You’ve been somebody long enough. You spent the first half of your life becoming somebody. Now you can work on becoming nobody, which is really somebody. For when you become nobody there is no tension, no pretense, no one trying to be anyone or anything. —Ram Dass

I have searched for an identity all my life, as we do. I deeply envy those who have one — the somebodies — I latch to them like a starved leech. Those who “found themselves”, ooze happiness, confidence, self-worth. Or is this mere myth, one that drives us to the ends of our psyche, desperate to find and keep that blissful catapult into the zone. I’ve felt it on occasion.

My scattered attempts come and go, came and went, a steady flow with my ever undulating moods and moves — artist, swimmer, skater, printer, designer, teacher, counselor, east coaster, west coaster, mid wester, person who is strong, capable, knows things on the good days, weak, short-sighted, imbecilic on the bad. I am a maximalist in all dimensions.

Desperate tiny successes to earn approval from family—an impossible task, attributable to the conditional love parenting style rampant in the 60s-70s-80s social and economic suburban ladder climbing achievement driven culture, producing hard working hard playing Gen X-ers proud of our latch key status and who you want around when the zombies come to town. We were perfectly primed for the internet rage that exploded in the 90s, some of us working incessantly on a frontier of publishing not seen since Ottmar Merganthaler’s Linotype machine revolutionized printing at the turn of the 20th century, speeding up dissemination of information by a factor of 6.

Our “whatever” attitude was partly cultivated by impossible to achieve parental conditions driven by a demanding consumer culture. Acquiring material goods that signal monetary success generally requires being exceptional at something. Gymnastics and music and soccer and ice skating and art lessons and good grades and ribbons and trophies and a lead role in the school play and student body elections, tutoring for essays for college applications to boost visibility beyond just average to a maybe slightly above average SAT score. God forbid we have a moment to stare at the walls and be bored, an essential activity for building a robust imagination. None of it was ever good enough.

I try on identity after identity, zipping skins over my meat suit. Others land in well defined costumes—mom, dad, lawyer, teacher, scientist, successful tech company start up entrepreneur, musician, social worker, professor. I continue to diffuse, latching to jobs, titles, relationships and friendships with people who have it figured out, or, better yet, don’t care. Those rare beings, content with being, not a care about doing—productivity for them does not determine value. I flounder in a sea of empty, never good enough, productive enough, smart enough, creative enough. Never just enough.

I go to a book and printmaking fair in Burlington. It’s the first of its kind I’ve attended in years. I am flat and detached and uninspired and disconnected. I talk to people. I know no one. I am a fraud. Letterpress and design has been part of my identity for 20 years. Friends and family supported me to create a thing I don’t know if I know how to do anymore. What happened? Is this the pain of becoming nobody?

I started a new career in counseling in Fall of 2023 when I moved to Vermont, at a community MOUD clinic with my shiny degree and art supplies and determination despite my first office being a broom closet. I sort of knew what I was getting into, except for the daily urine samples. Months went by, I move to a shared office, then to a larger space because I had clients doing art and yoga, my coworkers embracing my modalities as a valid reason to give the newbie the bigger office. I loved the space and the job and the camaraderie and collaboration. Jokes in the hallway, family style lunches, micro breaks, opportunities to co-regulate with one another in between the more than often deeply heavy interactions that leave you exhausted and at times hopeless.

Then it cracked open, the clinic closed unexpectedly, and I was spit out into a land of nothing and no one, scattered to a noxious ether, untethered, splashing in a sea of terror I had yet to experience in my life, my partner, our dog, and our home my only anchors (for which I am endlessly grateful). I had created a false sense of connection with clients and coworkers, they were the scaffolding holding me together after a cross country midlife move, career change, sobriety, topped off with perimenopause and a mood disorder. My job was my only community, scattered to the wind in a matter of months.

I drive home from the book fair confused and conflicted. What’s changed? My partner, my perspective, my career, my entire life. I never fit into a closed loop. Leaning into the Zen concept of “don’t know-ness” I believe signals my full plunge into midlife crisis—time to get some votive candles and a guru altar.

My skins no longer fit my meat suit. What was important in the morning is no longer, and I wander in afternoon fog searching for what matters.

Maybe it is becoming nobody.

“Very few people ever really are alive and those that are never die; no matter if they are gone. No one you love is ever dead.” — Hemingway

5 years ago this month my design professor and friend of many years passed. He knew he was dying. I saw him one last time in July 2021. He gave me a worn yellowed folder reinforced with camouflage duct tape, embossed with a gold University of Maryland stamp where he taught who knows how many students for over 30 years. The smell of cigarettes and dust and late nights soaked in vodka and Jägermeister waft from the pages.

A cranial titan, son of an American WWII medic and a German mother, his passion for history was the backbone of his approach to art, teaching and practicing graphic design. He impressed upon students that understanding the greater context in which we exist — socio-culturally, historically, politically — was paramount to producing meaningful visual work that achieved the purpose for which it was created.

In that folder is a treasure trove of lectures, rambling lists on psychology and propaganda, technical notes on design production from 1982, essays, and the speech he gave to the art department at my graduation from the University of Maryland in 1998. Transcribing his musings into a more permanent format is on my daunting list of passion projects.

For now here’s the speech.

*****

Why Art?

University of Maryland BFA address, 1998

Firstly, a demonstration of mankind’s cognitive will to structure his or her interpretation of nature into a tangible form. This is naturally manifested as an image or object in translation to what is perceived as reality by its creator.

But why this need to create forms or manifest ideas which are pale examples of the forces of the universe which paradoxically surround our being in both light and darkness?

Forces which generate far deeper questions and provide the mysteries of infinite answers at times — yet continue to fuel the creative spirit; which has remained constant in the human endeavor to ground or axis this secret code of existence — through the form of an idea or inspiration via the image or object.

Herein lies the mystic struggle of youth which is ever present in the heart of the “wild child” of humanity — the artists.

In all cultures and throughout history, they are the purveyors of somnambulist truths which awaken the dreams and fire the souls of the broader society — who yearn desperately to partake of that dark freedom.

That freedom of creative action, reflection, and process which is greatly admired at a distance but is likewise feared, distrusted, or scorned for its brutal honesty of expression — not unlike that of the child who asks constantly for the time, and how does the mechanism of the clock work in the first place — and above all why keep track of the ticking minutes when in the morning we awaken and at night we sleep. Anyway. Both snakes and eagles are hatched from eggs.

Plato would argue that all artists and their creations represent the lower rungs of human intelligence — because the creation of imagery remains lost in the phenomenology of illusionistic representation and diverts mankind from the purity of the metaphysical form or transcendent idea.

In many respects — Joyce would argue for art which advertises itself or attempts to manipulate the baser emotions of the witness — is locked in the realm of the pornographic. Vacant in the aesthetic arrest — which he defines as essential for any great piece of work to transport the viewer toward spiritual reconciliation.

