Orphaned

Back home > Orphaned   I didn’t see it coming – but then I did. The forgotten passwords. Her TV began to go on the blink intermittently, never an explanation. She began to iterate on topics previously discussed, not just repeating herself but...

Doing Hard Things

Back home > I Skied Yesterday   Done something really hard lately? Recently, I did. Before 30, every “first” seemed challenging. College. Jobs. Marriage. First mortgage. Fatherhood. Bigger mortgages. 🙂 It isn’t hard to see how these were all...

I Skied Yesterday

Back home > I Skied Yesterday   I skied yesterday. Earliest day I can remember free-heeling in the back country. November 9th. We hiked it very early that morning—7:00 a.m.—myself and two of my sons. I eyed the snow depth every half mile or so, and tracked six...

85 Horses

Back home > This essay won Honorable Mention in the 2019 Richard H. Cracroft Personal Essay Contest. Publication coming soon.   85 Horses   Dad was 24 and single when he got his first boat—a new, 1956 StarCraft—15 feet long, burgundy and white, with a...

Vernal Equinox

Back home > This essay won first place in the BYU Studies personal essay contest for 2000. View the original publication here.   Vernal Equinox   ​Here I sit, practicing a solo version of “You Are My Sunshine” on my harmonica—the same instrument that my...

Miles to Go

Back home > This essay won first place in the 2002 BYU Studies essay contest. View the original article here.   Miles to Go Before I Sleep   ​Cold days were the hardest for her. A skiff of snow on the ground would mean that the air would pack around her...