A Humble Return

A few months after the birth of my daughter in March 2016, I resigned my position teaching high school Latin, and a few months after that, my wife and I moved from my hometown of the Bronx, NY to her hometown of Owensboro, Kentucky. During the day she works and I care for our toddling bundle of joy and mind our home.

I certainly expected to take a hiatus from writing after those changes, though I did not intend it to be so long. I waited to return to the blog for intertwined reasons: the less I wrote, the weaker my powers of writing, and the weaker my powers, the longer the next essay would take. Absent the time to write, I fell silent.

My delay was also extended, unexpectedly for me, by my advances in reading Latin. So much has the language worked its way into my head that I have not yet assimilated it into my style, such as it is. I have grown, but require pruning.

On the flip-side of style, though, I have much to say, especially about my education as a husband and father. In particular I hope to live up to the name of this blog, which I stubbornly refuse to change although I am sure it is a source of confusion and keeps the blog in relative obscurity. Some plants, however, grow in the shade.

Oddly, I feel myself in a better position to live and reflect on a vita literati than I was eight years ago when Mr. Tyrell Northcutt invited me to this curious blogging project. Obligations have since taken him from the halls of this blog, and while he may return here at any moment, you may likewise seek him at the Philosophical Farmer.)

For my part, I intend to write often, but briefly. It will likely be the case that ideas spread unplanned over various and disparate reflections rather than in systematic articles.

I intend to make some use of Twitter, with, I hope, great restraint. The sight of many respectable people making fools of themselves has been a great caution to me and, frankly, I find the platform's arbitrary restrictions to be quite insulting. I would sooner bend my ideas to fit into hexameters than tweets.

Finally, if you are a long time reader, please accept my thanks and apologies. I hope that my future work here will redeem my absence and prove a small help or pleasure to you!