What is curious about the arguments of both of these great thinkers is the common thread of creative energy, curiosity, and aesthetic desire to pursue a critical mass of thought, meaning, and reflection which they hope will attain some stature, or, manifest itself on a higher metaphysical plane.

In short, I would argue that the experience of the process of the creative unknown consistently challenges the mirrors of all artists, for all time and for all cultures — it is this mysterious childlike force which, (for better or worse) defines a society and its culture.

Yes. Art Is… Selfish. Often ruthless and brutal in both its interpretations and technique. Art is mercenary in its desires, arrogant, pontificating, and in many cases over-inflated in concept and price.

Yet, art is honest in its truths, naive in its innocence, sensual, functional, and therapeutic in its rather bizarre democracy of spirit.

You as young artists are now standing in the middle of a bridge which you were driven to cross. One of the most difficult decisions that any young artist must make now is to cross that bridge or retreat to a safer, more convenient shore. In the end — you and you alone will be faced with that ultimate choice — for only you and your creative soul can answer this question. Do not make this decision based upon material or monetary gain or socio-cultural pressures.

As Carl Jung said —

Art — as is love, is a very complex and often painful process which should never be viewed as mere entertainment or a way-station on the road of private experience. Your art and the creative process which you manifest through your work will forever belong to all humanity — whether exhibited or not publicly — you can sleep with the knowledge that your images, your objects and your dreams took form and were realized.

To paraphrase the Beatles as in love and in art, the love you take is equal to the love you make.

Lastly, never forget that if Leonardo Da Vinci’s parents had a choice between the Mona Lisa and his first drawing as a child to hang on their refrigerator. … I rest my case and wish you all success and love.

www.jamesthorpedesign.com

My friend and I have completed 19.3 miles, ascending a total of 6,335’, descending 7,333’. It’s 6pm at Corliss Camp. Grimacing wincingly, I stretch on my cheap Thermarest, the same model I had in Wyoming in 1994, my body hurting in ways I did not think possible.

A gal and her 9 year old nephew arrive. It’s his first backpacking expedition. I have zero gas for anything but tending my sad sore out of shape bone bag. I’m grateful for my friend’s professional kid whispering skills, honed over her career in k-12 social work.

I half listen — where are you from, how far are you going, what’s your favorite subject in school, sports, music, his favorite song — Brandi Carlie’s cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. My ears perk at this oddity. I don’t know Brandi but I love Leonard.

He launches into the back story:

“She went to the hospital, they told her she wasn’t pregnant, that she couldn’t get pregnant, so she left then her water broke in the bathroom at a taco place, she took me there once, into the bathroom, and showed me the exact tile! When she was giving birth to me she started dying and then I started dying. Then the song came on and she heard it and came back to life and I came back to life! My dad was sleeping which is pretty typical, when she almost died, and I almost died, she threw a Gatorade bottle at him to wake him up after I was born and he missed the whole thing!”

My insides quiver. I watch his aunt’s face. It’s obvious this is news. We later learn his parents are divorced.

My friend tells me the trick. You ask a few innocuous questions, then listen — they’ll tell you all the things their parents never wanted anyone knowing.

It’s a familiar tactic. My job is best when I say the least. Leave empty space and a person fills it. In art therapy the art does the work. Those are the best days, painting, drawing, sculpting, materials as medicine, words fall away into magic quiet.

I make $27 / hour. Gas is $1.15 / gallon in the Washington DC metro megalopolis, runner up to Los Angeles California for freeways with the most worst awful traffic in the US of A.

It's 2026. I get my second big girl therapist job counseling people struggling with and conquering addiction.

I make $29 / hour. Gas is $4.49 / gallon in the Montgomery VT ruralopolis in a state boasting more cows than people.

Discussing one's finances is gauche yet I sear my reflective underbelly on this social frying pan for mostly passive diners, and for anyone else feeling adrift, dazed and confused.

I changed careers midlife, eyes wide open. A humbling experiment, scalpel to an ego once propped by a worry free bank account. My self worth grappling in a 10 round match with our societal measures of value and success exceptionally internalized due to my family of origin.

It's the hardest job I've ever loved. I work the kinks, search for rhythm, study for the LADC exam under the inquisitive lonely eyes of Bodoni and Garamond and Franklin and Stymie all wondering when I'll come out to play.

***

"We wish to make our lives simple, certain, and smooth — for that reason problems are taboo. We choose to have certainties and no doubts, results and no experiments, without seeing that certainties can arise only through doubt, and results through experiment."

— Jung

It’s 2006. I spend hours pawing through crumbling cardboard marinated in decades of storage, searching for diamonds in the rough, wandering up and down dimly lit aisles, wondering where the “beware of falling objects” signs are hanging.

Dave was in his early 70s at the time, a tall gentle quiet figure, a deep well of a wealth of a lifetime of knowledge and know how. His vast life included a degree in civil engineering and a brief stint in Libya in the 1950s with the Army Corps. The love of letterpress captured him as a teen (per his obituary) and he embraced his passion nose to toes, 60 years collecting, learning, running Sterling Type Foundry, furnishing our quirky community with parts, supplies, and know how.

My first ever order from Dave was a box of furniture in 2002 (wooden blocks necessary for composing and printing, not sofas and ottomans). I eagerly rip it open in my Portland studio, in the towering B&O building, a vast warehouse on 107 Washington Avenue off East Burnside, home to a goldfish breeding farm nestled in the creepy basement, tanks blooming with algae lined up among the largest burlap spice bags I have ever seen hanging from the ceiling, cumin and cinnamon and turmeric burning your nose covering the moldy fishy smell, we try to avoid the creepy supremacist bookseller and his bins of Mein Kampf during our spelunking.

I massage the shellacked surfaces, breathing in a deep patina of decades of solvents and deft fine motor skills of typesetters carefully placing the blocks, tightening quoins, fussing over misspellings.

A couple days ago, sitting on a dusty floor, I organize the collection curated over 20 years ago in my nifty card cabinet rescued from a St. Louis estate sale garage, puzzling the blocks together snuggly with a deeper appreciation, discovering them again with renewed delight.

Written and edited exclusively by the author. No AI tools, including ChatGPT, were used at any stage of its creation.

Yesterday I hang my grandmother’s tryptic, completed in a year unknown to me. Huge and heavy and hard to move, three 2’ x 4’ oil painted panels, rescued from my childhood home in Maryland years ago, shoved along with a crated neurotic fish breath Lenny the dog, in my at times rickety Ford Focus wagon (something always seemed wrong and dangerous with the suspension), hauled to St. Louis where they hung in my studio for over a decade.

I send my family a photo.

My mom reminds me it’s the 11th anniversary of her passing. She was 99.

My grandfather died an early tragic death in his 40s, massive heart attack, leaving my grandmother raising tiny toddlers and 5, 7, 8, 11, 12 year olds (exact ages also unknown to me, 8 in total, all under 13).

