At 10:30 a.m. today, after I dismounted my treadmill at the Scottsdale Community College fitness center, I turned left. This primitive, but meaningful, message scrawled on a nearby whiteboard captured my attention.
Yes, I am relieved and happy about the blue tsunami that made landfall in the United States last Tuesday. (If you squint, you can detect blue glimmers of it in the reflection of my photograph. Well, not really. Actually, those are the blue skies of Arizona bouncing through western-facing windows.)
The full effects of our political sea change–a true mandate from the American people cast across red, blue, and purple states–won’t become clear until January 2027. That’s when a newly elected, eager-and-diverse slate of Democrats take their seats in Washington, D.C., before a mountain of problems to solve.
But in this period of a landmark transition, we should Be Happy as individuals and as a nation. It feels like we finally may be stepping away from the precipice of our demise, like we have turned a treacherous corner, like we have come to our senses and rediscovered our best intentions before the stroke of midnight.
In this month of Thanksgiving, this seismic-and-hopeful political shift is something to celebrate and truly be thankful for.
That day has come. It is the eve of a frightful pivot point in American history. Will we salvage our democracy at the polls or hand over the last keys of liberty with a whimper? I hold my breath and hope for the former.
Like much of America, my husband and I cast our votes early. Now, amidst raging flood waters that swamped much of Arizona over our unusually soggy weekend, I pray for an early November blue wave. To stop the madness. To flip the script. To calm this exhausting social and economic quagmire. To welcome common sense and human decency back in the front door.
Meanwhile, I give thanks for the successful completion of my sixth memoir writing workshop at the Scottsdale Public Library. For three consecutive Fridays in October, I bonded with eleven diverse and talented writers–seven women; four men–around a rectangular table at Mustang Library.
They trusted me to help jumpstart or embellish their literary journeys. To open their hearts. To share their stories and give them voice. Along the way, we shared a few laughs and several cascades of cathartic tears as they collected constructive feedback and encouragement like hungry trick-or-treaters trolling for their favorite candies.
In a nutshell, together we fostered and nurtured an organic community of storytelling. One I imagine they will carry forward with passion and persistence.
As we parted last Friday, one member shepherded the creation of a email contact list, so that they can discuss ways to continue on this literary journey together.
Though I feel I need time to refill my creative tank, I know in my heart I have contributed to the well-being of eleven other lives … eleven who strive to share their pain, their light, their wisdom, their voices with a world desperate for truth and greater goodness.
Sixes are wild. I have written and published six books–most of them in my sixties. Meanwhile, last Friday, I welcomed another group of writers to my sixth memoir-writing workshop at the Scottsdale Public Library.
Each writer arrives in the room with their own suitcase of metaphorical stories to tell. In my role as leader and facilitator, I encourage them to unpack the most meaningful, vivid ones.
There are eleven participants in the current class. We’ll have two more three-hour sessions together. One is tomorrow. The last one is October 30. Though we meet just three times in person, I try to cram as much writing into our time as possible.
My goal is for them to find and develop creative momentum in this temporary writing community, then move ahead independently to write a personal story. I focus on helping them tell ONE story from their lives, rather than THE story of their lives. I think that makes the process less intimidating.
This week’s writing? To describe a setting that is memorable from their lives. It might be a city, town, or something more specific. Perhaps a room in a house where something important occurred. In a worksheet I gave them, I say, “What does this place look, sound, smell, feel, taste like?” Then, I ask them to include these sensory observations in the narrative of their story.
I work with the group to build trust right from the start of the workshop. So, I will keep their story submissions confidential. But suffice it to say, their “settings” stories they submitted run the gamut. The organic and raw nature of memoir writing is what I find my fascinating about the genre.
Last year when I first introduced this “settings” exercise in another of my workshops, I completed my own version of this exercise to see how it felt.
What I’ve written below is a description of one of my favorite cities in my home state … Flagstaff, Arizona. I’d love to know what you think. Send me a comment.
***
Like much of America, downtown Flagstaff lives in transition.
Wooden porches of once-proud homes sag and creak. They speak of generations of heavy snow, extreme temperatures, and familiar faces gone but not forgotten.
Scattered wildflowers bloom through deep cracks in sidewalks and curbs. Occasional murals–born and etched by Arizona artists–adorn avenues. They tell hardscrabble stories of past lives.
North and south of historic Route 66–on both sides of parallel train tracks that dissect and rumble through the town–entrepreneurs have stripped and transformed buildings. Trendy pizza joints, aspiring restaurants, cozy coffee houses, touristy bars, ski shops, reimagined inns, dental offices, healthcare clinics, law practices, and investment firms anchor street corners.
