From my first essay nearly published a decade ago to the viral essay that got a million readers to the little goof essays I write now, here are 10 things I’ve learned about writing powerful personal essays
We stood on a closed-off street at a music festival, near midnight, third or fourth beers in hand, when the musicians on stage stopped in
I’d be driving and think, “Oh damn it, I never followed up with Susan.” I’d be shopping and realize it had been six months since
My coaching student scoffed. “Why are you learning grammar?” A part of me was with her, scoffing at grammar that meant memorizing latinate words. Grammar that
I’m looking up Narratively’s instructions on how to pitch, and I see this from their editor, Lilly Dancyger: “In case you’re wondering, here are some
When I decided to start a blog as a follow-up to my book Welcome to the Writer’s Life, I knew I needed to focus. Who
In 2018, I went to six conferences, which is, according to my bank account, too many conferences. Today I have a new podcast episode out
My favorite music genre being Sad Guy With A Guitar And a Story To Tell, my favorite band is naturally Bon Iver. They’re coming to
I don’t know why it took me so long to realize I could buy things for my home that I’d only used in offices or
Every month, I have a dinner party where we talk about the most forbidden of fruits as far as conversation topics go: money. We eat
I bartered with another business owner to help her design her systems, and we were deciding which electronic signing service to go with. It took
On the latest episode of my podcast, I get to talk with my coaching student, Bria, about how she saved up to take a year
I am feeling feelings about Kristen Arnett’s book, Mostly Dead Things, an absolutely fabulous and hilarious novel set in Florida. Psst: This site uses affiliate
As we walked down the beach one day, my mom and I saw two anchored boats cracking against each other in the waves. One had
I just finished Tara Conklin’s book The Last Romantics on a plane, and I wanted to call, “Attention: People in the emergency row. Have you
Like Will Ferrell or Amy Sedaris, it seemed like John Hodgman was creating a new kind of humor. We had no idea what he was
One thing I know about the writing life is that you get better at the thing by doing it. I started out hoping to be
I’m doing Liz Frugalwoods’ Uber-frugal challenge this month, and I don’t like it. I mean, I like her and her challenge, but I don’t like
It’s spending season. The sun shines upon Seattlites at University Village as I run to the Amazon book store, because it’s the only place to
Is there anyone classier, smarter, and more of a person I might be tempted to put a photo of on my mantel than Michelle Obama?
Before my trip to South America, I looked for places he’d been. I had 24 hours in Cali in Colombia, and he’d gone there, had
“In my mind, a beach read is something that’s “unputdownable,” whatever that means to you,” says Susan Kehoe, managing partner of Browseabout Books. When the
Zadie Smith is kind of everything you ever want to be. I’m in love with this short story I heard her read on the New
As you know, Amy Schumer is ridiculous. I consider her my long-lost third sister. Not only does she have her book, The Girl with the
I’ve only once fallen in love with a piece of land, and I’ve been trying to write about it for a decade. When I bought