Unexpected widowhood and busy momhood didn’t stop her wholehearted pursuit of painting and drawing and sculpting nearly until her shuffle off this mortal coil.

Her passion and tenacious devotion to finding beauty finally here. I have missed her.

I wake at 3a, ruminating.

The Internet says:

—

This is consistent with a sudden attachment rupture. Your nervous system is treating it as an unresolved social threat.

—

Well. It feels awful. A thousand miles of separation anxiety from a person I haven’t seen in over 2 years.

Our nervous system co-regulates with friends, family, strangers, we truck along blissfully unaware until a social railroad spike gets stuck in the wheel. Distress systems linked to survival ignite, shame and guilt boil.

Shame is an emotion once necessary to survival. If our actions were not conducive to the success of the group, out comes the scarlet letter, enforcing social norms and correcting behavior.

Guilt signals we did something wrong and more often leads to repair. Shame signals something is fundamentally wrong with you and leads to withdrawal. It’s much more difficult to engage in social repair when we feel shame. I didn’t realize I was causing pain and I feel both.

I descend into a rabbit hole of rubble pawing through navigational complexities of long distance friendships. I’ve had several due to an incurable gypsy foot that’s bounced me around 3 cross country moves, and they require a different more deliberate effort. The frequent passive easy social interaction when living in a dense community doesn’t translate to distance and, as I’m learning, is nearly absent in a rural place.

Nearly all of my conversations with most of my St. Louis friends since I’ve moved have been over text or social media, mediums not built for micro expressions or sorting through complex feelings or deep conversations. Too much lost in translation.

I too broke up with a long time friend last year, over text — I feel shame over this. My sensitivity perhaps influenced by symptoms of my endocrinological age. Since moving I hadn’t spoken to her on the phone but a handful of times. I don’t know why. More translations lost. There are people who don’t do phones and I don’t call because they don’t call because I don’t want to bother people because they have kids and families and busy lives.

I make a few calls this week. I don’t have kids, I barely have coworkers due to ongoing job instability, I’ve had broken partnerships over the years, and I moved away from my complicated and emotionally unavailable family almost 30 years ago. My occasional conversations with them vacuous and wanting leaving me empty. My friendships are what I have and this is a sobering reminder of how fragile they can be.

I lie awake in sweaty nights wondering when I’ll become nobody, mucking around for the life lesson, two regrets of the dying on repeat — I wish I’d expressed my feelings and I wish I’d kept in touch with my friends.

It’s April 7. I walk my semi daily route musing on hope that spring arrived this past weekend, only to be broken today by the 3 inch layer of snow crunching under my feet. I didn’t ask the migrating goldfinch their opinion. I imagine they are not amused.

I watch my new friend boil sap yesterday in the teeniest sugar house I’ve yet to see in Vermont (albeit I’ve seen less than 5, more than 2) knowing I’m carrying home a delicious jar of that amber gold along with my repaired feed board for the 8x12, crafted of reclaimed wood, with a surprise inlaid racing stripe along the edge. I help shove 10 inch cuts of pine into the fire barrel inscribed in chalk — “this machine makes life sweeter” with hope that sap keeps flowing, new friends continue emerging, my kindling optimism survives certain seemingly unchangeable realities.

I embrace this hurdling marathon, jumping over emotionally heavy work weeks, traversing a sparsely populated state seeking new connections, steeplechasing my stormy inner turmoil.

Two repaired feed boards, an assembled furniture cabinet, fiddleheads ahead, 12 hours of daylight prove to inspire.

I am still posting updates on my Go Fund Me page. Once I gather more email addresses, I’ll retire it and move on to snail mail when the press is up and running!

Post partum project slump hit me after the move like a wayward train. Amidst the depleted dopamine days of winter and a missing part on the Vandercook that required finding a machinist, I found myself paralyzed, emotionally and creatively.

I met a gal at a coworker’s mom’s house over Thanksgiving. I mentioned letterpress. She mentioned her neighbor Kyle Schlesinger of Cuniform Press. Kyle emails me about joining him on his once a month community radio show on WGDR to discuss letterpress and art therapy.*

A local artist and machinist hears the show, remembers seeing a post I put on Briar Press about the part, and contacts me. I go for a tour of his beautifully knolled shop. A few days later, the part is complete.

I’ll pick it up in a couple of weeks, which coincides with the beginning of sugaring season. He has 40 or so maple trees he taps each year to extract the delicious Vermont tree juice. I’m looking forward to learning more about the process.

Stay tuned for part II — repairing the feed board for the C & P!

*In the radio interview I mistakenly mention Ben Kaplan, when I meant Ben Kiel! And I actually have a Vandercook Number 3, not a Universal III — I always mix them up.

Disclosure: This article was written and edited exclusively by the author. No AI tools, including ChatGPT, were used at any stage of its creation.

I participate in a military simulation event for a marathon 40 hours on a 5,000 acre timber farm in Fern Glen, Pennsylvania, organized by a veteran-owned company called MILSIM West.

One could say it’s extreme LARPing, offering camaraderie, intense physical and mental challenge, and an opportunity for military veterans to use and teach combat skills and the kind of team work deemed mostly useless in a civilian world.

Others could say it’s indoctrination of a younger generation into military culture, glorifying war and guns and death, celebration and encouragement of violence.

Historically there is an invisible barrier between military and civilian, concepts and language lost in translation, a culture with its own social rules, hierarchy, and traditions. My father served in Vietnam, yet I don’t feel I grew up understanding military culture. Perhaps that was by design — due to the aftermath of their homecoming so long ago Vietnam veterans often buried that part of their lives.

I muse on how I could participate without having to use a weapon. I have a fascination with female war correspondents and although I’m not a great photographer, I don’t have a fancy camera with long lenses, and I’ve only recently ventured into writing, I figured this could be the answer. In my efforts to step through the portal, I buy a flak vest and hat, stitch on press patches, and sign up as a war correspondent.

My fascination sparked after watching A Private War, a film about award winning journalist Marie Colvin killed in 2012 while covering the devastating Syrian conflict. I then picked up the stunning compilation of her work published posthumously – On the Front Line: The Collected Journalism of Marie Colvin.

There are many notable female war reporters, early trailblazers like Margaret Fuller who covered the revolutions in Italy in 1849, and Maggie Gellhorn who snuck aboard a hospital ship on its way to France in 1944 after losing the D-Day coverage assignment to her lover at the time, Ernest Hemingway. She ended up among the first journalists on the beaches of Normandy, and beat Hemingway to the punch with her early reports.

Then there’s Catherine Leroy, a French photojournalist who participated in a combat parachute jump in Vietnam with American troops in 1967 when she was 21. She was so lightweight she had to be weighted down to ensure a safe landing. In 1967 she was the first woman to win the George Polk award, and Picture of the Year for her photo at Battle of Hill 881, Corpsman in Anguish.