Some have since closed, casualties of the pandemic. The lucky ones endure, connecting bohemian neighborhoods within view of the breathtaking San Francisco Peaks.
The overall effect produces a block-by-block checkerboard of western resiliency, community pride, mountainside retreat, and twenty-first-century regrets.
Two days of much-needed rain, remnants of hurricane Polo, have scrubbed our Sonoran skies and revealed–on the last day of September–sunny-and-mild, early autumn.
This is our desert version of fall, which would be characterized as summer anywhere else. Comfortable mornings. Perfect for hiking and plenty warm to swim outside. I did both before noon.
With every stroke back and forth at Eldorado Pool in south Scottsdale, between 10:00 and 11:00 a.m. I found myself Septembering … a word I’ve crafted to represent six sweet September 2026 moments I choose to remember here.
***
On September 4, my parents would have celebrated their seventy-eighth anniversary. A friend and ex-colleague touched me by colorizing and retouching their wedding photo. Such a pleasant surprise!
On September 6, Tom and I celebrated our twelfth anniversary by treating ourselves to a fabulous matinee performance of Les Miserables at the Phoenix Theatre.
On September 17, my husband kicked off his eighth Movies That Matter film series at the Scottsdale Public Library. Since launching it in January 2023, his popular program has attracted cinephiles who crave absorbing the meaning of fabulous films and Tom’s fascinating insights in a fun-and-engaging community setting.
On September 25 (9/25 day for Dolly Parton lovers who grieve), I was one of ten members of the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus who sang back-up to Mamma Coal (host performer shown below) for a rendition of “I Will Always Love You” at a Celebration of Dolly at the Van Buren concert venue in Phoenix. A portion of the proceeds benefitted Dolly’s Imagination Library.
On September 26, my sister Diane celebrated her seventy-second birthday in the Chicago area. I remember how we teamed up beautifully during the last four years of our mother’s life (2009-2013) to care for her. For Diane’s special day, Tom and I bought her a gorgeous blue-green scarf, which she loves, in Vancouver’s Stanley Park during our Canada visit in late July.
On September 30, Tom and I enjoyed cooler temperatures and hiked along the Crosscut Canal near Papago Park in south Scottsdale. Though we’ve lived in the Sonoran Desert of Arizona for more than nine years, at times I still feel I am walking on the moon whenever I witness the stark beauty of the buttes and saguaros.
PS: Supporting photos below appear in no particular order. For good measure, I’ve also included a September 2026 photo Tom took of me (not one of my sister; she prefers her privacy).
As Dad, Mom, Diane and I approached my grandparents’ rambling farm in Huntersville, North Carolina, in 1968 in our four-door Chevy Biscayne, waves of kudzu vine blanketed the trees.
At some point during our July vacation there, I remember my stoic maternal grandfather telling me this invasive plant, this weed, was blocking the sunlight.
Bit by bit, the kudzu was smothering the native plants and large trees in the southeastern United States.
In a metaphorical sense, I feel like one of those older trees–perhaps an oak or pine–that has grown through the seasons and spread its branches only to discover that the censorship and hate of our nation’s government (said kudzu vine) has insidiously wrapped itself around my trunk.
This is not a new development. I have been feeling this way for years. Trying to remain positive in the face of ICE raids, misogynistic slurs, shuttered healthcare programs, disregard for our most vulnerable citizens, the environment, and our right to a free press. The list of losses is endless.
Recently, my husband and I have lived firsthand through the threat of censorship in our community. It is causing us both great pain. It is also prompting me to realize how far we have fallen as a nation and what I am willing to tolerate or accept.
At some point, I will have more to say about this. I don’t know when or how. Suffice it to say, this kudzu vine–the 2026 version of the McCarthy era in the United States–is out of control.
I do believe that, ultimately, historians will shine light on whatever it is we are living through. I hope I live long enough to see the return of truth and reason and the eradication of these smothering vines.
Over the weekend, I learned that one of Nick’s (my older son’s) high school buddies from the late 1990s/early 2000s, died recently of an apparent suicide. He was forty-two years old.
The timing of this devastating event for his family and friends has dredged up another dose of September sadness for me.
***
In September 2023, Tom and I received a letter in the mail from a close friend, who–less than a year before–had moved from the Phoenix area to another part of the country. I’ll call this friend Brett.
Brett’s snail-mail message was an eerie, lengthy, desperate, and personal admission–typed and folded meticulously. In it, Brett recounted a series of voluntary testosterone injections that messed with his body and mind.
He told us: ” … I had consulted with several friends in the medical field, all of whom told me there were no side effects to these testosterone injections and it would raise my numbers. Unfortunately, this did not turn out to be true … and it destroyed me forever.”
