Highlights from 2024

Books, music, movies, personal moments

Well, it’s the last day of 2024. I thought I’d share some of my highlights from the year, both personally and the classic stuff (movies, music, reading, etc).

Things I Did For Myself

1. Published another collection of poems, The Tree Remains (yes you can go buy it). This one really meant a lot because the poems came from some dark but meaningful years of struggle. After twenty years of poetry writing I *feel* like I’m finally writing from somewhere true to my deepest self.

   

2. After several years of hemming and hawing I finally started going to spiritual direction and honestly it has been so tremendously life changing.

3. In August I decided to go back to grad school for an M.A. in Spirituality at Merrimack College and it’s been exactly the life project that I’ve been needing.

Life Events

1. I think the solar eclipse in April was the first time I knowingly as an adult viewed one. Incredible. *cue Interstellar soundtrack*

2. After living in New England for 41 years of life, I finally made it to the top of Mt. Washington this past summer when Jen and I were in North Conway for our 10th wedding anniversary:

Reading

1. Working through Joyce Rupp’s Open the Door and Dear Heart Come Home this year were really helpful in excavating my personal and spiritual life.

2. Other tremendous non-fiction book I read this year were The Understory by my friend

   Lore Wilbert
   , The Way Home by Ben Katt, A Sunlit Absence by Martin Laird, and A New Harmony by John Philip Newell

3. Apparently I enjoyed a lot of fictional duologies this year! N.K. Jemisin’s Great Cities duology, Rebecca Ross’ Elements of Cadence and Letters of Enchantment duologies, and The Devouring Gray duology by Christine Lynn Herman.

4. Other one-off fiction books I enjoyed this year: Winterwood by Shea Earnshaw, Where the Dark Stands Still by A.B. Poranek, I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger, and Fairy Tale by Stephen King

Viewing

1. My favorite TV: The Bear (so stressful but good), Abbot Elementary (heartwarming as always), The Acolyte (gone too soon), Mr. and Mrs. Smith (surprisingly good), The Chosen (good as always), Rings of Power (season 2 was amazing), English Teacher (hilarious)

2. My favorite films: Dune 2 (epic), Inside Out 2 (made me weep), Wicked (okay, but Ariana, seriously), A Complete Unknown (what can’t Timothee do?), Furiosa (that ending)

Listening

1. The albums I enjoyed listening to the most this year: Star Sign by Ryan Adams, What Could We Become? by United Pursuit, Deeper Well by Kacey Musgraves, Polaroid Lovers by Sarah Jarocz, Collapse List by Novo Amor, Proof of Life by Joy Oladokun, my own abridged playlist of Tortured Poets Department, Keep Me On Your Mind/See You Free by Bonny Light Horseman, Appaloosa Bones by Gregory Alan Isakov, and Moon Music by Coldplay

Writing

1. Here are some of my favorite essays/poems I wrote here on Substack this year:

• Let the Poets Prod You: On developing new spiritual metaphors

• Two Desert Messiahs and the Ring of Power: Dune, The Chosen, and Tolkien’s dark vision of corruption

• Why Men Need Poetry

• Taylor Swift the Romanticist

• The Emotional Healing of Inside Out 2

• With Light: Rings of Power teaches us to fight the darkness

• The Alpine Zone

• I Keep Spending Money on Perennials

• Become Ungovernable