Insane Earthlings

It was my second Christmas. I was not even two years old. I don’t remember it of course, but there is the photo . My father, a news photographer, took thousands of pictures of me and my siblings over the years. There are a lot of great photos of the four of us. But this photo taken of us posing with our gifts around the perfectly decorated Christmas tree is special. It’s iconic. It documents a defining moment in our lives as three brothers and one sister. It would be our only Christmas in a town that none of us were born in. The one year that my father sought the greener grass of the New York Times owned newspaper in Chattanooga. A year idealized in my mind by the recounted stories my parents and siblings shared about our year living atop a mountain. The year my older siblings would sit, barefoot, in the open windows of the local church on Sundays. The windows that they would hop out of when the sermon was finished. And then they would dash to our little homestead, carefree and ha...

I almost stayed home last night. A historic music venue in the city I live in, is scheduled to cease operations at the end of this year. The band that both of my brothers are in was taking the stage at 9:00pm sharp. This was my last opportunity to see them play that stage together. I almost didn’t make it to stand beside my sister and play the supportive sibling role that has been our custom for many years. I came very close to letting a grudge get in the way of being where I belonged. I started writing this blog several weeks ago. I have been posting an eclectic mix of musings, personal narratives, and poems. I have felt a need to prove to myself that I can do something outside of my job. That I can do it well and stick with it. While the blog has not consistently followed a theme or format, I wanted it to convey two things. The first being honesty. I feel that, as a whole, we do not express ourselves honestly to each other or even to ourselves. The second purpose was to honor ...