ALS (MND) is a terminal disease for which there are no effective treatments. Within a few years, it gradually suffocates and kills its victims, first fully paralyzing them while leaving all sensation and cognition untouched.

This illness stills my legs and quiets my hands, forcing me to write the words you read here using only my eyes. It places me like a stone in this lingering twilight between darkness and dawn. Yet, this rare and terrible gift has opened me to what many rush past unnoticed in their time. As my body fades, my vision has grown bright.

This journal is my message in a bottle to you from a strange shore that you must also someday cross.

Open it and remember death, yes. But in remembering death, remember life. Let mortality sharpen your senses, widen your mind, deepen your loves, kindle your wonder. For we all dance with death. Some just hear the music more clearly.

***Please note that you can now explore my little vally virtually  through the “The Valley”  page.***

*** CAN NOW BE LISTENED TO LIKE AN AUDIOBOOK BY PLAYING THIS YOUTUBE PLAYLIST (Click the following to open in a different tab.):  “What Remains is Radiant: A Journal from the Edge of Breath”  ***

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One year ago today, I began this journal. Today I finish, while I have the strength to do it well. The year’s circle is complete. My final reflection is about the freedom of release. About how letting go becomes the blessing. About how, in the unclenching, we discover what remains. And what remains is radiant.
Not quite snow. These early arrivals drift past my window like ash from a distant fire. They appear against dark trees, vanish against pale sky, disappear the moment they touch earth.
Most trees now stand bare. Autumn nears its final whisper. But one tree—an ancient Dawn Cypress—still holds its light. This reflection is about sunset falling west, sunrise catching in the east, and the strange truth revealed when the world seemed to fold itself. There are no beginnings. No endings. Only a circle—wide enough for everything.
Tonight brings the first hard frost. What cannot flee, fades. What cannot bloom, waits. What cannot stay, dies with a kind of grace only frost can teach: Beauty lives in letting go. What seems to die… only deepens.
Steam curls from my coffee. Sunlight threads through pine. Five hours lost since midsummer, and still—this light, this table, this breath. This reflection is about what remains. Not symbol. Not story. Just this moment, luminous and complete.
This was not a good year for acorns. No feast, no rustle of plenty beneath the oaks. Just empty branches and quiet ground. This reflection is about wild turkeys, acorns, and the deep wisdom of feast and famine, the rhythm of everything. Accept the feast. Accept the famine. Let go.