Father’s Day 2012
My kids and wife brought me breakfast in bed–good black coffee, some egg whites with chopped peppers and Sriracha–and four hand-made cards. There were gifts, too: a couple of beers and limes in a...
Author: Brad Willis
12-year gift: Fireflies
Fourteen months ago, my wife and I bought this home. It had its flaws. It had its places it could be improved. It’s a slow and sometimes frustrating process turning someone else’s house into...
Some things never change
You can move from one house to another. You can mature beyond your age. You can grow up as fast as fate allows. But sometimes the unavoidable gravity of youth pulls your face back...
Mastodon Weekend returning to Greenville?
Details are still to come (you’ll see them right here sometime in the next week or two), but for now, if you ever thought, “Wow, it sure seems like those cats in Greenville are...
Greenville Mud Run 2012 video
I’ve had a lot of people shake their heads at me. A shoe salesman actually said after looking at my battered body, “Maybe if you get some new shoes, you won’t fall down as...
The weeping cherry
I was blind to it at first. The property I’d just bought had more trees, shrubs, and plants than I could count. You couldn’t turn your head five degrees without seeing a new explosion...
Collections
It’s been nearly one year since we moved into the new Mt. Willis, and I don’t think we’re fully unpacked. I mentioned this to a friend today who responded, “If a year has passed...
Welcome to the neighborhood
The sirens from the fire department spooled up in the distance. The firehouse is barely more than a mile away. If we listened close enough, we would’ve heard the firefighters squeaking into their boots....
GoPro Hero 2: Experiments in fatherhood and beyond
My dad died the weekend before my 38th birthday. I didn’t learn until a few days later that one of the last things he did was buy me a birthday gift. It was a...
13.1 miles for Dad
I wanted to tell somebody, but there was nobody to tell. Though I was elbow-to-elbow with some 40,000 people, I was alone. There was no one to tell my story, no one who a...
Hunting
My son found a .30-06 rifle in my dad’s closet, similar to these Winchester rifles. It was unloaded, unclean, and unused for decades. Though mildly unnerving for all of us, my boy was in...
Christmas Eve 2011
My dad was born in Texas on Christmas Eve 1946. He was a child with no privilege, a post-war baby, the son of a decorated Navy man, the son of a boxer who would...
John H. Willis (1946-2011)
For those who knew my dad or our family, this will be published in our local paper Tuesday morning. I’m posting it here for family and friends around the country who may not be...
He smelled the flowers
A few years ago, I looked down a sidewalk at my local zoo to see my father leaning over to smell the blossoms in front of him. He was alone and not affecting any...