Category: Random Musings
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A Change of Pace
Every Tuesday for more than a year, a post has gone live here. Sometimes personal, sometimes philosophical, and sometimes political. Sometimes I was writing weeks ahead of schedule; other times I was racing the clock at 11 p.m. to make a 12:05 release. Lately, I’ve been thinking about what this blog has been—and what it…
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Trying to Be the Man of the House
Most people who know me know the military stories. They know about Afghanistan and Iraq. They know about deployments, firefights, and the years I spent in the Army. What they usually don’t know is much about the life that came before the uniform. They don’t know the kid from Las Vegas. The teenager who spent…
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Things run so smooth we forget they’re not guaranteed to
I heard recently that we’ve moved to a post-scarcity society—and that it wasn’t even up for debate.Stopping at the gas station in the morning shatters that illusion.If we were actually post-scarcity, there’d be no shortages. Prices wouldn’t exist. Geography wouldn’t matter. Conflicts on the other side of the world wouldn’t touch anything here because you…
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Why I Chose Stoicism Over Epicureanism
Philosophy isn’t some wasted elective from high school, or a lot of debt from a college with no method of recompense — it’s a tool for life. When understood and applied, it can help you lead a good life, but first you have to define what a “good life” actually means. I’ve dabbled in philosophy.…
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What Do You Call Someone Who’s Been a Lot of People?
When I was a kid, almost nobody called me by my first name.It wasn’t personal—it was practical. Common name. Too many of us in every class. So the name always came with a qualifier. Mike G. Blonde Mike. White Mike. The name alone wasn’t enough to point to a person.As a teenager, the names changed.…
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Life’s a garden gotta dig it, and weed it, and fertilize…
Life has a way of filling idle moments with noise—regrets, imagined slights, and endless loops of “what if.” I’ve learned that letting the mind wander unchecked is like leaving soil untended: weeds take over, choking the space meant for growth. Energy, if not directed, becomes mischief in the mind. That’s why I’ve chosen to put…
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Two Wars, One Generation: Why Afghanistan and Iraq Veterans Deserve Proper Recognition
For more than twenty years, American service members fought across two completely different battlefields: Afghanistan and Iraq. A lot of us — myself included — served in both. But the way our awards are structured, you’d think those deployments were all part of one single conflict. Anyone who actually fought in them knows that’s not…
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Life after door kicking. 