So let’s talk failure. Here’s a photo I posted to both my website blog and my Facebook page last December. I’d just finished the first draft of the novel I’d planned to be the follow-up to Ordinary Grace. It had taken me nearly two years to complete that draft. I thought it wasn’t bad, but … Read more
As another year is about to sink completely into the realm of memory, I can’t help but look back and marvel. I couldn’t have asked for, hoped for, or even, if I’d been able, crafted for myself a better twelve months. It’s been filled with the fruit of many labors. An old book greatly honored, … Read more
In Minnesota, killing someone isn’t the worst crime you can commit. The worst crime is what we call here “getting the big head.” This means letting an honor or some publicly recognized good work make you believe that you’re better than other folks. In my own mind, this isn’t quite as bad as murder, but … Read more
One of my favorite lines of poetry comes from Charles Bukowski, the great California poet, novelist, and postal worker: “And the days run away like wild horses over the hills…” I watch them go now, the days, in exactly the way Bukowski said, and every year they seem to vanish faster than before. What they … Read more
When I was a kid, maybe eight or nine years old, my brothers and I pooled our saved allowances and bought a really cool radio. It stood about a foot high and was shaped like a rocket. It rested on its tail fins, nose pointed skyward, and out of that nose we drew up the … Read more