A warm, smiling close-up portrait of the authors of The Dawnatella Edit, a man with glasses and a beard in a striped sweater and a woman in sunglasses and a yellow jacket, with blooming pink trees and buildings in the background.

It’s time to take time.

We’ve embarked on a period of adventure. 

It’s hard to say exactly when this adventure started. It could be when I retired from my job as a rhetoric and writing professor in May 2025. Maybe it was when James’s job as a software engineer ended in July 2025. 

I like to think that it started in August, when my scheduled sabbatical would have begun. That’s when we started getting rid of our stuff. That’s when we readied our van for its final cross-country road trip. 

I know that it didn’t end when we returned to the US in March 2026 after three months traveling around Spain.

This adventure is perhaps a little strange. Right now, everything is about the edit. 

I’m in a moment of constant revision. As a former writing professor, that means a lot to me. It’s not just polishing. It’s not just moving things around. It’s deliberately reviewing my life with an eye toward what comes next. That doesn’t mean a lack of spontaneity or an absence of fun. It just means choosing and not coasting.

Right now, I’m choosing a life that reconnects me with writing, with the red clay of the North Carolina Piedmont, and with family. I’m taking root in a Greensboro bungalow.

I’m so glad you’re here.

Check out how we’re doing it.

A close-up portrait of a man with glasses and a beard leaning against a barrister bookcase next to a jar of fresh flowers, holding a Greensboro Public Library DVD copy of the classic film noir Laura.
A top-down view of a black plastic seedling tray containing young moonflower and garden sage sprouts pushing through dark soil in a mulched Greensboro yard.
A top-down view of a cardboard box filled with vintage glass jars, including clear wire-bail mason jars with rusty metal clamps and several upright Ball canning jars with silver and gold lids, in a Greensboro, North Carolina home.