Saying Yes

Saying Yes

9-16-14 | They say dogs understand a good deal more of the words we speak than we realize. Our intrepid seven-pound poodle Ben understands a lot.

Milk, Flour, Eggs

Milk, Flour, Eggs

9-5-14 | What are the ingredients of a meaningful, satisfying life? I think they boil down to three: love, work, and trouble.

What Does It All Add Up To?

What Does It All Add Up To?

8-27-14 | The task of writing a book sometimes feels so overwhelming that I could see it tipping me over the edge into despair. What keeps me sane and gets me through it is a belief I have. It may sound weird, but it is the singular faith that pulls me through every difficult stretch and dark time in the writing process: To me, the finished story already exists.

Share a Little Light

Share a Little Light

8-19-14 | I have a formal job description as husband: it is my professional responsibility to make my wife laugh. It is a duty I take very seriously.

The Art of Upset

The Art of Upset

8-12-14 | “Turn the other cheek” isn’t a cover for denying your feelings or wimping out. It’s a smart tactical tool for effective living.

A Love Story

A Love Story

8-5-14 | Our wedding anniversary (#6) is coming in three days. If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you might know this date has been, well, sort a hit-or-miss thing.

Tweet Tweet

Tweet Tweet

7-29-14 | Outside my study window, our garden is visited constantly by birds. Cardinals, redpolls, finches, doves, grackles, catbirds, downy woodpeckers, flickers, evening grosbeaks, bluebirds, owls, even two big gorgeous hawks. This week, they have become my muse, because they know how to do something that I needed to learn.

Say What You Mean

Say What You Mean

7-22-14 | This week a sad thing happened: it was announced that some 12,500 employees are being laid off at Microsoft’s devices unit. What elevated this event from merely a shame to an outrage, and at the same time a sort of uneasily, weirdly hilarious outrage, was the way they found out.

May I Help You?

May I Help You?

7-15-14 | Apparently I’ve been ambling in and out of Amazon’s “Top 100 Most Popular Self-Help Authors” list for the past nine months. I had not really thought of the stuff I write as “self-help,” exactly. Whenever I thought about the term, it would invariably call to mind the wisdom of Steven Wright.

Making Things Happen

Making Things Happen

7-8-14 | When my older son Nick was a toddler, he used to sit in the kitchen and smash trucks. It went like this:

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