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I’m writing from a new marriage milestone.
Last week, my wife and I celebrated ten years together.
That’s right. One whole decade.
I know. I almost don’t believe it either. We got married in our early twenties, just one year after college, nine months after our first date. Both of our previous relationships had lasted longer than ours did before I got down on one knee at Fort Pickens Beach in Pensacola, Florida.
Later that night, we went to Flounders to celebrate. My soon-to-be wife got on stage with the band and flashed her new engagement ring. A van full of oil wrestlers bought us celebratory Jägerbombs.
I know I’m a novelist, but I’m not making this up.
In our first year of marriage, we bought a house, sold a house, bought another and moved two hours north from Arkadelphia to Clarksville, all so I could chase my dream of becoming a head high school football coach. Three years later, I’d given up coaching altogether and started trying to write books.
In case you haven’t figured it out yet, my wife is a saint.
She’s also a former record-setting pole vaulter, a pediatric nurse practioner, and the mother of our towheaded kids. Johnny Wink calls her “The Elfin Bruiser.”
To look at Mal, you’d probably understand the “Elfin” part. My wife could’ve been a Quendi extra in “Lord of the Rings.” To those of you who don’t know her, the “bruiser” bit might be confusing. To those of you who do, need I say more?
She’s the girl I always dreamed of, the one I pictured in my head as a boy. We went to the same high school, my mom was her kindergarten teacher, but it took me going all the way up to Sweden to realize she was the one I’d been waiting for.
I never would’ve found her without Facebook. Back during my international quarterbacking days, I had long hair down past my shoulders. I cut all that hair off the week before I came back from Sverige. I took a selfie and put it on Facebook. Mal “liked” it.
I immediately sent her a private message, inquiring about a date. Much to my surprise, she agreed (and has since told me she would’ve never done so if I’d still had my hair; little did she know I’d be bald and bearded ten years later).
Our first date came to pass at the local Ruby Tuesday, the only restaurant in Russellville with a liquor license at the time. There were more dates, a whole lot more, but our time was limited. I was set to play another football season overseas. This time in Cannes, France. The French Riviera!
I couldn’t wait.
But then, one night in a December gone past, after we’d been to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra with my parents and my dad asked, “I wonder if TSO has groupies?” and the Elfin Bruiser responded by saying, “Why? You wanna be one?” I realized I’d been waiting on the wrong thing.
Later that evening, in Mal’s apartment, I asked her to close her eyes. I told her I had a surprise. When she opened them again, I was standing in the middle of the room, empty handed.
She said, “What’s the surprise?”
“Me.”
As much as it saddened the “Iron Mask de Cannes” (that American football team in France), I never made it to the Riviera. I broke my contract, got the only job I was qualified for—coaching high school football—and the rest, as they say, is history.
Ten beautiful years I wouldn’t trade for anything.
Don't Know Tough
In Denton, Arkansas, the fate of the high school football team rests on the shoulders of Billy Lowe, a volatile but talented running back. Billy comes from an extremely troubled home: a trailer park where he is terrorized by his mother’s abusive boyfriend. Billy takes out his anger on the field, but when his savagery crosses a line, he faces suspension.
Without Billy Lowe, the Denton Pirates can kiss their playoff bid goodbye. But the head coach, Trent Powers, who just moved from California with his wife and two children for this job, has more than just his paycheck riding on Billy’s bad behavior. As a born-again Christian, Trent feels a divine calling to save Billy—save him from his circumstances, and save his soul.
Then Billy’s abuser is found murdered in the Lowe family trailer, and all evidence points toward Billy. Now nothing can stop an explosive chain of violence that could tear the whole town apart on the eve of the playoffs. |
Ozark Dogs
In this Southern thriller, two families grapple with the aftermath of a murder in their small Arkansas town.
After his son is convicted of capital murder, Vietnam War veteran Jeremiah Fitzjurls takes over the care of his granddaughter, Joanna, raising her with as much warmth as can be found in an Ozark junkyard outfitted to be an armory. He teaches her how to shoot and fight, but there is not enough training in the world to protect her when the dreaded Ledfords, notorious meth dealers and fanatical white supremacists, come to collect on Joanna as payment for a long-overdue blood debt.
Headed by rancorous patriarch Bunn and smooth-talking, erudite Evail, the Ledfords have never forgotten what the Fitzjurls family did to them, and they will not be satisfied until they have taken an eye for an eye. As they seek revenge, and as Jeremiah desperately searches for his granddaughter, their narratives collide in this immersive story about family and how far some will go to honor, defend—or in some cases, destroy it. |
| Previous columns: |
• An Invitation to the Party
• Writing from a Thunderstorm
• Writing from a Soundbooth
• Writing from “Jazz Beach"
• Writing from the Sabbath
• Writing from somewhere between Little Rock and Russellville
• Writing from my back deck
• Writing from the morning of my thirty-fifth year
• Writing on the day of the college football National Championship
• Writing from the space between breaths
• Writing from 2022
• Writing from the glow of a plastic Christmas tree
• Writing on a rollercoaster of triumph and disaster
• Writing from the drop-off line at my daughter’s elementary school |
• Writing with Thanksgiving on my mind
• Writing from the crowd before the start of a Shovels & Rope show
• Writing from the depths of a post-book-festival hangover
• Writing from the Ron Robinson Theatre
• Writing to you on Halloween Eve
• Writing from my bed on a Saturday morning
• Writing from my office with two darts clenched in my left hand
• Writing from the shade of my favorite tree
• Writing from my desk on a Tuesday morning
• Writing from a pirate ship
• Writing from the airport
• Writing from the hospital
• I'm writing from the water
• Writing from my wife's Honda Pilot
• Writing from my office |
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