I arrive at 3p Friday with a sense of overwhelm and trepidation. This is not my circus, and these are definitely not my monkeys. My circus is a museum or a design studio, my monkeys are artists, film makers, musicians. I’m also noise sensitive, relying often on noise cancelling headphones.

We wait an interminable 5 hours — gear layout, safety checks, radio checks. This includes a chronograph measurement of the Airsoft guns used by participants. The environmentally friendly biodegradable porcelain-like BBs (that hurt like a motherfucker) cannot travel more than 400 ft / second.

These are not cheap toys. They are professional-grade metal replicas of M4s, AKs, machine guns, and sniper rifles, ranging from $350 - over $1,200.

Some participants use real weapons with blank fire. These go through a different inspection to insure safety. I come to appreciate the depth of the immersion later while cowering behind a tree trying not to shit my pants, 10 feet from someone firing blanks, flames shooting from the barrel, the blasts rocking my eardrums.

It’s nearly 8p. We gather around a detailed terrain model representing the mountains and surrounding landscape, with a nearby lake, outlining the “area of operations”, for an enthusiastic “sand table” review during which the company commander explains the “operation order” — Situation, Mission, Execution, Service and Support, Command and Signal — SMESC, an acronym more easily recalled with Sergeant Majors Eat Sugar Cookies (an official army acronym).

This is followed by a lively get ready for the event motivational speech by CEO, co-founder and former Army ranger Josh Warren. He starts out “we are all doing one of the silliest things possible”. We swear in holding up our right hand stating among other things: “I am a silly war nerd who plays silly war games” and “when I get salty I will remember I’m at a fantastic party with my fabulous friends, in our incredible costumes, having a marvelous time.” The other oaths include “I will not be a jerk, I will not leave trash, I will not be trash”. He then states “the only thing that matters is that at some point during these 40 hours you have at least a 15 minute period where you forget where you are and enjoy the fantasy”. I remember this about 20 hours later, after I realize for about 15 minutes, I did indeed forget where I was.

Dusk descends. We pack up and our platoon ruck marches 300 meters (in the military a back pack is a ruck, and a hike is a march) to “infil” (or infiltrate) the “conflict area”. A platoon is composed of 4 squads — each squad is roughly 9-12 people. A company is made up of 3-4 platoons. For the purposes of this simulation, the 2 factions are represented by Russia, or RUSFOR and the United States, or NATO.

I am embedded with the NATO company, around 200 participants. RUSFOR also has around 200 participants, with the same structure.

There is a platoon leader who oversees the squads, and communicates with the squad leaders by radio, or directly when possible. There is one soldier in charge of the radio for the platoon, called an RTO, or radio and telephone operator. Our RTO Tyler McGraw, is a former Navy petty officer who lives in Milwaukee. It’s his first MILSIM — he does the job so well, he receives the MVP award for our platoon.

For the purpose of the simulation, there are “cadre” who coordinate with one another. In military terms, a cadre is a group of trained personnel often responsible for training new recruits. The cadre here are employed by MILSIM West — former army soldiers or marines; most have worked over 50 events. There is one cadre embedded per platoon. Our cadre, Parrianno, an Army veteran, was deployed to Iraq and fought in the 2004 battle in Fallujah. I learned of the bronze star he received when he pushed a disabled vehicle out of a kill zone with his Humvee, saving the lives of several marines. His vehicle was hit 3 times with RPGs in the process.

When he referred to several of our fellow soldiers as goobers, I reminded him that some were born after 9/11; this insult would sadly be lost on them. I’m not sure why I associate this term with the 90s, maybe some of you can help me out. According to the internet, goober is derived from an African word for peanut, “n-guba”, introduced to America in the 1800s by slaves. In the 1960s Goober Pyle was a character on the Andy Griffith show (cousin to Gomer Pyle), known for being a simpleton, which may be when the term worked its way into the broader lexicon to mean a dim-witted individual.

To keep the simulation organized, the cadre communicate the intent of the commander to the platoon leaders. The platoon leader then devises and executes that plan. For example our mission for the weekend was to push RUSFOR off the mountain by “killing” them or forcing a retreat.

In the simulation, if you are hit once, a fellow participant must put a “tourniquet” around your arm and you are “revived”. The tourniquet in a MILSIM is a velcro strap. If you are hit again, you are “dead” and can be revived only if you are not actively under fire, and are within arms length of a medic who gives you a 15 oz bottle of water from a limited supply, which you must drink in its entirety before returning to action.

Moving on.

Our mission Friday night is inspired by intercepted RUSFOR intelligence indicating their travel along a nearby road within the upcoming hour.

It is dark — my eyes adjust, but unlike nearly 75% of the participants I don’t have night vision goggles which range in price from $3,000 - $10,000. The most common model (PVS-14) is the same used by soldiers during the Global War on Terror. Many players rent setups for the weekend for about $300.

About 20 minutes into our tiny march, the squads in our platoon drop their rucks and move out to set up an ambush. I am left behind with my chaperone Darrow, a 25-year old airman from rural Virginia who lives in Laurel, Maryland 8 minutes from my hometown. He speaks fluent Pashtu, and works for some unnamed government organization doing something vague. He shares his night vision with me as we lay on the ground, gazing in wonderment at the brilliant stars. His girlfriend is also a mental health counselor. Darrow is the medic for our platoon, and is responsible for manning the “casualty collection point” (CCP) where the wounded are brought for revival.

At this point, I have to poop very badly. The porta potties are far and it is dark and scary and I can’t use any lights because that could alert the enemy. Having just met Darrow, I choose not to disclose my bodily needs this early in our blossoming friendship.

The ambush continues for hours. Gunfire and screaming punctuate our stargazing, and occasionally make me forget my intestinal discomfort. A few participants congregate at the CCP to be revived and return to action.

It’s around 1a. I finally confess my intestinal situation and am given permission to use a tiny red flashlight to seek out a location for my situation. I find a giant tree up a hill, knowing nearly everyone has night vision. I reflect on my untimely urge to poop (I am a morning person), wondering how often this affects others in times of combat. The topic arises in later conversations about physical reactions to enemy engagement and the adrenaline dump that often results in unexpected pooping.

When I return to Darrow, the rest of the platoon is straggling back. I have no idea if they won or lost, how many “died” or if any of that mattered. I learn it doesn’t. According to the self-deprecating participants there is no winning or losing, no prizes in the end — “we’re already losing because we’re dressed up in silly costumes shooting Airsoft guns all weekend”.

We sling on packs and ruck farther up the road to set up.

