Reaching a Milestone

Thank you for being one of 300 subscribers! Want to help me reach more?

“Our Reality Show” reached a milestone this week — 300 subscribers now receive this newsletter in their email or via the Substack app.

In the grand scheme of things, that may not seem like much. But in a world where anything and everything is competing for our squeezed attention spans, I greatly appreciate everyone who takes the time to open an email and see what I’m writing about these days. A diverse set of topics — education, family, memoir, music, parenting, performing arts, and photography — find their way into this space, and it’s nice to know I’m building a base that keeps coming back for more.

Do you have a favorite essay, or one in particular that stands out? Is there a topic you’d like for me to expand on or revisit? What can I do better/differently?

So far in 2023 more than 50 items have been posted to my Substack site. If would rather visit the website than read the emails, you’ll find that I’ve made the posts easy to find with various categories, a number of which have been added and expanded this year.

As longtime readers of my work know, “Our Reality Show” gets its name from a time when my wife and I were raising four kids — including twins now working as performers in New York — who at the time were in four schools in three states. I continue to write quite a bit about those times — plus the (often hard) lessons I’ve learned in my 58-plus years on the planet — in essays listed as “Parenting/Family” and “Stage Dad.”

Here are two examples you might have missed:

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Here’s a quick look at some of the new categories, along with a link to an essay you might have missed, that have been added this year.

• “Conversations”: A series of Q&As with musicians, authors, and people of interest. I’ve also revisited several interviews from my 40-years in journalism/communications, like this one with B.B. King from 1991.

Conversations: B.B. King

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• “In-Depth”: In these sections, I’ve gone deeply into two topics — Brown v. Board of Education and the school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas — that have played large roles in the education writing I’ve done over the years. These will continue to be expanded as developments warrant.

Conversations: Rachel Louise Martin

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• “The Music Diaries”: Occasional long-form essays focusing on a topic or artist(s) that have impacted me in some way. Many of these are also published in Americana Highways, where I contribute as a writer/photographer, or are expansions of show reviews that spark something I’d like to say. (Under the “Concerts” tab on my Substack website, you also can see reviews and small photo essays from shows I cover.)

Jason Isbell & The Last Waltz

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“Visual Stories”: A series of photos with a narrative explaining the purpose behind them.

The Photographer’s Chronicle

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Thank you again for supporting and taking the time to read my work. I hope you will share “Our Reality Show” with friends and family far and wide. If you’re a fellow Substack writer, please consider recommending it to your readers as well. Let’s continue to build this community together.