Hi y’all,

Thanks for stopping by. I love writing stories. I created this website to share them with you and pass along some of creative insights I’ve gleaned along the way.

I also doodle. So you’ll find both here. Ideas and illustrations, inspired by what I’m creating, what I’m thinking about, and what I’m learning.

Whether you’re a fellow writer, a baker, a candlestick maker, the refrain throughout these pages is simple: let’s make good stuff, people.

That’s my what.

I’ll tell you my why in a story…

The Sandbox

A few years ago I parked next to an elementary school right as the kids were letting out for recess. The doors flung open and a throng of happy little people burst out, hootin’ and scootin’.

Out of the big crowd a smaller troupe emerged. They had the wind at their backs and grins from ear to ear. They stormed the sandbox and started digging.

For a few marvelous minutes I watched in awe as these friends raised and tackled sandcastles, cartwheeled over buckets, dug holes to nowhere and sang from the top of their mounds.

Part pirates, part leprechauns, part honey bees – they were loud, boisterous, free. They worked with one another, and for one another. Above all they seemed to work in a spirit of inexhaustible joy.

I was seized by their sandbox spirit. Long afterwards I told myself I want to write like that, tell stories like that. For me writing has never been about being a genius, or saying profound things. It’s about people. What makes them move. What turns them to stone. The outrageous things that happen in the course of a life. Their virtues and vices, their wisdom and folly – the paths they choose and the paths that choose them.

Words are my shovel for laying bare the beauty and hurt of life. Stories are my sandbox – the place where I strive to sing the unsung, and dig deep enough to strike some bedrock wonder.

In sum, the sandbox kids taught me something. If I could hammer it into a mantra, it’d go something like this:

Work in joy. In a big-hearted way. For others.

FAQ

What else? Here’s a little bit more about me.

Where are you from?

I was born in Jerusalem, grew up in Maryland, then lived in D.C., Charlottesville, and Boston after college. Now I live in Nashville, TN.

How would you describe yourself in a few words?

An optimist, a romantic, a glass half full family man. I have a wonderful wife and two loud, lovely little girls. When I’m not driving a pen down the page I’m probably driving a stroller down the sidewalk. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

My go-to dad line is: “I’m just a thorn among roses.”

How would your friends describe you?

Years ago I was on a retreat with my friends. At the end of the retreat we wrote epitaphs for one another – short words or phrases that captured the essence of that person – wrote them on tiny stones and handed them out to one another. Here’s what people wrote on mine:

heart fire / matt the muse / wagging dog / passionate positive pusher / harbor

I still have the rocks. Sometimes when I’m in a funk I pull them out and think, Oh yeah, that’s me. Be more like that.

Where did you go to college?

University of Maryland. Go Terps!

What did you study and what about work?

I studied International Business in undergrad. Later on I got an MBA. After college I worked in finance, marketing and higher education. I’ve enjoyed pursuing business alongside writing.

You often think of business as practical, efficient, feet on the ground stuff. And you often think of writing as dreamy, musing, head in the clouds. But you need both. The disciplines interweave. Business has taught me to be a better writer and vice versa.

My secret formula has been to be a writer with his feet on the ground and a businessman with his head in the clouds.

When did you start writing stories?

I started writing stories when I graduated from college. My first job was in finance. Before going into the office each morning I would walk to McDonalds, buy a hash brown and coffee and sit down and try my hand at writing — I didn’t exactly know what to write so I began by writing poems; ooey-gooey unrequited love poems. I thought they were pretty good at the time. They weren’t.

Gradually those poems grew and became basically glorified descriptions of stuff and people and the smell of rain and whatever else I became curious about. Were they any good? I doubt it. But there I was, a happy fool with a hash brown and a headful of ideas. Deep down a bell chimed every time I put a pen to the page.

Eventually those descriptions spun into scenes and those scenes into stories. It wasn’t magic by any means. I just kept doing it. And the more I’ve done it, the more I’ve enjoyed it and felt a responsibility to do it well.

And all thanks to hash browns and coffee.

What is your ethnicity?

I’m half filipino, half caucasian.

Favorite stories?

When I was a kid, Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry was the book that baptized my imagination. It waved a spell over me that hasn’t lifted since.

Later on, John Cheever’s short story, Goodbye My Brother, was like a bowl of literary Wheeties. It was the story that made me want to try my hand at storytelling.