, and I think it still is, but this is going to be a weird one. No Nebraska football. I’m in Chicago now, so...
#23 / Let's Talk About The Weather
Hey y’all, Does it feel like nothing in the world is going according to plan right now? Last week I promised that in my next email I would have pictures from...
#22 / Heart of the City
Hi, Next week I will have some cool pictures from the bird sanctuary and from Starved Rock State Park, but not this week. This week, once again, I did not go...
#21 / It's Just Your Expectations
Hey y’all, I’m going to keep this one shorter and lighter, both because last week’s was long and heavy, and because I’m feeling pretty tired. I have no bad...
#20 / Staying Afloat
Hey everyone, What do you do when one of your favorite authors writes a vicious take-down of another one of your favorite authors? Do you feel personally...
#19 / Peace Amidst The Shambles
Hey y’all, I’m working on a couple of essay-type pieces that I’m hoping to be able to share soon (he said convincingly), so this week I’ll highlight a...
#18 / One, But Not the Same
Hey everyone, Let’s just get the anticlimactic part out of the way: all of our baby caterpillars are gone. I’ve seen wasps buzzing around our milkweed all...
#17 / Bleed Into One
Hi everyone, When I decided to start this email newsletter, about 20 years ago, I was uncertain where it would lead. But one thing that I do know for...