I know how much Brett cared for Tom and me, and we certainly listened and cared for him. “Our talks on our hikes always inspired me,” he went on to say. He told us he wished he had made better decisions in his new hometown.
When Tom and I finished reading the letter, we both felt dumbfounded. So much so that Tom ran a search on Brett’s full name. Brett’s obituary popped up.
Through a few subsequent texts and phone calls, we discovered Brett had committed suicide.
Evidently, Brett had left a short stack of letters to close friends in his home. Soon after he died, a member of his family mailed them.
In late September 2023, we heard from one of his brothers. He told us Brett had spoken highly of us. We told him how much we cared about Brett, and how frequently he mentioned his love for his family.
We sent him pictures of Brett, Tom and me banging on drums at the Musical Instrument Museum in Scottsdale. It was a fun day in May 2021, though you couldn’t see our smiles. We were wearing masks. It was the height of Covid.
We will never know the full detail of what happened to Brett or why he felt he had no recourse but to take his life. But, with time, Tom and I became acquainted with Brett’s mother and sister, too.
I am certain that talking with us about Brett provided much-needed comfort, but I can’t presume to know the devastation of what they feel when Brett’s birthday appears on the calendar every January … or when this day–September 8–reignites the fire of grief.
It is an endless nightmare.
***
Depression doesn’t only emanate from one man’s worries over his testosterone levels.
The division in our country in 2026 boggles the mind. So many people live in fear and isolation as our nation’s government–and many of the institutions we once trusted–breeds disarray, pain, anxiety, and uncertainty.
If you know someone who is struggling mightily, I encourage you to reach out to them and lend a listening ear.
Or, if that person in pain is you, please know that you matter. Help is available around the clock.
Call or text 988 to be connected to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. Do it for yourself. Do it for Brett.
Whether you are facing mental health struggles, emotional distress, alcohol or drug related concerns, or just need to talk with someone, a caring counselor will provide confidential emotional support.
Remember, you are not alone.
A lone blue heron stands at the water’s edge at Chaparral Lake in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Lately, I feel like an anxious hummingbird, flitting about from one branch to another. Zooming in and out, searching for creative inspiration. Trying to find sweet nectar that will help me link one idea to the next.
Maybe it’s the late-summer desert doldrums. The intense Sonoran heat has worn me down. I don’t feel the impetus to write here as frequently as I once did.
Even so, I have experienced two moments of writing bliss in the past week. Both led me to draft deeply personal poems for members of my family–chosen and otherwise. At some point, I may decide to share them publicly, but not now.
Maybe this is simply what it feels like to be living in my “late sixties going on seventy” (sounds like a parody of a song from The Sound of Music) in a world gone mad.
All the while, I try to nourish myself.
I try to help others I love who have lost jobs or are battling cancer.
I play word games on my phone when I wake up each day.
I recall the stunning scenes and pine scents of western Canada.
I pack for my younger son’s wedding in Chicago this weekend.
I squeeze in another trip to the gym.
I watch the young-and-promising St. Louis Cardinals I root for self-destruct again in the late innings.
I download the music for my December choral concert and prepare for my next rehearsal.
I socialize with friends away from the heat produced in the Valley of the Sun.
I take afternoon naps to reboot my brain.
I prepare to lead another memoir writing workshop in October.
I recoup with my husband at home. We enjoy quieter moments in the confines of our Arizona abode.
Through it all, I wonder when or if I will rediscover the time and energy to complete another book.
Like the rumbling Bow River rapids of Alberta, Canada, that raced past me in late July in mountainous Banff, life’s quiet and meaningful moments keep rushing by.
There isn’t much any of us can do about that, except to maximize the present. That’s difficult when the human memory teases us to revisit past indelible images that we magnify through our sensory connections.
For instance, smoke-tinged skies from forest fires that shrouded Kamloops, British Columbia, when we arrived at our hotel there on July 24, 2026, will forever be sealed in my consciousness.
As will the joyful feeling of reverence for nature, as we rode on the Rocky Mountaineer train the following day, slicing through deep, green canyons on the way to Jasper.
If there is a God–and sometimes I wonder given the state of the world and American society–perhaps he, she or they reside in Canada.
That would explain the seemingly endless supply of pines, spruces and aspens north of the border.
Perhaps God plucked the trees from a celestial palette, drew them on mountains that rise from the bottom of the Thompson River’s edge to the height of a soaring eagle’s eyes.
If so, the clouds passing over the Canadian Rockies applauded in unison.
Of course, there isn’t a never-ending supply of trees, natural resources, or shared beautiful moments.
We must protect our environment, cling to the best of our days, and endure the mundane–and the madness–that exists.
