June 2026

June 18

There's a moment in the evening when the sun, as it begins its curvilinear descent beyond the mountains, meets my west-facing window, and the light - in its golden form - flares throughout my room. The light becomes the room. It fills the imperceptible pores of the otherwise pale walls, and only the shadows of objects on my windowsill that bend and lengthen with the hours are hidden from the light. The light then deepens as it's confronted with nightfall, as if the darkness clings to light with a fused, gilded weight. A heaviness that turns the light from a fortunate, polished straw blonde before the hours darken by the enveloping shade.

June 19

Outside my window is the train depot—a deep reddish-brown brick building, built in 1902. The main brick terminal is encircled on either side by a courtyard enclosed by rows of buff-colored brick columns that connect the terminal symmetrically to the separate baggage and restaurant buildings. The last passenger train stopped at the depot in 1979; today, the depot acts as an event center and pop-up museum. A freight train passes in irregular intervals, springing between tracks like a steel tide. I stand by the window and watch graffiti art painted on the sides of train cars. Often, the train's moving too quickly, and so I can make out only a torrent of polychromatic slides. And suddenly the train is gone, the torrent with it, and only the steel tracks, surrounded by black, polished rocks, are left shivering in the wake.

June 20

I've made a suite in an historic hotel my home for the last four years. The same historic hotel whose echoes include the footsteps of Kurt Vonnegut, Jim Harrison, Dave Matthews, Jimmy Buffett, Jeff Bridges, Robert Redford, Tim Egan, Colum McCann, Waylon Jennings, Michael Keaton, Gregory Peck, Terry Tempest Willimans, Rick Bass, Leon Redbone, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Sam Shepard, and others. Sam Peckinpah used to live in the room above me, decades before my time, but nevertheless. I can still hear his footsteps.

I haven't always been fascinated by history, at least not in the context of who might also have walked the same halls, until I started thinking about how our experiences shape us and the small, unconscious things that influence us in ways few recognize. 

Sam used to fire a pistol into the ceiling of his room. People come from all over to ask whether the holes are still left smoldering in the walls. In my hand, I hold a slug pulled from a hole in the wall. 

June 21

I spend my days writing, almost exclusively. I work the front desk of the hotel for a few hours at night before turning down the lights, taking in the last moments in the darkness of the lobby, and tiptoeing up the 122-year-old marble steps to my room in the earliest hours of the morning, and drift to sleep. One of the marble steps was kicked loose by Trigger when Roy stayed here. I know where to step to silence the rattle, but sometimes I like it. I wake up after the sun rises, fairly late, usually between ten and eleven, and quickly get through my morning routine before settling in to enjoy my tea; often, while sitting on the rooftop patio, before I start writing. I don't stop writing until around seven when I make dinner. After dinner, I plan the following day's work, then meditate, and wait for my late shift. 

June 22

"Rebellion, which I’ve come to understand, is both inevitable and necessary. A rite of passage that serves as more than mere noise or disruption. It’s exploration in its rawest form, a way to test the boundaries of selfhood against the expectations of the world. Some people rebel loudly, with grand gestures and public declarations of independence from whatever authority they’ve chosen to reject. Others conduct their rebellion quietly, through sustained reflection, through patient questioning of inherited assumptions, through the deliberate choice to live according to principles they’ve examined and claimed as their own.

Neither approach is inherently superior, because rebellion, when it emerges from honest self-examination rather than mere reactivity, will plant seeds that eventually grow into the qualities we desperately need as adults navigating an increasingly complex world. Qualities like etiquette, empathy, self-respect, confidence, and acceptance. These are not rigid rules imposed from outside, but as living principles that emerge from understanding how we want to be in relationship with others and with ourselves." Excerpt from my essay, The Lost Art of Etiquette.

          I think a great deal about rites of passage, and particularly the quote/unquote 'Vision Quest.' Outside Native American culture, there are similar examples of this coming-of-age exploration of the self throughout the globe. I'm most fascinated by the less-than-traditional Vision Quest taken by young Americans. In the States, this journey often parallels going off to college or different stages of youthful rebellion; self-reflection is rarely associated with the American 'tradition.' And even less so now, as young Americans search for identity in online communities and social media. Instead of practicing introspection, we are, culturally, relying on the reflection of shared experience. And while many form their identity around tribal inclusion - concentrated even to a single ideology that we develop our entire sense of self around - we unwittingly reject certain intrapersonal truths that we no longer explore, even if only as an unknowing symptom of the necessity and urgency of solitude.