In my effort to indulge in the total immersion, I do not bring any items of comfort, namely a sleeping pad or pillow. This means sleeping on hard ground on a tarp, in a sleeping bag, wrapped in a “woobie”. The silliness of the term is not lost on me — grizzled veterans singing praises of their comfy woobies. This essential item was introduced in the Vietnam war — a poncho liner, made of nylon and polyester batting. The childlike term was adopted by service members in the early 90s, an homage to the 1983 movie Mr. Mom, in which Michael Keaton’s son called his security blanket his woobie.

It is my first time sleeping this exposed in the wilderness — no tent, no shelter, and wearing safety glasses that cannot be removed for the duration of the simulation. I use my tiny red flashlight to maintain “noise and light discipline” and clumsily organize my sleeping area, once again at a disadvantage without night vision.

It’s nearly 3a. The platoon leader, a veteran and my significant other, whose enthusiasm for these events is so infectious he convinced me to tag along, is organizing guard duty during which 2 soldiers from each squad rotate out every hour to “pull watch”. The 2 soldiers then keep one other awake, so they can alert the platoon of threats from the enemy — ambushes, recon teams, snipers, bears, etc. This is called the LPOP, or listening post observation post.

The platoon leader then informs us we’ll be rousted at 530a to get prepared for the next phase of the operation at 6a sharp. There is no indication as to what that next phase will entail.

Too exhausted to remove my boots, and not knowing what may ensue in the middle of the night, I crawl into my makeshift bed, where I sleep for maybe a fitful hour.

5:30a rolls around too quickly punctuated by the platoon leader yelling to pack up and be ready to head out. I am grumpy and cold and hungry and tired and sore, surrounded by equally grumpy, cold, hungry, and tired participants. However I’m nearly 20+ years older than any of them — I doubt they are suffering the brutal soreness of my 50 year old bones I have abused throughout my life with various high intensity sports.

I begrudgingly crawl out from my lair and shove a bagel in my face. I wrap up my bedding and stuff it in my bag and wonder what the hell I’m doing here. I strap on my flak vest and sit next to Darrow and McGraw with my notepad brainstorming questions for interviewees:

• Do you have a cat

• If you could be in any war in any era what war would it be
  What is your favorite dessert

• Who famously quoted the Bhagavad Gita — “I have become death, destroyer of worlds”

Someone gives me a cup of coffee. It’s 6:30am. The platoon leader is barking orders – one squad is assigned to the LPOP, one squad is sent on patrol, and the third squad is on rest. This arrangement rotates each time the squad on patrol returns which is standard procedure at a patrol base.

I ask McGraw about his life, where he’s from, his time in the Navy, and what he’s doing now. I ask him if he has a cat. He looks surprised and says yes, his girlfriend has 2 cats. I write his answer. Not having fully embraced my character, I feel silly and lose my nerve to ask him my other questions.

A very long 4 hours later, I head out on patrol with my camera and note pad and strangers, leaving Darrow and McGraw behind, the only soldiers I had befriended thus far. And. Nothing happens. I ask a 23 year old participant if he has a cat. He looks incredulous “How did you know?! I have two.”

We return around noon, I am starving and bored and once again have to poop. I head off to the porta potties this time, dawdling on the way back, chatting with one of the 3 women who were at the event. She and her husband are from Lancaster PA. They play traditional Airsoft, basically paintball without paint — this is their first MILSIM. She tells me she’s 2 months pregnant and gets cold easily and they’re leaving.

Back at the patrol base, people are milling around, someone hands me a cup of ramen noodles. I haven’t figured out my war correspondent role as no war appears to be happening. Suddenly it dawns on me — this is part of the simulation. Hours upon hours, (in real war perhaps days and weeks and months) of absolutely nothing happening. In war the effect of the mind numbing boredom is complacency, and complacency kills.

I don’t fare well with boredom. In any sitting around waiting situation since the first iPhone came out in 2007 I’ve been dosed out on social media, texting, reading, anything to distract my mind from the notion that I’m doing nothing. Prior to that I always carried a book. I have my phone, there is no service, and no one else is playing around on their phones, so I follow suit. I also have a strange knot in my stomach and a sort of skin crawling anxiety and a painful urge to be with my dog. I realize this is the longest separation since adopting him a few months ago. I think about my dad — he had to leave my pregnant mom in California when he left for Vietnam, she was 19 and he was 25, and my brother was born while he was overseas. The separation anxiety must have been unbearable. I’ve only been away from my dog for 36 hours.

I ask the platoon leader when we’re leaving or doing anything other than sitting. He says, “You see that cloud up there? It kind of looks like snoopy. And that other cloud over there looks like a dragon. And that one kind of reminds me of Santa Claus.”

I realize he has no information and I sort of want to strangle him. Yet another reminder I’m in a simulation — we are on standby, waiting, watching, searching for the enemy and no one knows where they are or when anything might happen. We only know that the 3rd and 4th platoon had ended up at their destination and were doing the same thing.

I ask a few others my questions, warming up to my role, and figure out the majority of our platoon is under 25 with a small percentage of former military and a large percentage of 1st timers who didn’t fully grasp what they had signed up for (like me). Hence our cadre referring to them as goobers. More veterans and seasoned participants make up the 3rd and 4th platoons — they had a 5 mile middle of the night ruck up the mountains and more demanding cadre. Most of our platoon would have thrown in the towel upon hearing 5 miles.

To my question for all interviewees throughout the weekend regarding what war would you participate in, regardless of era or nationality, which war would it be? Two responders (TWO!!!) noted the Toledo War, an infamous battle between the state of Ohio and the Michigan Territory in 1835 over the Toledo Strip. Tensions escalated and a Michigan sheriff was seriously wounded when an Ohio official stabbed him with a pen knife. No other casualties were reported and no monuments erected. Ohio, thinking they were winning, got stuck with Toledo, while Michigan continues to suffer the sloppy seconds of the Upper Peninsula and her crystal clear emerald waters of Lake Superior.

Several interviewees noted cheesecake as their favorite dessert which sparked raucous debate and a declaration that hills would be died upon in defense of cheesecake being a pie and not a cake due to it having a crust. This dispute did not spark violence despite my fanning the flames. It was decided that cheesecake may meet clinical standards for a diagnosis of gender dysphoria due to its cake vs. pie identity confusion.

Everyone born prior to the invasion of Iraq correctly (and quickly) answered my trivia question — Who famously quoted the Bhagavad Gita, ? The under 22 crowd racked their brains, falling short even after several hints — WWII, scientist, 1945, recent major motion film.

Based on my (very) small sampling of participants (n=20), more than half have a cat, or their girlfriend has a cat, and they like the cat.

Josh Warren (CEO and cofounder) did not admit to “having a cat”. However, he stated he feeds the neighborhood cats, and allowed one to live in his house, and named it Turnip, which means, he has a cat. He currently feeds Tomatoes, a moniker honoring the feline’s unusually large testicles.

I sufficiently pass time, amuse myself and my comrades, staving off boredom for a couple hours and dare I say, have fun.

