It was the summer of 1980 when we took our first big family trip. We were not one of those families that took vacations to places like Florida or out west. We only went on one or two in my childhood / teen years. We did more day trips — hiking, visiting local or close-by…

When I was a kid, I was helping Dad and Papa remodel the house next door to my grandparents who lived at the top of a hill on Caroline Street. (They lived “down in the city,” which seemed huge to me as I was from the country.) The house next door was a two-story, two-family…

23 years ago I met a 12 year-old kid named Robert who helped me move from Winona Lake to Osceola. He told me about his life on the hour long ride back to Osceola, and I was like… uhhhh is this true? It was a wild story, but very true. As I got to know…

We had islands up and down the crick, went hunting for crayfish, and built hopelessly impossible rafts that never floated. My brother, Matt, turned 49 a couple days ago. I wrote part of this back in 2009 for his 34th birthday. I thought I would update that post and add in some more memories and…