I promise your horizons expand. — Since I was 15 years old, I wanted to leave Lansdale, Pennsylvania, the working-class town that fate chose for me to born in. It took me over 25 years to leave for good. When I made that decision, the journey called life only got better. If you do the same…

Sometimes, you win when you lose. The ending of a year inspires me to think about new beginnings. Many times, it inspires me to purge: clothes, shoes, things I haven’t used in six months and won’t use in six years. The same goes for thought patterns and ideas that don’t…

Don’t complicate it. In 2015, I came to the realization that teaching no longer satisfied me. That wasn’t fair to me. It wasn’t fair to the students I taught. Before taking the plunge to walk away, I took a sabbatical researching Students with Interrupted Formal Education and wrote a scholarly…

The road went ever on and led me here. Considering the limited view I had of the South, it’s a wonder I moved to Georgia from Pennsylvania four years ago. Who could have guessed I would experience the most growth of my life in this place? As a visitor, I…

Something to consider in these difficult times. It’s hard to know what to say to people who think differently than you right now. Whether it’s politics, religion, or culture, when you don’t see eye-to-eye with people, it can create tense situations. …

Will it help them save the Senate? As the 45th president refuses to concede the election, we remain a divided nation. Donald Trump’s subsequent legal action didn’t surprise anyone. He made his attempts to steal the election and not accept any results that weren’t a win for him transparent. …

Especially when more is coming — 2020 relentlessly serves up cause for cynicism. Between a pandemic, political unrest, and division, unlike anything I’ve seen in my lifetime, I’m having more WTF moments than ever. Considering the fuel the coming election results will add to the societal wildfire, the chaos will likely peak. …

We didn’t learn anything new. After the presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, we all needed a shot of normalcy or just a shot. When the fiasco CNN’s Jake Tapper called a “hot mess inside a dumpster fire inside a train wreck” ended, we had no more clarity…

Your compassion, too. I have come to an uncomfortable truth that I avoided accepting before. White supremacy and racism are not a deal- breaker or even a concern for more Americans than I realized. 2016 During the 2016 election, when Donald Trump called Mexicans rapists, a colleague said to me, “Oh…