A Kings

By a guy who has learned that in a Houston summer, the only sane response to the heat is to stop resisting and lie down in the shade like the grass does The afternoon comes down on Houston like a lid on a pot, and everything under it goes slow and soft and dreaming. The…

by a man who came from somewhere else, did it properly, and is furious watching the rules change for everyone behind him I was not born here. I want to say that first, plainly, because everything I’m about to say only means anything once you know it. I came to England as an immigrant, with…

By a guy who still remembers the sound of childhood On my father’s side of the family, my generation wasn’t very large, but I had cousins who were a constant part of my life. Or at least I did once. That particular branch of the family tree feels more like a memory now than a…

By a man who has been stabbed in the back so many times he’s considering a punch card system There is a peculiar kind of magic that happens between two people who genuinely like each other, and it has nothing to do with proximity, WiFi signal, or how recently you’ve spoken. You know the sort…

By a man who queued behind three Scotsmen at a Boston bar and watched them order the last of it. So. The World Cup. Held, for reasons that will be argued about by men in pubs for the next forty years, in the United States of America — a country that, until roughly six weeks…

By a guy who washed his car just in time for the rain to do it all over again. There are hot days, and then there are Richmond days in July, where stepping outside feels less like opening your front door and more like volunteering to be steamed like a dumpling. It’s absurd. Even Georgie…

By a guy who remembers when “out of office” actually meant you were out of the office There was a time—gather round, children—when work had the decency to end. Properly end. You’d arrive in the morning, do your job, perhaps argue mildly with a colleague about something trivial, drink tea that tasted faintly of cardboard,…

Reflections from a man who has never stopped believing in America. Two hundred and fifty years. By the standards of the great civilizations of history, America is still young. A nation measured not in millennia, but in centuries. Yet in those 250 years, it has accomplished something extraordinary. It has endured revolution, civil war, economic…

by a guy who came for the food and stayed because he couldn’t find the exit There are cities that ease you in gently. A polite handshake. A modest offering. Perhaps a sandwich and a quiet park bench. And then there is Houston, which does not shake your hand so much as grab you by…

By a man who would rather argue about woodland creatures than politics, but here we are. I must begin with a confession. I’m slightly hesitant to write this because these days Americans are about as calm and unified as a wasps’ nest someone has just attacked with a lawn mower. The country appears split into…

By a guy whose heart finally found its missing piece. Some songs are written in a studio. Others are written in the quiet moments between heartbreak and hope. This one is different. These are my words—the ones I carried through lonely nights, broken promises, and the long road of wondering if love would ever find…

By a guy who thought putting a few flowers in the ground would be cheaper than owning a race car There comes a point in every man’s life when he stands in his backyard, stares at a patch of dirt, and thinks, “You know what this needs? A little gardening.” This, of course, is the…

By a Guy Who Remembers When Winter Knew It Was Winter When I was a kid, the weather had the decency to follow some basic rules. Summer was hot. Winter was cold. Spring was wet. Autumn involved leaves falling off trees and your father announcing, for the sixteenth year in a row, that this would…

By Someone Who Probably Should’ve Been Supervised. Working for the railway in England has its perks. There’s the cardio—miles of it. The countryside views that look like a Windows screensaver. And, of course, the occasional flirtation with death that really spices up the midweek shift. Back in the spring of 2004, two buddies and I…

By a guy who now pulls a hamstring putting on socks There comes a point in life when you realize you are no longer a rugged adventurer. You are, instead, an aging household appliance with questionable wiring and a strange noise nobody can locate. For me, this realization arrived while getting out of bed. Not…