Writing
I’m a writer in addition to being an editor and creative consultant, and I began being published when I was a young spoken word poet. Now I write and publish memoirs, travel and music stories, fiction, and meditation pieces. Click on any entry below or on older entry pages to read my work!
Tedium 2 — A Plastic Soldier After an Imaginary War (Fiction)
The road from San Francisco through Vallejo was littered with odd remnants of decades gone by. Old factories and warehouses. The ghost of Rosie the Riveter floating on disappearing docks. It was once an area known for building war machines but those submarines had...
A Piano Punk, a Gonzo Journalist, and a Car on Fire in the Desert (Music Memoir)
When we left Santa Fe, it was an extremely hot June afternoon. The radiator in Greg’s red hatchback was leaking water badly, he was out of his bipolar medication, and I was late for a gig in Albuquerque. My first set of show dates in New Mexico turned out to be far...
You have the power to make your own world and create your own life.
Sometimes we feel out of control. We don't like our lives. We feel powerless and dissatisfied. It's as if someone else is pulling our puppet strings and making us dance to chaotic music on a stage filled with holes. It doesn't have to be that way. We have power. Even...
When in Doubt, Paddle Out — Why Surfers Choose to be Ageless (Surf Memoir)
I got out of my old Toyota truck, stood on the ridge, and looked out at the Pacific Ocean. Walls of water were rolling in big and breaking with massive sprays of whitewash being blown by the January wind. Each gust tore across the ocean’s surface, rushing against me...
Take a risk. Learn something new. Step into the unknown.
Are you a writer, musician, artist, entrepreneur, change-maker, or another kind of creative? I want to help you. I can assist in getting your project off the ground or in getting it to the next level. It might be a book, business, record, film, organization,...
Tedium 1 – Waiting for The Cat in the Hat to Show Up (Fiction)
When the bottom of bottles clink in the trash, the dirt on the bottom of your shoes refuses to fall off, and your head wakes up every day with throbbing pain, you know you’ve lost your innocence. But was it there in the first place? Is losing innocence a rite of...
You can travel anywhere, anytime, because you have a mind and an imagination.
I'm fascinated when people say they get bored because I don't understand how. Our minds are vast, incredible places where we can create anything. You can sit right where you are and have adventures. Why? Because you can think and you have an imagination. You have a...
My Birth Defect Changed Me: From Innocent to Misfit and Victim to Hero (Memoir)
My mom, dad, and I were all in a patient waiting room in Minneapolis. A small room in an area of the children's hospital. I was cold, wearing nothing but a thin, paper hospital gown. It was the late 80s and I had turned 15 the day before. Half my head was shaved and I...
The Joy of Being a Surfer — One Morning on the Big Island (Surf Memoir)
Nothing compares to riding a wave. One of the greatest joys in my life has been surfing. It’s the most difficult and rewarding thing I ever learned to do. I learned to surf late in life at the age of 25. Because I was living in San Francisco, I taught myself to surf...
If you live well, your life will feel like an incredible novel.
I was talking to my girlfriend, Whitney, recently about writing and a particular period of my life, and I said to her, "I knew right in the middle of that time it would make a great story." That's what living your life well means to me. When you're right in the middle...