Right now in the Valley of the Sun, Tom and I live in a warm (no, hot!) way station between significant summer events.
We relish our Canada adventure as we also prepare–later this month–to fly to Chicago for the wedding of my younger son, Kirk, and his future bride, Jennifer.
I’ve already advised them to reside in the magical moments of their wedding day as much as possible.
To embrace the cool waters of love from each other, from family, and from friends. To let all of it wash over them.
It will be a day that they–and I–will remember always.
I live in the Sonoran Desert and the Sonoran Desert lives in me. That’s been the case for nine years. My most prolific ones as a writer.
The language of the desert–like grains of sand that blow in through the door–is now part of my creative being.
Shimmering sunsets. Slithering lizards. Skittish quail. Stray cats. Spiky cacti and succulents. Scattering snowbirds. And those are just a sample from the letter “s”.
When I served as a “Writer in Residence” at the Scottsdale Public Library last spring, I prompted the writers in my workshop to explore the role setting plays in the stories of their lives.
I asked them to consider a place in their lives that is or was prominent and how that place might be considered a character in what they have to say. In the stories they want to show and tell.
The places I have lived or frequented have certainly provided texture to my existence and informed my perspective. The orange earth of the Carolinas. The rolling hills of Missouri. The flatlands of Illinois. The rugged buttes of the Arizona desert.
They represent distinct periods in my life, and–in hindsight–I now understand better why they each deserve their proximity across my body of literary work, six books … a lifetime of stories.
The heat here in July is intense. But it is bearable because the Sonoran Desert–even in its most torrid state–is otherworldly.
At times it feels as if I am living on the moon. The astonishing natural beauty and stately saguaros–sentinels that stand tall in valleys and on hillsides here–have led me to a creative destination outside the orbit of my midwestern sensibilities.
One where I “write on” … as I just celebrated my sixty-ninth birthday and begin this final lap in my sixties. Learning and growing. Teaching and influencing.
Standing tall as a gay man, a husband, a father, a writer. Proud as a saguaro despite my visits to the cardiologist and dermatologist to manage my personal frailties. Rooted to this vivid place, the Valley of the Sun, that is my home.
***
Note to those of you who live in the Phoenix metropolitan area: On Thursday, July 16, from 5 to 7 p.m., I will be signing and selling copies of my latest book, Sixty-Something Days, at Grounds on 2nd in Old Town Scottsdale, located at 3703 N. 69th St.
This charming neighborhood place (coffee and wine bar) is one of my favorite spots in our Scottsdale, Arizona, community. It truly is an inclusive, creative space my husband Tom and I frequent to write, read, and chill with friends. In fact, I wrote and edited a considerable portion of my latest book there.
If you are in the area, stop by to sell hello, grab a book and a glass of wine. I also will have a few copies of my other five books–memoirs, poetry, and short fiction–on hand in case you are looking for options to add to your summer reading list.
In April 2026, friends at the Scottsdale Public Library gave me this shirt after I completed my “Writer in Residence” stint there.
Uncertainty exists in every day, in every life. I try not to dwell on it, but on this day–the 250th anniversary of the United States adopting our Declaration of Independence–uncertainty is our next-door neighbor.
I certainly remember our 200th anniversary, our bi-centennial celebration, in 1976. I was a bright-eyed, long-haired, eighteen-year-old, idealistic American.
Living in suburban St. Louis, I recall seeing the tall ships grace New York Harbor on our console TV on July 4, 1976.
That summer I worked at Six Flags Over Mid-America near St. Louis. As a tribute to the bicentennial, the Screamin’ Eagle rollercoaster roared across the sky. It was the newest, tallest, fastest ride in the park. Teens rode it again and again just for the thrill of it.
Even though the corruption of Watergate and the devastation of the Vietnam War were still fresh in the American psyche, in 1976 it felt like all Americans lived under and abided by one set of rules. That we aspired to one vision.
That the United States of America–the collective red, white and blue–was one nation and indivisible. A beacon of hope and freedom. That we believed, honored, and protected the notion of life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and justice. For all.
Over the past several years, like a rollercoaster that has jumped the tracks, we have been derailed by a malicious force. I don’t need to–or want to–speak their names. They have fostered twenty-four-hour-a-day uncertainty and anxiety in this nation I still love.
What I choose to celebrate today are the American citizens who still hold fast to the principle our nation was founded under: freedom and justice for all Americans, no matter your skin color, ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, gender, social or economic status.
That is the memory of the United States of America I am proud of.
That is the country my father and thousands of other true patriots have bravely fought for and defended.
That is the country I knew and lived in yesterday.
That is the country I still dream of and worry over.
That is the country I cling to and pray for on July 4, 2026.
That is the country I want to live in today and tomorrow.