June 25

What is authenticity? How would you define authenticity? Has what it means to be authentic changed in your lifetime? How? Do you define authenticity differently for yourself than you do for others? 

It's difficult to be authentic. Straight out of the gate, most of us adopt ideologies and beliefs impressed upon us by our parents. And we accept the mentality entirely, fostering the whole of any one political platform and religious dogma without examining those ideas or the methods we used to form them. We merely continue throughout our lives defending those ideas, often violently. And not just our ideas but also the unconscious systems our ideas built. As teenagers, when we begin to transition into independence - or the illusion of it, rather - to find our authentic self, we're forced to sever our relationship to the only example of self we've known, only... how do we do that? We would have to be aware of our inherited modalities and do so with the kind of mindful experience to understand that they are conditioned, not examined.

June 26

There's so much about conventional American society that seems like a trap to me; it certainly feels that way. And I don't know how not to see it. I would say it's funny, but that's a platitude; no, rather, it's a learned hypocrisy that we build our own personal deceptions around. We all recognize it to some degree and blame, I don't know, whatever we've abstractedly settled to focus our rage around. I think there might be some truth to the idea that some powers created systems to abbreviate independent thought; however, it's absurd to think that the intent is so complete that these powers regulate accountability, discipline, and choice. Because I'm not talking about a 40-hour work week, 9-5 jobs, and a 30-year mortgage, I'm talking about everything in between: the problems we choose to focus on, the emotions we can't name, recognize, or even care to, the unwitting influences we allow to manipulate our own selves.

June 27

I'm struggling to focus, which makes it difficult to write. I've got too much spinning around in my head; it's making me tired and dizzy. When I try to focus on any one thing, fragments of everything else slip through, and fleeting snapshots behind my eyes interrupt my natural stream of thought. I find myself staring off into the distance, waiting for something to settle, as if my thoughts were particles of sand and time were finite. I need to start inscribing everything that's whirling around up there so that each notion, each sentiment can begin to recover its form, take shape, and reconcile. But first, I have to figure out what the fuck is going on up there!

June 28

For some reason, we like to think that people don’t or can’t change. It’s true in the sense that change requires effort and demands recognizing patterns in our behavior. But most people just don't, because it requires self-reflection, and self-reflection is uncomfortable for many, sometimes even unbearable. I know that I’m not the same person I used to be. Leaving an abusive relationship before thirty forced me into a different kind of life. At the peak of PTSD and CER, my days were shaped by depression, anxiety, and anger that all arrived at once. I remember standing at the window of my little house in Livingston, negotiating with myself over the anger I carried, believing it was warranted, yet knowing I didn’t want to live through that lens forever.

I started spending hours in silence, learning how to sit with myself. When you live with anxiety long enough, it becomes a kind of weight you can easily mistake for security. Letting go of it felt like shedding the only defense I had for years. Meditation gave me space to ask harder questions, to revisit old wounds, and to sit with whatever surfaced. Eventually, the noise quieted. The anxiety and depression loosened. I found a version of myself that felt more honest.

Something I learned about myself was how much I’m drawn to the patterns beneath everyday life, how people think, react, and make sense of themselves between ordinary moments. I don’t look for meaning in systems or performances. I find it in the lived‑in details: genuineness, beauty, respect. I trust what’s real, not what’s loud. I value clarity over spectacle, honesty over performance, and groundedness over noise. And if you look closely enough, people and places start to make sense.

June 29

Creativity's a crimson couch,

before the morning commute, 

and the sun warming.

Tapping cold fingers

on the steering wheel,

mimicking sounds

from stereo speakers.

(My ex-girlfriend said to "stop,"

and that it was "stupid").

The curious boy outside 

the windows;

not yet overthinking

this thing, and that.

An echo’s already approaching,

a sudden fear of growing up,

But there’s no use,

already in the

rearview

mirror.

glanced away

from art for 

The hourly pay of a

College dropout, and shift work.