It’s 4p. Another patrol is gearing up to head out and I tag along. I meet a 22-year-old studying biology at a college in DC. I meet a 17-year-old still in homeschool in the remote mountains of Virginia, and a 25-year-old HVAC technician from somewhere outside Philly. They are early into their MILSIM careers. None of them have cats nor can they answer my Oppenheimer question.

Our conversations are suddenly punctured by the sound of hundreds, perhaps thousands of teeny whizzing white pellets and banshee-like screaming from deep in the woods. Chaos ensues. The squad breaks off the road sprinting into the trees for cover while the squad leader tries to maintain some semblance of order (which doesn’t work). I run after everyone and anyone, trying to figure out where to go, learning there isn’t anywhere really to go and all of the trees are about 6 inches wide, nothing to hide behind. I crouch on the ground alongside squad members who are screaming and frantically shooting into the trees an average of 25 rounds / second of the teeny plant-based biodegradable plastic BBs which are also whizzing by my head at a terrifying rate. I remember my camera amidst my adrenaline soaked haze and start taking photos. I trip over a log, landing on my back. I have enough wits about me to have my camera at my eye pointing to a soldier a few feet away, when I see blasts of flame shooting from the barrel of his gun, the sound cracking my ears and shaking me to my bones. I feel stunned and paralyzed and legitimately terrified.

I forget where I am.

Someone next to me is screaming for a medic. A few others are also screaming — I see soldiers running to them slipping the velcro strap onto their arms. I crawl over to the injured soldier and ask him if I can help. He hands me his tourniquet. He’s revived, thanks to me. I feel proud. I tourniquet a few others, hoping my contribution is helping the cause.

The pellets continue whizzing, I scramble low to the ground, taking as many photos as possible when I hear a barely audible thwap of a pellet hitting my flak vest. I don’t even feel it. For a split second I consider pretending it didn’t happen, I’m just the press, just a tourist — I don’t *really* do this LARP thing, I’m not one of *those* people. But I know that would be cheating, I’d be cheating myself, so I fall to the ground, screaming for help, hollering about the Russians’ blatant disregard for freedom of the press. Someone crawls over and puts a tourniquet on me. I continue my run-crawl under an onslaught of BBs spraying my flak vest, my second hit, and now I have to die.

Dying in a military LARP simulation is an opportunity for your finest academy award acting. To maintain the immersion one needs to harness the inner terror one might expect during their last minutes on earth. My self consciousness out the window at this point, I fall to the ground crying out for water and morphine and my last rites and my mom. Luckily the medic (who carries the revival water) was close by and base slides into me with a bottle. I chug it down and eagerly return to the fight.

Something happens to time. I don’t know if it slowed down or sped up or I stepped into an alternate dimension but I have no idea how much of it passed.

I realize my comrades are sprinting toward the road. Someone is yelling “break contact”. We regroup and the squad leader informs us we are returning to the base with our new intelligence about the RUSFOR’s location.

Other squads from our company were out patrolling as well with the ultimate goal of locating the RUSFOR base to plan a final assault. We arrive at our base, everyone chattering excitedly about the engagement, how many times they died, and how many Russians they killed. I chime in complaining about disrespect for journalism.

Once again, I have to poop. This adrenaline situation is a natural laxative.

Moseying back from my porta potty trip, I hear gunfire and screaming, I break into a run toward the base and learn that RUSFOR is assaulting our LPOP, about 200 meters away. First and second platoon, about 80 people, are racing to the woods shooting as they run. I grab my camera and follow. Dare I say I’m getting the hang of this.

The onslaught quickly mows us down, RUSFOR overwhelming us with outmatched fire power. Every soldier in my vicinity is hit except me and I am frantically crawling around in the leaves and dirt and ferns tourniquetting screaming dying comrades, BBs whizzing dangerously by my face, doing my best to bring them back to life as any wayward journalist with hopes of a feature editorial in a major news outlet would, when I feel like a spike has been shoved through my fingernail. I realize it was a BB and I start screaming out of indignation at this tiny injury taking me out of the fight. Someone I just tourniquetted tourniquettes me, and I take his picture while he runs off.

Not a minute later I am hit again, presented with yet another opportunity to earn my academy award. Several others are in the same state, all of us screaming out, harnessing our inner Willem Dafoe in his infamous Platoon death scene.

The medic slides into us tossing out waters. We chug them down and are back in the fight. I continue taking photos, run-crawling, tourniquetting, and dying. By my 4th death, I have almost earned my academy award, and the medic is gone. Others are dead and screaming, the platoon leader included, and at these moments in a simulation disbelief is suspended and the dead retreat to the CCP for revival. There are about 30 of us. We arrive at the CCP a couple hundred meters away, quickly drink, and rush back to the woods. This time I survive unscathed as the platoons successfully repel the Russians and we hold our position.

It’s early evening, people are milling about, coming down from a mountain of adrenaline. Darrow pulls out a tasty looking MRE. I eat a Clif bar whining to my significant other that not having my own MRE and chewing on a dry hunk of plywood made out of dirty hippies and broken dreams of the possibilities of peace, packaged in a colorful tastefully designed wrapper with a mountain scene is breaking my immersion. Something is happening, some connection I didn’t expect. I write some thoughts in the pages of my notepad which, due to the chaos of the upcoming final battle on Sunday during which we are completely overrun by RUSFOR, and my unwise choice to not wear zippered pocketed pants, are now scattered and lonely across 5,000 acres of the forest floor.

At this point about 20% of participants have had enough, or need to return to kids and wives, or their grandmother got sick. There is a running joke that by Saturday night of a MILSIM, at least 10% of participants have a sick grandmother. I understand why. I’m ready to go home, to a soft bed and my snuggly dog, an evening bowl of cereal and some instagram.

Alas, I pull out my headlamp, unstuff my bedding, and prepare for a long uncomfortable night. This time I take my boots off. Surprisingly I quickly nod off.

Hours later I’m jolted awake by maybe one of the most disconcerting sounds to permeate the dead of night while you’re sleeping on the cold ground — gunfire. The platoon leader is on his feet in helmet and night vision scanning the perimeter. My heart is racing. The cognitive reality check that this isn’t “real” doesn’t seem to be working in pitch dark. A few more cracks of fire and he assures everyone that it was just a RUSFOR scouting operation. With only a couple hours to sunrise I find myself flooded with adrenaline, listening intently on high alert, unable to shuffle into dreams.

Once again we’re rudely roused before dawn, stuffing our packs, me with my nearly useless red light, everyone else with their night vision, no time for coffee or bagels. Luckily I finally do not have to poop. I stay close to Darrow as we head up the road in the dark. We hike a couple miles to meet up with 3rd and 4th platoon where we thought we were launching the final assault on the RUSFOR base. They’re not there, and neither are any Russians.

