Hi. My name is Rich and I'm a tortured artist.

The Confession

Well, really, I'm more tortured, than artistic. And it may be argued that the artistic is more artifice than artful. But I try, nonetheless.

Folks who don't know me well (meaning just about everybody) don't realize I have this creative half that doesn't wield its powers in the company of friends and coworkers until long after we meet. In fact, not knowing myself as well as I ought, even I remained largely unaware of this need to create until the beast was unleashed during my final year of high school. My more "public" facing personna tends to be bookish, I suppose — and there's a good reason for that: I'm rarely without a book. Even in good company.

Not quite a misanthrope…

As long as I'm in the

Just before leaving Muskegon, Michigan, this Thanksgiving, AJ started asking us about Lake Michigan, and we realized we hadn’t taken him to see the lake for a couple years. He’s nearly five, now, so he has no memories of seeing it before. So, after driving around and trying a few frozen over access points—and one over-run by hunters—we took AJ to the pier/lighthouse where I proposed to Jennifer in 1997. There was a massive ice-shelf extending into the lake (beyond the lighthouse) when I proposed (I was literally standing on nothing but ice!), but it wasn’t that cold yet this weekend, so we thought it would be a great time to visit.

Boy, was it cold. Ice had already started forming on the lighthouse and the pier leading up to it. We couldn’t get any closer than what you see in this picture because the concrete was far too icy and