Stories from the ridgeline
Reflections on fatherhood, faith, healing, leadership, adventure, and the spaces between expectation and reality.
October 3, 2026
Some days, I feel like a crash test dummy. Hit the wall. Reset. Another impact. Another lesson. Another person telling me that someday I’ll understand why I had to go through it. There is an idea I have heard throughout most of my life in the church. To be fair, I have heard versions of […]
September 9, 2026
Some questions don’t feel like questions at all. They feel like that moment on a trail when the ground changes beneath your feet; solid dirt giving way to loose scree. You stop, not because you’re tired, but because something underneath you has shifted. This was one of those questions for me: What good is empathy […]
August 30, 2026
I have carried a trauma bag for years. It goes with me on adventures because I’ve learned that the wilderness rarely asks permission before something goes wrong. Rivers change. Rocks move. People fall. Bones break. Kayaks flip. Weather turns. A peaceful afternoon can become an emergency in seconds. So I prepare. Inside the bag are […]
August 28, 2026
When the Old Trail Still Feels Like Home I’ve hiked trails enough times that I no longer have to think much about them. I know where the roots cross the path, where the rock gets slick near the creek, which switchback steals my breath, and where the trees finally open enough to see the ridge. […]
August 26, 2026
Sometimes someone says something so simple that it stops you in your tracks. There’s no polished language, carefully constructed insight, or attempt to sound profound. Just a sentence. Today at Cedar Ridge, I was talking with one of the residents about some of the decisions that had brought him there. Like a lot of young […]
August 24, 2026
The weeds had not taken over the parking lot all at once. They arrived quietly; one seed carried by the wind, one green stem pushing through a hairline crack, one neglected edge stretching a little farther across the pavement. No single plant looked powerful enough to reclaim an entire parking lot. Yet, given enough time […]
August 22, 2026
A while back, someone told me they didn’t think I was emotionally intelligent. The comment caught me off guard. Not because I believe I’ve mastered emotional intelligence. Far from it. I still get things wrong. I become overwhelmed. I retreat when I should lean in, and occasionally lean in when I should step back. I […]
August 20, 2026
Somewhere along ten miles of trail, a conversation about faith wandered into deeper country. I don’t remember exactly what led us there. That’s often how the most honest conversations happen on a trail. You start by talking about the weather, the climb ahead, the view through the trees, or how many miles remain. Then, somewhere […]
August 7, 2026
Some days, the most important thing we build isn’t a trail, a fire pit, or even a program. Sometimes, we build a memory that should have existed years ago. Today was one of those days. I spent the morning supervising a group of at-risk teenage boys on work detail. Many of them are navigating the […]
May 22, 2026
We were driving home from an unsuccessful shopping trip, my daughter and I, carrying the small disappointment of an errand that did not give us what we hoped it would. It was one of those ordinary moments that somehow becomes more than ordinary while you are still inside it. We had gone looking for something […]