We sit. And sit. And wait. I feel exasperated and bored. No one is talking. Everyone is tired and crabby. Once again, I reflect on the simulation aspect — this is the point. You’re exhausted and sore and hungry and want to go home and snuggle your dog, yet you’re in a war and at any moment you may be ambushed, or doing the ambushing.

Another hour passes. The 3rd and 4th platoon show up. We move into the woods as a unit, spreading out wide in a line, walking tensely in silence, not knowing the location of the enemy. We walk for over an hour, on high alert, attempting stealth. This in itself is exhausting. I can’t imagine doing it for days or weeks on end, in a monsoon in a jungle, or in a snowstorm in a heavily wooded forest.

Suddenly someone starts screaming, then many someones, then what sounds like everyone. A cacophony of the now familiar whizzing of tiny finger piercing pellets permeates the soft fern forest, punctuated by the bowel rattling bangs of blank gun fire. It’s my second encounter with the elusive RUSFOR and they look crazier than I remembered. They’ve taken the LARP up a few notches in this final battle, yelling with well rehearsed Russian accents, decked out in their carefully curated Russian uniforms. There’s been something chaotic about their vibe all weekend, no one seems to be in charge, their energy determined and deadly. The final battle rages on for what seems eternity, but really an hour. I die quickly, giving my all to what I believe will be my last academy award attempt. I take cover in a shallow ditch behind a fallen log next to some fellow dropouts, throwing hands in the air when Russians stumbled upon us. I manage to capture one photo of the third of the three female participants, a fiery RUSFOR soldier who pounced upon us eager to tally up more kills.

I hear someone yell “END EX!” and everyone parrots and I ask what’s going on and they tell me it’s over. I learn NATO was overrun by RUSFOR and no one won because we’re all playing Airsoft.

We’re called to the side of a dirt road by Josh Warren where we gather around for an “after action review”. Awards are handed out, I hear a rumor I was nominated by our cadre, and I’m relieved that McGraw, our RTO receives it. It’s his first MILSIM and he was cool as a cucumber, ensuring our platoon leader was well aware of our position and status at all times.

I’m more than ready to retreat back to civilization, to hide behind the palace walls with a new understanding and reality check that far surpasses the many hours I’ve immersed myself in war movies and books and conversations with veterans. I have a different appreciation for the complex emotional toll of war and military service albeit a pale comparison. The separation anxiety, the itch to use skills one learns and masters at a young age, the desire and often desperate need to feel the irreplaceable camaraderie that disappears when you’ve completed your service.

I reflect on my earlier question if MILSIM is merely another expression of military indoctrination and a glorification of war, and I recall relaying my experience to a counselor colleague, an avid disc golfer, seeming pacifist, and one of the last fellows I would expect to be interested in a militaristic event. Much to my surprise he expressed how much he would love to participate, that it’s a desire for most American males, and an oft repressed one for those on the supposed pacifist side of the aisle.

Indoctrination or not, there remains an inherent human curiosity about extreme tests of one’s mettle, and in those 15 minutes when you forget where you are, you get a quick taste.

At any rate, you’ll find me reporting from the ground at the Caspian Insurgency in February.

I’m not a long range planner, but if I reach 90, 40 years of snowy winters, making art, and sharing my love of letterpress with others await.

I hope some of you find your way to Vermont for a tour. It will be my delight!

The move was smooth, sunny and 20 to start, a quick shift to clouds and snow by early afternoon.

Some people exude trustworthiness, a natural confidence in their knowledge and abilities, and an indefatigable determination. By an unexpected stroke of luck, I crossed paths with a person who embodies these qualities, who knows how to move very heavy things, and lives close. And, he brought someone who understands the craft of letterpress and old machinery. Being the anxious human that I am at times, fretting for months over the logistics of this move, they put me at ease and got the job done flawlessly.

I have struggled with art making my whole life, overthinking, questioning my inspiration and output, starting and stopping over and over.

I picked up Art and Fear (1994) for a reread recently.

A quote:

“Until your ship comes in, the only people who will really care about your work are those who care about you personally.”

My ship is here. I found what matters — people who care about me, and care about my work, in art and therapy. I have a fleet of ships and they all showed up.

I haven’t communicated with him in years I can’t count. My visits to Maryland are fewer, shorter, isolated to family.

My eyes are leaking. I’m ovulating, ovaries crying out for a last chance, as they careen into the Mojave desert to dry in smouldering sun, instigating hormonal havoc that may or may not be occurring. I don’t know what’s going on. Words escape.

The move continues to hover. The stone mason is responsive and friendly. We meet on Sunday.

Stick season has arrived.

I’m astounded at meeting the second goal. I’m attempting a third and final, as the moving cost creeps higher, and I didn’t account for smaller stuff — doorknobs, extension cords, eventual air conditioner, new ink. Thus far you’ve all helped cover more than 65% (!!!!!!). The number of people means astronomically more than dollars, and each postcard and letter and package I send reminds me of the importance of connection.

Here's the link.

Living feels heavy lately. I often avoid the news. I revisit the top five regrets of the dying. I pay particular attention to number four.

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I didn’t work so hard.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

Today clouds erase mountains already sprinkled with snow and yellow leaves of hardy birch trees cling desperately to avoid the unavoidable.

As do I — moving heavy things.

And, we’ll both be ok.

I’ve always had someone who understands the art of moving heavy things — partners, friends, friends of friends. Pallet jacks, forklifts, tie downs, trucks, trailers, bottle jacks, furniture dollies, ramps. I once moved a press with a tow truck. Logistics are not my strength. Physics and I don’t understand each other. I tried hard in college, squeaking by before dropping science and retreating to dark halls of art buildings on the opposite side of campus at the University of Maryland.

A couple months ago I meet a guy in the only coffee shop of this 56 square mile town boasting a population of about 1200. He uses photogravure and other turn of the century techniques to print his photos. ChatGPT (which translates to Cat I Have Farted in French) suggests less than 200 artists currently practice these processes in the US, and a 0.0360% probability of one living here.

In the chaos of the past weeks, he slips my mind.

On Friday while calculating moving costs, he pops up unexpectedly. I ask his advice. His friend is a stone mason, drives forklifts, and moves heavy things. Synchronicity? Maybe Carl Jung and Sting are on to something.

The friend answers my call, also a rarity. He thinks he can help. I send photos and a video. I hold my breath, waiting for an answer.

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It’s going well, far beyond expectations. $13,824 thus far, an astounding number for mental health and art. Most donations from a deep network in St. Louis — designers, artists, former coworkers and clients, letterpress students, roller derby teammates. St. Louis, my home of 17 years, stocked with kind people who hold friends close, and have enormous generosity and big hearts. My homesickness excruciating at times.

I neglected Substack — overwhelmed, stumbling around the discomfort of asking for financial help, and careening through the endless web of social media, an expertise that has slowly eroded from my skills.

Posting the latest updates. For more information, and to support this project —visit Go Fund Me

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The shop is here! More videos and photos below.

