About

Hello!

This site stems from an idea I had for a book many years ago: how not to be a jerk when your friends have kids. Most of my friends have kids, but I don’t. Some people (like me) flounder a bit in relating to our friends once they go through this life change.

Then I realized – there are so many ways we can all act like jerks. It might be unintentional. It might be sort of intentional. But those who are not ACTUALLY jerks are probably interested in not acting like one more often than not. So here – let me help you.

Ideally, we’d all be striving to be kind. Like,’ small woodland creatures help me dress in the morning’ levels of kind. But that can be really hard, and people are busy, and sometimes we encounter new experiences that we don’t know how to navigate. In those moment, we are just trying not to be a jerk.

Join me, won’t you?

Advice

Most of the posts on here are responses to questions I’ve received. I’m offering up advice to a specific question that I hope to make a bit more universal. I remove identifying material when I start working on a response, and encourage people I know to use a fake name to avoid me unintentionally bringing background knowledge or assumptions with me. Also, all questions are 100% real, in that they were submitted through the contact form by someone who isn’t me. I edit submissions for typos or grammatical errors, and for clarity.

Essays

This is where I can pick whatever topic I want and wax (or rant) poetic about a topic. Usually it’s a current event, but it might stem in some way from a question I receive. For example, someone wrote in asking the best way to end a friendship, which got me thinking – how do you know when to end a friendship? So I’m working on an essay about that now. These pieces may be a bit more hyperbolic and aggressive, so feel free to skip them if that isn’t your thing.

I mean, that goes for the whole site, right? Like, there’s an entire internet out there, so unless I’ve completely missed that an advice piece or essay is problematic about race / gender / class / culture / religion / sexuality / ability (in which case, let me know!), feel free to move on down the superhighway.

{That picture of me? That’s courtesy of Ashley Vos Photography. And that lovely logo design over there? That’s courtesy of Dalin Miya Calligraphy & Brush Lettering}