While returning to my hometown and spending the holidays with my family, I witnessed a beautiful reunion of childhood friends. We took a detour home one Sunday through my dad’s childhood neighborhood. By some perfect coincidence, we saw his childhood friend (that my dad hadn’t seen in nearly 30 years) pull into his driveway. My dad quickly stopped the car, and waved down his friend. Seeing my dad talk with his old hometown friend was nothing short of paradigm-shifting. Seeing this man, likely weary in some ways of the world he inhabits, light up when he saw the face of a childhood friend was t ..read more

I take off for a run, one night, deep in summer. In the middle of the dog days, as they say. The air is hot and envelops me entirely, as I step past out past the threshold of my apartment. The sky is dark, except for the fading sliver of light on the western horizon. It’s an early darkness though–the sun’s light hasn’t completely departed yet. I run down 700 North towards the mountains. In the darkness all objects are best defined by their silhouette. The grass is thus defined by its crisp edges neatly framing the dividing line between sidewalk and yard, or grassy median and street. There coul ..read more

I usually don’t stray away from political topics in any of my written ramblings, however, it has been a while since I last directly addressed the political landscape around me. I have been prompted to evaluate this landscape in light of national and personal events. The tired cliches for describing our political situation are easily accessed, but the more we use them the less satisfying they become. The more we fall into these verbal ruts, the easier it is to let our thinking become equally sloppy and repetitive. Without a doubt I will fall into many of these same ruts, but I hope to be at lea ..read more

I now work for a small debt collection law firm in Provo, Utah. The transition from higher education to menial and mind-numbing clerical work has been rocky, but one of the bright spots each day has been my commute to and from work. I love the way the air is fresh and crisp in the early fall mornings, just cold enough to wear a jacket without numbing your face and hands as you ride. The mountains are absolutely perfect in form and inspire my wandering thoughts as I make the short trip to work. Recently I have taken to listening 60’s and 70’s folk-rock while I bike. I am constantly in awe of ho ..read more

Yesterday, on a sunny, bright, and cool morning my brother, my friend, and I headed into the woods. I put it like that because when so phrased it appears less banal than saying “I went hiking,” and has an almost mystical ring to it. Any experience in nature should maximize the unformulated, mystical, and transcendent. Too often, we formulate our experiences in nature (as elsewhere) in highly rigid, structured, and sterilized ways. We stay on a narrow path, we make sure we have more than enough water, and we measure time and distance in miles and hours. Looking beyond these tired tropes and par ..read more

A little while ago I traveled with my wife, my younger brother, and some of my wife’s family to the Kolob Canyon section of Zion National Park. Our most substantial hike was through Taylor’s Creek, a 5 mile out-and-back hike to a spectacular double arch. On our way back the sky, formerly clear and blue, was obscured by (in my amateur estimation) cirrostratus clouds that framed the day and the landscape in an “atemporal” light. For without the direct play of the sunlight, the afternoon was bathed in a neutral light. It seemed like there was no passing of time. It stood absolutely still. All tha ..read more

I had an amazing conversation with a close friend while out on a run in the unseasonably warm Christmastime weather late last year. My friend mentioned that he considered himself an atheist after a rather long faith journey through Christianity and Judaism. This ignited a longer conversation on the relationship between faith and reason. This in turn led me to want to further flesh out my ideas on this important relationship and belief generally. On my own belief. I believe in God because I’ve had glimpses of what we might term with obnoxious cliche “the bigger picture.” I believe because so ..read more

I usually reflect on the subject of driving and how it has come to define our modern life as I’m biking to work or as I’m walking around Provo (usually taking in the Joaquin neighborhood or a particularly leafy sections of Center Street). The experience of self-powered travel, in my mind a more mindful form of transportation, is entirely different in nature and form and effect (psychological, physical, emotional, etc.) than standard car travel. In many ways our approach to transportation is analagous to our Western approach to life. We focus so doggedly on an increasingly narrow goal that we m ..read more

I usually don’t stray away from political topics in any of my written ramblings, however, it has been a while since I last directly addressed the political landscape around me. I have been prompted to evaluate this landscape in light of national and personal events. The tired cliches for describing our political situation are easily accessed, but the more we use them the less satisfying they become. The more we fall into these verbal ruts, the easier it is to let our thinking become equally sloppy and repetitive. Without a doubt I will fall into many of these same ruts, but I hope to be at lea ..read more

I now work for a small debt collection law firm in Provo, Utah. The transition from higher education to menial and mind-numbing clerical work has been rocky, but one of the bright spots each day has been my commute to and from work. I love the way the air is fresh and crisp in the early fall mornings, just cold enough to wear a jacket without numbing your face and hands as you ride. The mountains are absolutely perfect in form and inspire my wandering thoughts as I make the short trip to work. Recently I have taken to listening 60’s and 70’s folk-rock while I bike. I am constantly in awe o ..read more