Blog Posts
2025 in Dad Rock
I am perfectly on time with this, which is to say I am late.
Essays
We're here tonight, and that's enough
“Wonderful Christmastime” is not a perfect song. It might not work on your holiday playlist, or stand proud on a list of beloved classics, but it might be that it’s not a song to be played at home with intention
Blog Posts
Learning to love the ennui of release
The lesson learned in all of this is that I need to work harder on allowing myself to celebrate the victories and the little things, that I'm allowed to be here living this life.
Essays
The Gales of November remembered
This is the beauty of the song, the heart of it in those who lost their lives in service of building a world many believed they never belonged to, as if they are men out of time.
Lock The Gates
Maron is vulnerable, but he is also allowed to be in a way that many simply are not.
punks on the internet
I have long described myself as Taylor Swift agnostic, which is not really true because I do believe she exists, and the truth is that I always misuse agnostic when I really mean atheistic.
The sidewalks are watching me think about you
When I lived here, I was always chasing something, the perfect idea of a life in the wild and untamed north. Partied and thought about parties and how each one would be the answer to the questions that kept me awake and pacing in my living room, like a raven seeking food half-buried in the snow.
Essays
Damn it Johnny, you know I love my Big Beef N Cheddar
The second time I ever came out as trans, it was in an Arby’s drive-through in Alberta on a flip-phone in the height of the oil boom. A decision made with impassioned haste that left lingering memories of trying, failing, and the desire to try again regardless of how
Essays
A brief history of darts in the body
I started smoking, and I don’t remember the first one at all, but that is often the way of firsts.
Essays
Cheap McNuggets at the gates of Heaven
Tasting heaven only cost $.49, and each bite brought me closer to God.
Essays
Everything Looks Perfect From Far Away
Do you ever think about how the emotional core of “Such Great Heights” will never feel the same due to an alarming lack of answering machines? I mean, yes, sure, even without the machine it is still an emotionally resonant song about long-distance yearning, but that distance feels cheated now.
These Frameworks Labeled Home
The Weakerthans second album, Left and Leaving, turned 25, and I am late celebrating it. I started writing this on the day of its anniversary with the best of clear-eyes intentions. I started and stopped sentences, cleaned out spelling mistakes, went back and recompiled half-considered paragraphs. I thought about the