People think healing’s like a day off work—kick back, drink soup, and wait for the body and spirit to knit themselves together. They don’t tell you it can feel like dragging yourself through a tar pit with a piano tied to your ankle. I’ve learned that healing, whether it’s from a busted bone, a bruised…

Being a trained observer can be hell. You see things as they are, not as you wish them to be. There’s no malice, no romance, no filter, just plain reality staring you down like a poker player who’s holding a winning hand. And when I drive around my old hometown of Klamath, that’s exactly what…

They took a shot at Charlie to send a message. That message was as clear as the crack of the rifle, “Be quiet. Don’t rock the boat. Keep your head down, or else.” Now, I don’t know about you, but whenever someone tries to tell me I can’t say something, my mouth gets itchy. It’s…

This morning, I sat down at the kitchen table with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and a strawberry cream cheese muffin in the other, or at least, that’s what the label said it was. The muffin had strawberries, sure enough—sweet, tart little bursts baked right in—but the cream cheese part was about…

Two items landed on my desk this morning. Not bills, not junk mail, not another politician asking for a donation to “save the Republic,” again. No, these were better—so much better. Eash helped stitch up some of the holes in my heart that have been leaking since Wednesday, September 10, at 12:23 p.m. If grief…

They told us when we were kids that everybody puts their pants on one leg at a time. It was supposed to be the great equalizer–a tidy parental sermon wrapped in cotton and elastic–nobody’s better than you, nobody’s worse, and for heaven’s sake, don’t act like a peacock in a tailor shop. Trouble is, pants…

The difference between me and Superman, according to my wife, is that Superman has super vision, while I need supervision. Now, I’d like to argue the point, but the truth is she’s got me nailed down tighter than the lid on Grandma’s pickle jar. Superman could see through walls and across whole city blocks. I…

I have been in combat, and I know what it looks like when a sniper takes their time, lines up the shot, and squeezes the trigger. You don’t forget the aftermath. It isn’t clean, like Hollywood tries to convince us. It’s final. Brutal. And it’s meant not only to stop one man but to terrify…

There are some things in this world that will never quite make sense, no matter how long you live. Heading home from my radio job the other day, I experienced one of those moments that leave you scratching your head, half laughing and half wondering if civilization has finally come unglued. I was minding my…

Today, my pen refused me. Every word I tried to write came out like gravel, sharp-edged and bitter-tasting. My hands shook not from too much coffee, but from sorrow, rage, and that kind of helplessness that makes you want to punch a hole in the wall. Someone murdered Charlie Kirk. And no matter how you…