One year and 8 days ago my brother helped me stuff my life into storage, a culmination of ambivalence, alcohol, a mood disorder, confusion, awakening, reckoning and resolving. The grief and growth from then to now, exhausting and exhilarating.

At that time my decision involved an unspeakable unknown — what about the presses?

I began collecting almost 25 years ago — a 6 x 10 Chandler and Price table top, my first typeface 24 pt Copperplate Gothic, barely enough to set my name. I walked away from all of it to save my heart and spirit. I now have a partner who is my biggest champion. He helped ignite this project 4 months ago when I found out my job was ending. His steady encouragement propelled me forward along many dark paths over which I stumbled these past months.

I learned a lot about grief and loss and longing and homesickness the past year. A word I stumbled on recently captures it so well — Hiraeth. A Welsh word for a feeling that goes beyond homesick yearning or nostalgia. It describes a deep aching pain, not only for a place or people, but for a past that never was or a future that could have been but became impossible. I remain haunted by both.

I cried the day the space was delivered. Many dreams of setting type have haunted me this past year, waking and trying to reconcile possibly never using it or seeing it again.

This future you’re all helping create is one I hadn’t imagined and would have insisted impossible even 6 months ago. I won’t escape Hiraeth — perhaps some of you can relate. I now rebuild a smoldering wreck of a ship, ready to sail again.

I’m not the greatest at promoting this, I’m learning and doing my best, and am humbled at the support thus far. I hope to keep it going through November, maybe by then I will have learned a bit more about social media to do this right!

Thanks again to everyone, and please send your address along! I have a love affair with snail mail.

I run / walk to the mid-ish Jay Peak point, rewiring dopamine receptors to stave off dark cracks in my mind’s door, knocking finally faint yet insistent in the dark disagreeable hours. A fork in the trail spills out to a ski run, the tram descends to the left, a range of the green mountains, now orange, ahead.

My calf twinges. It’s 50 years old, a worn down spring on a somewhat maintained car. The oil wasn’t changed for several thousand miles — it’s getting better upkeep, just needs less pedal to the metal.

Ageing is confusing, confounding, baffling, powerful, uncertain — is this a mood, depression, menopause, bad sleep, life choices?

Times are weird. Weirder than JFK? Operation Northwoods? Nuremberg trials? Do we simply know too much too often due to the relentless cognitive warfare of the media bombardiers?

My mind is also 50. I stumble around dazed and confused, wishing I was on the edge of 17, enjoying sweet leaf, comfortably numb, and breakin’ on through to the other side.

I saw Bob's beautiful dynamic photos on Facebook and spoke with him about using them for our marketing materials. He agreed and handed me a CD (back in 2008 that was standard procedure) with six. thousand. photos. 6,000. We met up and discussed the process of selecting photos he thinks are best before handing off to design, that the editing process is part of the job of the photographer, and will help him develop his eye as an artist. Basically paring 6,000 down to maybe 100.

He came back with fewer photos that helped launch the next iteration of the brand -- powerful action photos, bold colorful type, featured skaters on the covers of programs. His powerful photography drove the design and was the backbone I leaned on for the next 5 years as we continued to collaborate. Everything I produced relied on his photos.

He experimented with installing bee lights around the track, investing thousands of dollars into equipment, sitting for hundreds of hours at games, partying at every after party, traveling with us all over the country, organizing tens of thousands of photos, perhaps hundreds of thousands. I imagine he has a server or three stocked full.

A few months ago I suggested we collaborate on a photo book. He was game. Time and life went by, as it does, and it did not materialize. I'll be on my own for this one. I still have thousands of his images hanging out on a hard drive somewhere.

Love you Bob. Grateful for our collaboration, your creative spirit, and dedication to our sport.

https://litehouse.media/2025/08/24/local-roller-derby-photographer-bob-dunnell-passes-away/

He had untreated bipolar disorder, and a lively, unsteady life. Voted Mr. Pittsburgh as a teen, he was a stunning athletic man with a natural operatic voice. He never achieved a singing career, unlike my cousin who has been working as a professional for years, named "Bavarian Kammersängerin" in Germany which I guess is a big deal, sort of a knighthood for singers. After my uncle dropped out in the early 2000s he had aspirations of auditioning for The Voice. I think he could have made it.

My father, his older brother, introduced him to olympic power lifting in his teens. He was hooked. Family lore has it he attended olympic trials and missed making the team by a few pounds. I have not confirmed this — I only have his recounting of the aftermath of homemade pre-meet concoctions of dexedrine and dianabol, raw eggs and milk that kept him awake for 3 days.

He worked as a bouncer for a stretch, at shady dive bars in rusty Pittsburgh, moving on to earn his nursing degree, eventually working in jails treating inmates. Until he broke.

I remember sitting on the floor in my grandmother's house looking through a box of his things that included years of expired driver's licenses over 5 year intervals. Drastic changes recorded by half decades, heaviness in his eyes, deepening lines in his face.

He did not use traditional substances that sometimes accompany mental health issues — alcohol or cocaine or weed. His "drugs of choice" were weights and steroids. I wonder if he had body dysmorphia. He was a huge man, legs like trees, a refrigerator rib cage. He was funny and loved to laugh and to make others laugh, and his mood could turn on a dime into raging, hateful ranting.

As the years moved forward, his eccentricities progressed — he converted to Quakerism, adopting the broad brimmed hat and suspenders which, oddly enough suited him well.

The what ifs are painful. What if he had received proper treatment? What if he had found the right person? I often chalk it up to heavy karma, and the unfortunate paths some walk, as their souls struggle to find the next life.

When I was diagnosed with biploar disorder, I immediately thought of my uncle, wondering if I too have heavy karma — yet I am lucky to have proper treatment, and a partner who understands, and family support. I too have retreated to the mountains in a rural place, and my eccentricities are progressing, and perhaps I will end up a Quaker. This disorder will continue to do its thing even with treatment, but I understand it and embrace it and try to lean on the gifts (if there really are any) that accompany it.

He passed a few years after singing Ave Maria at my Grandmother’s funeral.

That this closure comes on the day after the weekend after a certain bill passed does not feel coincidental.

The fallout is a microcosm of rural communities across the country. Current estimates indicate nearly 300 rural hospitals are closing immediately with 700 more at risk in the coming years.

My own despondence escalated this week. Insomnia I struggled with only occasionally this past year due to positive lifestyle and situational adjustments came roaring, my appetite plummeted, telltale signs of a major depressive episode.

A client call this morning was the proverbial nail. Words did not align, my responses sparse and meaningless. This is not ethical care.

I meet with my supervisor.

I meet with HR.

I file FMLA paperwork.

I sit on hold with short term disability.

I talk to my farming neighbor who offers me $3.50 / pint for picking -- she says I can make $25/hour if I'm fast.

I'll be out back for a while, psychoanalyzing the blueberries and assessing their substance use.