Blog
 
Where language meets real life

A blog is an open door into someone’s world. Welcome to mine—unapologetic, curious, and sometimes messy—as I find my way as a teacher, a language learner, and a human with more questions than answers.

photo by Beth Van Oss - Lake Michigan The blessed rain came down last night and woke me out of a deep sleep and this morning, I saw a Greater Roadrunner out my door here in northern Arizona. I love their sound, and watching them move through the landscape as they stalk for bugs and lizards always hopeful for a snake, I’m sure. Their long legs move quickly and deliberately like a Heron, and when something catches their attention, the feathers on top of their heads suddenly rou

image by: https://unsplash.com/@skv_creates?utm_source=wix-media-manager&utm_medium=referral I have always believed that one of the best ways to understand a place is through the food people eat there. Not simply by finding the “best restaurant” or checking another experience off a travel list, but by sitting down, paying attention, and becoming curious enough to ask a few questions. What grows here, and perhaps more importantly, what does not? What did people eat before high

Update from the life of an entrepreneur… This week looked less like glossy planning and more like walking… through town, through ideas, through the slow build of something new. I spent the day moving between Spanish lessons, notes, and conversations with strangers - the kind that only happen in small towns when you’re willing to say hello first. It’s how you know a business is still in its earliest, most hopeful phase: you are visible, a little exposed, and deeply optimistic.

I had a conversation about how Google AI learns and later watched a fascinating video on it that really stuck with me. AI systems don’t just learn from experts... they learn from us, from millions of tiny interactions every day. When we identify traffic lights in a CAPTCHA, click on a photo, or answer a quick prompt, we’re quietly training the machine. We don’t even realize we’re helping it learn. And that’s the strange part: it’s passive learning. The AI gathers constant inp

I didn’t just wake up one day speaking Spanish. Not even close. I trained for it the way an athlete trains for game day -well, more like an amateur athlete. Because here’s the truth: it’s not about being “talented” or finding a magic trick. It’s about showing up, every single day. Even when nobody’s watching. Even when the results don’t come right away. Even when I didn’t “feel the vibe” to study. Think about an athlete. They don’t wait to feel motivated before practice. They

Writing is like that for me.. it comes, it goes. It’s inconsistent. My journal is the same. – Trouble? I write a lot. Not so much? Then it’s a blank page. And I start a lot of writing but don’t always have a conclusion or get further. However, that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t write more. I was an Outward Bound instructor for a decade and it was a foundational building block of my instructorship – and truth be told – studentship. Outward Bound’s motto is to serve, to stri