Six years ago, I swore an oath to my state and my country. To say that these years have been the best time of my life would be a lie, to say that it’s been a wonderful adventure would be an understatement. I’ve had the opportunity to serve my fellow Americans many times, and have…

Here I am, standing in the gun turret of a Humvee, and I have the chance to see what has been the most beautiful display of nature in my life. The mountains of the Mojave desert stretch long and wide in the distance. A vast sandy plain lies between them and myself. Shrubs and other…

Mojave Nights The tortoise in his humble home. The lizard in his earthly dome. The crow takes flight in the sky. The wind allows the dust to fly. The sagebrush is it’s dullish green. The tumbleweed rolls silent and unseen. The coyot’ searches for his scraps. The desert fox takes his naps. The mountains lumber…

David Maxwell ran up the stairs of his apartment complex. He wasn’t very fond of elevators. Once, when he was six years old, he got stuck in an elevator for six hours with his father and a few other people until someone came and got all of them out. Ever since then, he didn’t do…

January 2019 I grew up among the rolling hills of Appalachia in South-Central Pennsylvania. As the son of a local city police officer and the grandson of generations of farmers, I wasn’t raised in a home with excess money or wealth. When things broke, we fixed them ourselves. From the age of 5, I became…