When I was little, my dad would tell me about what it was like to be a child during China's Great Famine. He told me that he would eat ants off the ground for a brief sensation of what food tasted like, and laugh because in America I didn't have to do that. He always served me first when he cooked, and I wondered if I could ever do that, if being grown-up meant feeding other people first.
Today is my third anniversary since I quit my corporate job to throw myself into my art career. It's been more than a year since my business turned its first…
I had the honor of presenting at TEDx Madison at the end of 2016. My talk is officially online, and I'm excited to finally be able to share it. The talk…
February 8, 2017, would have been my dad's 66th birthday. He has been gone for nearly 8 years. I have been thinking a lot lately about things that come in…
It is two days after Martin Luther King Day and two days before the 45th Presidential Inauguration. We began the week by honoring the memory of a man who emerged…
It's been a really good summer, in many ways. Full of laughter and play. Weekend trips. Camping. Outdoor excursions and inside jokes. Crackling fires. Summer pies. At the same time,…
My mother once told me the story of a cartoon she saw in a newspaper some years ago, which explained God. In the cartoon, God is a faceless, featureless oval on a table. People come…
Did you miss my show at Arts + Literature Laboratory? Here's a recap of why I chose to focus on power and a video of the story I told at the reception.…
Lanesboro Arts Center is beautiful. The space is bright, open, welcoming, and full of activity. They regularly host artists and writers to use the space as a getaway to focus on projects,…
The chase. The game. Love it or hate it, love it and hate it. Choose to play, choose not to play. There's no getting away from it. Our existence depends on…
My mom, like most parents, worries about my happiness and wellbeing, which means she spends a lot of time thinking about me being unhappy and unwell. Funny how that works, right?…
"What do you do?" This is the number one small talk question we ask people, on par with discussing the weather. It's a question we either don't care about at…
Back when I started working in manufacturing, I had a boss who would ask our team: "How do you catch a counterfeit?" The answer? "Study the real." There are infinite…
Comparison is a blessing and a curse, depending on how we use it. Comparisons help us understand context. They give us familiarity, which is vital for connection. The same things can be…
It's taken me waaaay too long to finally put this information together, but since a lot of people have asked, here's what one year of "underemployment" looks like since I…
It was 1991. I was three years old. My dad was in Seattle and my mom would be alone with me that winter. The road was covered with ice on…
August 29th was the one-year anniversary of me leaving my corporate job. I left to pursue my artwork. On a deeper level, I left to make myself better and more…
Sunday, July 12th, was a picturesque, idyllic day. It started with a promising fourth (?) date. We made breakfast in the morning, then walked around Madison's Art Fair on the Square. Then…
Painting studies, pain aux raisins, and reading under the trees and a summer breeze. On Monday, a man with a knife attacked me in my neighborhood. On Tuesday, I talked…
Yesterday evening, towards the end of my run, a homeless woman stopped me to help jumpstart her car. My jumper cables were bad, so I went and got new ones.…