LIFE IN COMMUNITY

I love writing. I have ever since I could remember.

If there is a theme to all my work, it is seeking what is true, beautiful, and good. I’m drawn to what that means for our life in community.

In 2003 I founded Charlotte Viewpoint, a magazine about city life in the Charlotte region. I had moved to Charlotte in 1999 and had fallen in love with the city, believing then, as I do now, that Charlotte could lead the way as a great American place to live and work. Charlotte had the resources, dynamism, and ambition to matter, but had not quite determined what it wanted to matter about. I thought I could add to the public discourse with a magazine that advanced metropolitan ideas and art. I wanted to produce a magazine that elevated the expression of constructive ideas. In the first issue, I wrote “[w]e are an independent magazine that seeks to enter the debate of what is best for the city … Our aim is to celebrate the city, to encourage sustainable development, and to profile the citizens that are actively working to make it a better place.”

Charlotte Viewpoint published between 2003-2016. I served as editor for six years and as executive director of the non-profit that produced the magazine for nine years. Over its 13-year run, CV, as we came to call it, published essays, interviews, reviews, stories, poems, photographs, videos and works of art. In an article in Charlotte Viewpoint announcing that the magazine had been archived by the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Library for its historical significance, I wrote, “We sought to establish ourselves as an innovative voice and we did. We sought to publish smart and long-form discussion about art, culture and civic life and we did. We sought to create a platform and showcase imagery that was beautiful to view and we did. We sought to nurture new writers and artists and we did.”

In each issue of Charlotte Viewpoint in which I served as editor, I wrote a column about the city. I wrote 67 columns in total. I’m proud that my writing was only a small part of a much larger body of work produced by a great team of contributors.

Today, in one form or another, whether it is personal memoir or comment on the issues of the day, I’m interested in how we live into lives of meaning and possibility.

ARTICLES AND OP-EDS

• Some News & A Brief History of Charlotte Viewpoint, Charlotte Viewpoint, 4.02.19

• Charlotte Should Aim Higher Than Being a Livable City, Charlotte Observer, 3.29.18

• Mapping the Terrain, JWU Magazine, Fall 2016

• Dare to Know, nFocus magazine, 2.28.13

• Why I Live Uptown, Charlotte magazine, 01.15.10

• Why Our Cities Need the Arts, Charlotte Observer, 7.03.09

• Columns, Charlotte Viewpoint Archives, 2003 - 2009