My story is run-of-the-mill.

I grew up in Florida. I went to community college to kill time, banking on the idea that some kind of divine intervention would steer me in the right direction. I took some film classes, met some friends, tried some new things. Past the time, working at a local movie theater. Thought maybe this was it. That sign I was looking for was staring me right in the face. Movies. Hollywood. And before I knew it, I had applied to an incredibly expensive film school—a decision I’m still paying off to this day.

That school taught me a lot of things. It gave me eternal friends and is where I first fell in love. Does it change the fact that I live in a country that largely hates students, saddling them with debt for the crime of learning? No, but it does mean that the exorbitant price of admission wasn’t completely in vain.

In 2016, I graduated from college. A year later, I packed up and moved to Los Angeles, where I spent the next five years doing all manner of things in the film industry—that’s code for mostly helping other people tell their own stories. Eventually, I moved back to Florida and found myself working at the same community college I had attended over a decade earlier.

Over the years, I agonized over my trajectory. I wanted something crisp that could tell people exactly who they were dealing with. I wanted a label. Something people understood. I quickly ruled out filmmaker. I tried it. I have a degree in it. But the industry just wasn’t for me. Production is brutal. Post-production can be mind numbing. Don’t get me wrong. Movies are incredible vehicles for storytelling, but the grunt work of getting the final project over the finish line is exhausting.

My interests were all over the place too, diverging in many and often opposite directions. I was always jealous of the people who knew exactly what they wanted to be from a young age, while I frenetically bounced from one thing to another, never quite settling. But after all that time spent circling the drain of different creative pursuits, as I type, I think writer fits. It’s broad yet specific. It covers one medium but can stretch into many others.

I also for a time considered storyteller, but that felt pompous—too grand, too self-important. Writer works.

What do I do?

I write.

What Am I Writing?

Well, I’m working on a book. The rough draft is almost done. More on that later.

I also want this space to be a place where I write about stories that interest me. One medium I’ve gravitated toward in recent years is tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs), particularly Dungeons & Dragons. I never thought I’d be the kind of person who watches weekly four-hour episodes of people playing D&D, yet here we are. There’s something about that format of storytelling that feels genuinely magical.

Video games have also been a lifelong storytelling love of mine. Some kids were raised by TV. I was raised on Diablo II and Starcraft, arguing with my brother as young kids about who’s turn it was to play on the lone computer.

And, of course, there’s politics.

I’ve always been fascinated by it, and it’s really just another form of storytelling at its core—one where the stakes are dangerously real. It’s frustrating, infuriating, and occasionally, darkly funny. But ignoring it isn’t an option.

So, if nothing else, I’ll be here talking about stories—in film, in games, in politics, and in whatever else catches my interest. Whether anyone listens? Well, that’s a story for another time.

Cheers,