Category: Reflections
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Back in 2022, Substack writer Heath Racela got to meet legendary musician Ben Folds. Apparently, Folds holds master classes now, this one being in Concord, MA. The key take away that Heath mentioned in his write-up: “embrace the messiness of learning” Other keys: songs as a three-act story, “balance between the liberal and the practical”…
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“I have always felt like I was two wrong turns away from complete destruction. We all are, and we’re fooling ourselves if we think we’re not.” – Jami Attenberg This piece of raw honesty from Jami Attenberg comes from her memoir, “I Came All This Way To Meet You: Writing My Way Home,” when discussing…
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Here’s a wild thought: most of the things rattling around in our heads aren’t real. By “real,” I mean you can’t physically poke at them. It’s all just synapses firing off inside our skulls, telling us stories about things we think exist. Still, real or imagined, we love to give those intangible ideas a physical…
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History is often poorly represented and so much is being lost to current generations. If you want to learn anything about history, good luck finding any decent guided tours. You must do much digging and piecing things together to get enough insight into history to make your trip worth embarking upon. Essentially, if you want…
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I’ve dabbled in philosophy a lot over the years, including watching many philosophy videos on Khan Academy. Yet I’ve never actually sat and read many original philosophical works. When I have, I find myself lost. It seems like I can’t put myself into the right state of mind very often to understand the profound ideas…
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“Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.” – Pablo Picasso Many people might think of Picasso as the man who looked at the world as if it were a kaleidoscope and thought, “Why not make it even more twisted?” But, he’s also the guy…
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“Failure is always an option.” – Adam Savage of MythBusters Is it better to fail miserably and be forgotten, or to fail gloriously and make history? Would it be better to fail in obscurity and fade away into irrelevance? Or, should we seek to fail spectacularly in public view so that others may partake in…
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Incompleteness has been written about extensively in fields such as mathematics and philosophy. Sadly, it isn’t at all frequently discussed when it comes to volumes of complete works. A collection of complete works is supposed to be a group or set of literary, musical, artistic, or academic works created by a single author. Yet, one…
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“Being a queer girl isn’t something you decide. It’s something you survive, until you get old enough to claim it.”—Emily Pratt Slatin, Friendship Bracelets And Other Broken Promises This quote from my wife, Emily Pratt Slatin, is surgical. It names what so many queer femmes—especially lesbians and trans women—have lived: not a “choice” but a…
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Some time ago, while sifting through some old articles I wrote for the writing advice book I never bothered to finish, I stumbled across this passage that I decided to file away for later: “Write for you first, always. Just focus on getting your thoughts out of your head and onto a tangible medium. You…