I had a humbling experience this week when one of my students introduced me to yet another celebrity doppelganger that I resemble. By day, I’m a public high-school teacher, and one of my students confessed Friday that a picture of me has been viral among the students for at least a year, showing an uncanny…
I found out last night that a key figure from my past passed away in October. My Comic Book Guy–Al “Oggie” Medlock–was vital to my learning to function as an adult, and I don’t think he realized how life-changing that was for me. Emerging from darkness During my freshman year of college, I fell into…
(A shorter version of this story appears in the Jan. 9, 2025 edition of The Press-Sentinel. If you’re in or around Jesup, Georgia, you should definitely subscribe to that excellent newspaper! Sometime in 2015, I woke up from a vivid dream. Though I don’t recall most of it, I remember seeing Jimmy Carter’s face with…
I don’t have a single tattoo on my body, and yet I had an absolute blast writing my latest book, Under the Skin. It’s all about incorporating tattoos into your tabletop roleplaying gameplay. My obsession with imaginary tattoos started when playing Pathfinder 2nd Edition and leveling up my character so that he could “craft magical…
We often overlook gratitude in the consumerism-obsessed culture of our modern day. We get so caught up in the stuff we want to possess, we forget to acknowledge our fortune in the stuff we already possess–whether it’s tangible belongings, experiences, relationships or character qualities. It’s a shame, though, because scientific study after scientific study has…
This week, as many of us finalize plans for Thanksgiving, it’s time to consider: Who’s invited to your table? I’ve veered away from my ambitious reading list recently and begun to read John Pavolvitz’s A Bigger Table. The book focuses primarily on the Christian church’s failure to live up to its founder’s invitation, but it…
It’s been more than two months since I’ve made substantial progress on the creative project I’m most passionate about. “Why is that?” I ask myself. I’ve fallen into this pattern of almost fishing something far too much, and I don’t think I can attribute it solely to ADHD and my constant penchant for chasing random…
Last week, I addressed the importance of sitting down regularly and working on one’s creative discipline. This week, I want to expand on that to talk about the importance of simply showing up. As a teacher, I often see a clear correlation between absences and academic failure. For those who show up physically, I see another…
Now that I’ve survived a jam-packed week full of deadlines and stressors, I can take a break and look at a blank screen. But what’s a guy to write about when his brain’s turned to mush? Today, we talk about the sacred habit of writing. Nearly every time I’ve sat in on a writing workshop…
This coming week will be jam-packed with potential blessings and opportunities for me. When they all pile up like that, I tend to dread the mass of experience instead of savoring each individual accomplishment as it comes. In the meantime, my body’s fighting off a cold. Enter Anne Lamott. Not only is she a tremendous writer,…