One person.
Four rooms.
From Columbus, Ohio. One of six kids. Single dad to the most beautiful son on the plane[t]. The job description has been the same since day one: make beautiful things and help people. This page walks you through the four rooms where that happens.
It started on Xanga.
I was twelve years old the first time I published something on the internet, back when the internet was called Xanga. The habit never broke. Sixteen years of this site later, the count sits at 1,338 essays — fatherhood, faith, failure, and everything I figured out one essay too late.
Three of those essays grew up and became books: letters to a son who had not arrived yet, a family told in stories, and one I was scared to publish.
“If I had more time, I would have written less.”— from the desk
Make first. Explain later.
The hands have always needed something to do. Paintings, prints, one-off objects that escape the studio — and lately, art you can practice on: a line of yoga mats where every design begins as a full painting.
The gallery hangs the recent work in three rooms — ink, gold, and color. Some pieces are for sale. The dot turns red when one goes home with somebody.
Self-employed since nineteen.
Since 2008 I have worked on hundreds of strange, interesting, innovative ideas — everywhere from Silicon Valley to the asphalt on the street. My 20s were spent as a digital nomad, making my own work wherever I landed. Serial ADHD guides the ventures; curiosity pays the rent.
I once had the corporate job. The company went public on the NYSE; I had options at twenty-two dollars a share and cashed out before the bell. I watched them ring it from the outside — and had nightmares about it for two years. Then I went and built my own things instead. Best trade I ever made.
And then came Atlas.
I never expected to become a Dad. I spent a decade building independence — and then, two months, one week and three days before he arrived, I started writing him a letter every morning. Those letters became Dear Atlas, and the boy became the best thing in every room of this site.
He is the most beautiful son on the plane[t], my favorite critic, and the reason half of these essays exist. Single dad is the proudest line on the resume.
Latest field report: he high-fived Alice Cooper backstage — matching leather jackets, completely unfazed, like meeting rock royalty is just something we do now. Receipts below.
The creed, unedited.
Big fan of Jesus. Allergic to organized religion. Both things are true at once.
The world gets better when people treat others the way they want to be treated. That is the whole theology.
“He-haw” — if you insist on using them.
Make beautiful things and help people. Everything on this site is one of those two, or it does not ship.
Working on something interesting, want a piece off the wall, or just want to argue about any of the above?
aaron@tripleskinny.com