On burnout, self-reliance, and learning when to stop. I struggle to acknowledge my own weakness when I need help. It goes back to when I was a kid: I was my own rock, handling things on my own, sorting out my own fears and other emotions— I think this is common in our culture, this belief that we need to push past our own vulnerabilities. Our culture ingrains this requirement to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, meet goals, focus on achieving. A lie, and a destructive one

Working on the memoirs was like time travel. To tell the stories of the past, I had to experience the past; had to remember the world as it was thirty to forty years ago— I would love to take someone in their twenties or younger back there. “Bro, what is this place? My phone is not working.” That’s because there was no network, no internet. Our phones are amazing, we have all this information on hand and maps; no need to ask for directions, no need to ask questions about inve

I may seem domesticated, at ease in our hyper-connected world of apps and busy motorways, but in my heart I’m still in the van. In the middle of a forest or next to a hypnotic river, parked off a dirt road. I enjoy indoor plumbing, feel safe behind the locked door of my apartment— But not a day passes where I don’t recall following highways new to me, the only sound the wind through the tree tops or a raven croaking nearby. Yes, I am here, in a city…but part of me is on a lon

"Time, memory, and the long consequences of living." I do not speak with an English accent because I am pretentious or a pretentious Anglophile. I speak this way because I smoked too much weed when I was a kid. Let me explain. In my memoir The Bad Kids , I tell stories about the misadventures of my friends and me—misadventures fueled by copious amounts of marijuana. By the time I graduated eighth grade, I had stopped smoking. Before starting high school, I reinvented myself a

Dear Monica, I write. This is my calling. If a good story insinuates its way in my head I feel obligated to follow it wherever it leads. My father had a stroke a year ago. Thankfully, he had a nearly full recovery but it got me thinking about the past, about things I’d mostly forgotten, people and events I’d blocked out because the memories were impossible to face. Not because they are awful memories, but because they were beautiful and beauty is fleeting. We touch beauty whe

This is the Channeled Scablands Washington

I re-read Into the Wild , the story of Chris McCandless. For those who haven't read it, it is the story of an idealistic young man who...

I meant what I said about being on a break from the regular Tuesday posts, but from time to time I may post something unrelated to any of...

When do we learn to fear the dentist? Why do some people fear the dentist and some do't?

Can I get you to read this by including the phrase celebrity nipslip?

Some would say a “live and let live” mindset is admirable…in some case, perhaps. A live and let live approach when running a city is a...

I have friends who voted for Biden and I have friends who voted for Trump. I have friends who voted for neither and friends who didn’t...

There are distortions about what living in a vehicle is really like, some skewed to the positive and others to the negative. Some are...

Have traveled 60,000 miles in thirteen states I have seen a lot of beautiful places...and a lot of trash where trash does not belong. I...

What do you want? I ask because my last three blogs have gotten a mere three views, the videos six views--- So...what do you want?...

I have periods of overwhelming doubt: Nothing seems to be going right, everything I planned is not working out. Right now, I am starting...

The original plan was to scout places to spend the night in the northern Central Valley. If I ever refer to “the Valley” this is the...

This story is fifteen years in the making; I will try to make it so it does not take that long to read… In 2007 my first wife and I were...

Do you enjoy being alone? Do you enjoy it, or are you simply comfortable with it---being on your own, away from other people? After a...

I have established that I am a traveler and not a nomad, someone who needs a “home base.” Reaching that understanding is just the first...