Fifteen Miles Out

Calvin (Dar) and The Coyote

Grief punches a hole in your heart so big,
there aren’t enough words in the world to fill it.

For me,
I tried to fill it with stories.
I wrote a book.
I gave him a cap and a wave and a quiet goodbye by the fire.
But grief…
grief doesn’t work like that.

When Mark and I drive by Calvin’s house,
I feel it coming,
that wave of anxious grief
that starts even before we see the house.
Not the garage.
Not the driveway.
It starts where the smoke used to rise,
from the fire that was always burning.
But there’s no smoke now.
No fire.
Just the memory of it.
And still, it hits the same.

Sometimes, fifteen miles out,
it starts in my chest.
I know Mark feels it too.
He can’t even say the words.
I just look at him,
and then we’re both crying.
Because you don’t need words
when you’re both carrying the same weight.

Some small part of me still whispers,
“We’ll just stop and see who’s there.”
But it’s never him.
And even though the stops have mostly stopped,
the memory of them lingers.
Because he was always there.
Waiting.
With a cold one,
a grumpy smile,
the kind that came with a furrowed brow and a twinkle in his eye,
and a story you’d already heard a hundred times
but never wanted to end.

Calvin meant a lot to a lot of people.
Many knew him longer, knew him deeper,
and still, the space he left behind
feels impossible to fill.

And no one feels that more than his wife.
Her grief is deeper than I can speak to,
an everyday ache that none of us can imagine.
What I feel is only a shadow of what she carries.

And then there are the fishing buddies,
the hunting crew,
the wonderfully wild misfits
who knew his laugh in the early hours,
and his stories long before I ever heard them.

There are his brothers,
his cousins,
his nieces and nephews,
a family who knew the inside jokes and the old stories
that only belong to people who go back.

They miss him too.
In their own ways.
We all do.

Because everyone has a Calvin, don’t they?
That person who made the world feel a little lighter,
a little louder,
a little more theirs.
And when that person is gone,
it leaves something that can’t be patched or filled.
Not really.

And everyone carries that grief in their own way.
Sometimes it’s loud, sometimes it’s quiet,
sometimes it hits fifteen miles out
with no warning at all.

That’s why I wrote this book.
Not just for Calvin,
but for anyone carrying a grief that doesn’t go quiet.
For the people still trying to find words
for someone who was never just one thing.
I hope it helps.
Even just a little.
I hope it feels like sitting by the fire with someone you miss,
and letting the stories carry what words can’t.

📖 Calvin and the Coyote is now available here: www.fireflyandfog.com

If this speaks to you, please feel free to share.
And if you’ve got a “Calvin” of your own,
I see you.

What If Everything Works Out?

Lately, every time doubt sneaks in, when I open the fridge and realize I forgot to eat again, or when I open the 48th browser tab and forget what I was even doing, I say it out loud:

“What if everything works out?”

I’ve been saying it in the shower, while clicking “save” for the eighth time, while trying to remember what I meant to Google before the cat walked across the keyboard. I say it when I get a weird comment or when something doesn't upload, or when I wake up in the middle of the night thinking, Why am I doing all of this?

But really…
What if, at the ripe old age of 51, everything actually does work out?
What if it’s been working out all along?

Not in some perfectly plotted, everything is easy kind of way, but in the mess, in the chaos, in the slow unfurling of all these quiet things I didn’t even know I was building. What if every heartbreak, every weird job, every dead-end moment and strange turn led me right here, to this glow?

Because here I am. Launching a website. Publishing children’s books. Telling stories that were tucked in my bones for decades. And people are actually reading them. Visiting the site. Leaving reviews. Showing up.

Maybe not in droves, maybe not in viral waves, but they’re coming, one firefly at a time.

And yes, it’s exhausting. I’ve lost 7 pounds this week because apparently anxiety burns calories, and also I forget to eat when I’m building empires. My desk is a sea of sticky notes and half-finished ideas. My brain is one long run-on sentence. But my heart? She’s still glowing.

What if this is the part where it all clicks? Not because I forced it, but because I finally stopped waiting for permission.

What if everything works out because I decided it would?

Even when my lifelong fear of jinxing it creeps in, even when I feel like just writing these thoughts down might unravel them, I still repeat it.
Naaahhhhhh... WHAT IF EVERYTHING WORKS OUT.

And maybe, just maybe, that's the kind of hope that keeps us going. Not all at once, but in tiny sparks. A good sentence. A kind comment. A moment that reminds you to keep showing up.

So if you're reading this, and you’re starting to second-guess your path, try whispering it, just once:
What if everything works out?

Say it again if you need to. And then go do the next right thing. One small, stubborn, beautiful step at a time.

I’d love to know what this stirred up in you… thoughts, memories, tears, a little hope? Leave a comment below. I read them all, even if I’m wearing fuzzy socks and crying into my matcha.