Good writing takes its time.

Essays, field notes, and short fiction from people who care about their sentences. Read without an account. Write when you have something to say.

The Lighthouse Keeper’s Invoice

A retired keeper bills the agency that replaced him, net thirty days.

Oct 274 min read5246

The trouble is almost never the font, and I say that as someone who sells fonts

Oct 304 min read3346

A strip of dead grass in Tolliver Park beat a sign, a rope, a hedge, and a drainage study

Oct 264 min read4326

Flour and water will keep you company for decades, as long as you accept who is in charge.

Oct 294 min read2105

A thirty-year habit of removing the part you wrote to get warm, and the one time it failed me.

Oct 244 min read5515

A rewrite was on the table until we looked at one query and the order of three columns.

Oct 254 min read4255

A free sheet of paper from the harbor office runs my working life, and I have stopped arguing with it.

Oct 284 min read1735

All you need is cheap binoculars, a lawn chair, and a dumpster to stand behind.

Oct 234 min read3904

The worst note I ever gave was four words long, and it took a mail carrier eleven months to survive it.

Oct 204 min read4336

Nineteen years of night shifts, and what I have learned not to trust at that hour.

Oct 164 min read4234