Speech – On Writing at 80
On Writing at 80 Given on 6/3/26 I want to start by reading a story. It’s the scene that started all of this — the first thing I wrote that made me think: maybe there’s a book here. These stories trace back to Speedway, Indiana, in 1960. Over the next thirty years, they came little […]
Cowboy Poets
A Saturday in Bastrop – Cowboy Poetry There aren’t many events left where the main attractions are folding chairs, acoustic guitars, and people who know how to coil a rope properly. So naturally, I drove to Bastrop. It was the first year of the Lone Star Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Bastrop, scheduled back-to-back with a […]
No, The Horse. A Short Story
In November 2025, before either novel was fully underway, I wrote this scene based on a story told to me years earlier. The names Mary Ellen and Chester (Chet) Rawlins were already forming, though I did not yet understand how large their lives on the page would become. This short piece became the foundation for […]