Mirrors & Mountains
My phone was on the bathroom counter while I brushed my teeth in front of the mirror. I stood there studying myself in the most mundane and unattractive of moments. My phone lit up...
Category: Mental health
The other part of the reflection
The brush at the old Palms poker room led me to my seat one late night several years ago. The seven-seat at the table was the only open chair in the room, and it...
Mistakes
This is a story of two mistakes with eternal consequences. They happened almost exactly three years ago, but I’ve never written about them publicly. There are a lot of things that happen when somebody...
On getting naked
I could not have been more naked. Six months ago, I stood behind an open car door. It was the only thing blocking my man-parts from an entire grass-field-turned-parking-lot full of people on a...
Notes on fear
The note read, “If I die.” Nothing else. There was no last will and testament. There were no instructions. There was only a flower blossom picked from somewhere else. I was soaked with sweat...
Alarm
The roundest person in the entire gym was the firefighter who came to save our lives this morning. He was 350 pounds if he was an ounce. The sweaty struggle it must have been...
The Dennis DeYoung Dilemma
I’m sitting at a poker table. Or a bar. Or at the gate waiting for a plane. It doesn’t matter, because I ask the same question in all of these places and more. “If...
Honesty
I’ve known my friend T for a long time. We’re honest with each other as much as we can be. Sometimes it doesn’t work because we’re both idiots in our own way. With that...
People who died
I did something odd last night. I was doing it before I even knew why. I’m still not sure I have a decent grasp on my motivation. A guy who went to my high...
On failure
Richard Summers could claim scarred black lab tables and an exceedingly bad combover. This was the Summers Experience, and it was not a good one. It was easy to sit in the back of...
Turning off
Let me preface this by saying that there is no either place I’d rather be and given the choice, I’d pick being home every time. Still, making the mental transition from the Vegas war...
Deja true
I have a hard time believing in the supernatural. I’m a literalist turned existentialist turned fatalist turned optimist. I find it easier to be part of the -mist than a -list. You understand, I’m...
Maters
“I have too many tomatoes!” It’s a common cry this time of year. People with plants or who have been overzealous in an afternoon of picking at the farm find themselves with 40 pounds...
Somebody died
At 5am, I was sitting in a place called the Blue Gin Bar drinking a 1664 beer and wishing I’d never even heard of a place called Monte Carlo. It was a place that...