"After" the Blog: Highlights & Schedule!

Today marks ten years to the day since this blog first began.

As you might recall, I decided to "retire" this blog in early 2020, for reasons explained here. For eight years I posted a new story about once every three days, and to give the blog an appropriate climax I shared a walloping 55 stories all at once to celebrate the blog's "end," and give readers something to chew on for a while. In case you missed it, here's a video of yours truly telling the blog's "final" story, in video form:

The problem is, though, that artists never retire. How could you ever stop having things to say, ideas to express? Life is too interesting. What I suspect in the above video has turned out to be true: the blog has continued alongside my other endeavors, as there are simply too many good stories happening out there, and I just can't resist sharing them with you. I've settled into a pattern of posting new content here at the start of every month– check back in, and tell a friend! (You can also use the "Subscribe" button on the upper right of this page (desktop format; scroll down if on a phone) for automatic updates!)

For myself, I've been hard at work on a second book, promoting the first one (including two wonderful talks for the folks in Carnation and Northgate, plus a great show at the Wing Luke), and working on a new film project. I'll have some cinema-related material for you soon.

Although I don't post stories as often now, the ones I do post come not from obligation but from a deep, compelled desire to do share. They're often longer and more substantive. Here are a few highlights from the blog's "post-retirement" phase:

Bus Stories:

• It's About Who's Around: This is the story that got me to break the retirement. I couldn't not write it. It was too meaningful to me.

A few reflections on how our current hard times shape how we see others, and what we can keep in mind on that score:

• State of the (Seattle) Union
  
• Do Not Hide From This Awful Sensation
  
• Not Because it is Easy
• Better to Suffer Injustice Than to Do It
• The Antidote

More generally–

• Release: Some thoughts on embarrassment, shame, and growing up.
• Raskolnikov in a Beanie: two passengers argue over mask-wearing and reveal much on race.
• Something Early: An E Line story both hard-edged and soft.

...and three deep dives:

1. Cigarettes and Fentanyl: All Aboard: You've been wondering about all the drugs on buses now. Here's the skinny.
2. It's Complicated: Why Rainier RapidRide seems like a good idea, but isn't.
3. The Gift & the Question: A piece on returning to the 7 (again) and how good it feels to be among people who still talk to each other.

On Films by Others:

• Trois Objects 1: on Michael Mann's Heat: An essay on the afternoon that got me into films.
• Stillwater: I do not require my friends to think like me. I share common ground with this film's protagonist as much as anyone else.
• Neither Here Nor There: My take on the Slap. Yes, that slap. Or more accurately, the more interesting fact that Chris Rock did not strike back.

On My Film:

• Grateful: A piece on my film's journey through the festival circuit;
• Reviews: Three reviews for my film, Men I Trust, by UK Film Review, Film Threat and more;
• Anya Patel interviews me at London's Dreamers of Dreams festival (video).

Press:

• Why I Wrote the Book (video, 6 mins): For Redmond Library's Summer Reading Program: a video intro on why the book exists:

• A favorite of the interviews I've given, an in-depth piece for PLU's student journal Saxifrage;
  
• A largely non-political essay I wrote for Democratic Socialist's of America's newspaper, Democratic Left.
• Seattle Met selects me as one of their 100 Power Players for 2021;
• International Examiner interview, plus a rare essay on race and being Asian-American;
• Two more pieces in Seattle Met: on driving during the pandemic, and a panel discussion transcript about fare enforcement.

Photography
New work and accompanying essays on place and feeling within the following cities:

• Shenzhen
• Taipei
• Milan

On Art

• On Seattle's Waterfront: Before and After: two favorite essays of mine, the first of which appears in local treasure Laura Hamje's book Concrete Ghosts, discussed by me here. There was a Seattle before the Seattle we see today.
• Reflections from Workin' On It: Another essay diptych, for Hart Boyd's zine, this one about artmaking in childhood vs. adulthood.
• Trois Objets 2: Antonello da Messina: I keep coming back to this painting, and not just because it's finally getting its due for containing "the greatest hand in the Italian Renaissance!" Everything I love about it and why.

This list is incomplete. If you're on a desktop, check out the selections and archives on the right; if you're on a smartphone, scroll down for the same. Enjoy the links above, explore more, and don't forget to check in around the 1st of every month for new material!