Essays

This land is your land, this land is my land From California to the New York island, From the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters;...

July 4th marked three years since I last wrote an essay for my website. In those three years, I watched our son JD grow, celebrated...

Some daddies can take better care of their babies than others because some daddies aren't poor and some are. I can tell already that...

Growing up, I lived in a whole lot of different houses, but I never really lived in a home. There was one place, however, that always...

"I believe those dogs belong at that trailer up Beck Branch. The one with the goat tied up out front and the Confederate flag in the...

Last week, on the second anniversary of my mother's death, I took some time to think about the special bond we shared. I have often said...

Drug addiction is an issue that continues to draw clear geographic, political, and class distinctions in the US. Since the opioid...

Jesus wouldn’t recognize the brand of fundamentalist Christianity being practiced today in a whole lot of Appalachian churches. Growing...

When I was a kid, I didn’t get Ticonderoga pencils very often. The reality is that my mom usually couldn’t afford Ticonderoga pencils....

Poor people are cash cows. It makes no sense, really. One would think that poor people, by virtue of being poor, would not be profitable...

My mother died the day she turned 55. This Sunday will be my first Mother's Day without her, but nearly a year after she died, I still...

In Appalachia, our biggest export is people. I have heard that all my life. I continue to hear it from small-town politicians concerned...

I grew up poor. Often, when one reads memoirs or oral histories from folks who grew up where I did -- that is, in Appalachia, or in the...

Appalachia is a place. It is defined on maps, even when competing mapmakers disagree about its boundaries. It is also a culture, even...