Tuesday, June 25, 2019

I wrote a short personal ad for myself.


Broken-down, soon-to-be-35 year old man with terminal illness seeking woman to remind him that he is human. Actual requirements up for interpretation.


I haven't put it anywhere...except here.


Sunday, June 9, 2019


You are welcome to use this when you want someone to stop harping on the same issue over and over. Tell them, “The horse is dead.” If they don’t understand, say “Stop beating it.”

Friday, June 7, 2019


Sometimes I think about lasts. I can list a few that have already come and gone: last mountain I hiked, last time I rode a bike, last time I played golf or shot pool or lifted both arms over my head. There are of course countless more that may have already passed me by. Most people may be comforted by the idea that they could do all of those things again, though in reality many of them may have been left behind. I know that many of them are gone, and I fear that there are many more than I am willing to admit.

Thursday, June 6, 2019

Mark it down, June 4th 2019, Natty gets a wheelchair.

It’s a manual one, and really it’s just on loan. I’m not sure how long they expect me to have it, but I’m not planning on giving it back.

I spent 2+ hours being fitted for a power chair, and cruising around a bit, but I won’t have that for a while. If I weren’t so ultra-depressed about the whole thing, I could admit it’s pretty cool.

But I can’t do that. No matter how great the chair might be, it’s not walking, it’s not running, it doesn’t come naturally, and I can’t like it.

Tuesday, June 4, 2019

I used to walk across town a lot. In college I lived on or around Maple and was often walking to places around Pearl. One time (at least one time, I don’t fully remember), beginning another walk from Greene Street to my place at 295 Maple, I decided to go straight.

If you were to check a map you would see that both Greene Street and 295 Maple are about midway between Willard and Union. If walking between them, you must either go up to Willard or down to Union. Or hop a lot of fences.

This time, at some ungodly hour in the morning, I hopped a lot of fences. I of course only remember a few aspects of my journey given the time that has passed and my previously unmentioned but exceedingly obvious inebriation at the time.

But as I recall, I attempted to walk across town without using streets. So I cut through a lot of backyards, down driveways past parked cars, over and around fences. I reached Maple by way of Edmunds Middle School, but I left one thing out. Somewhere along the way I came to a chain link fence alongside a driveway packed with cars. I climbed the fence and stepped on to the roof of a Volvo 240 wagon. I paused to enjoy a moment of quiet revelry, walked down the windshield, over the hood, and hopped off.

Obnoxious I know. But the 240 was a tank. And I'm puny. It’s unlikely the car even noticed me up there.