Newfoundland is often called simply “the rock,” and though the metaphor is unintended, it’s a hard place, too. More than anything, things are changing. With all the wealth creation of the last decade, it’s easy to forget that many island communities didn’t get power lines until the ’60s. On the west coast, dog sleds were used into the ’70s as a primary mode of wintertime transportation. There’s a tangible sense of nostalgia for simpler times, never mind that they were lean times.

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“Clarence Riggs (“Clar” to his friends and “Sir” to me) has had a place up on the Terra Nova River since 1960. Born in Burin, Newfoundland, he moved to Glovertown, jtmarust north of Terra Nova National Park, some years before confederation, before there was a “national” anything in Newfoundland.

The original cabin, a field office bought from a completed government building project, burned down in the late 80s. The cabin we visited one grey Saturday in June was the new one. It’s just a kitchen, split bunk rooms and a porch with “Fish ’n’ Fur” written on a sign hung upside down. But you can tell that it has been home to weeks and weeks of good summer, year after year.

The walls are lined with plaques poking fun at fishermen—the kind they sell in rural gas stations. “Old fishermen never die,” said one, “they just can’t raise their fishing pole!” On another, with what looked very much like a sketch of the cabin: “There is no place anything like this place, anywhere near this place, so this must be the place.”

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My wife and I thank each other often. Thank you for doing the dishes, for going to the grocery store, for making tea. Thank you for the kisses, thanks for a nice weekend. I have never been as thankful, and I don’t really know why. Perhaps this will fade—we are, after all, not quite a year married. But it could also be that there’s something bigger at stake. I wonder if the near-constant thanks are way to keep the balance books close to zero—if we are always shoring up our thanks, always saying you’re welcome, then neither of us will ever end up with liabilities skewed way beyond our assets. We’ll be even, so we’ll be happy.

There are days when I’m not as grateful, or attentive, as I should be. Days when I sit at my computer for “just five more minutes” for more than an hour running. Days when I sit and work instead of getting up to say a real goodbye as she heads out to work. But luckily, our debt ceiling sits right around 16 hours. Which is to say: it’s hard to go to sleep without settling up accounts. I have yet to model the number of apologies that equal a thank you, but I’m sure it would be possible with the proper data.

So far, though, we’ve been good. Neither of us has gone into the red for more than a day or two, and, children of America, we both understand the value of good credit. I can pay back apologies over time, if it comes down to that. Emily knows I’m good for it. Just as long as these things don’t get out of hand.
Because the goal is still where it was before, balancing those books in the name of marital bliss. Never mind that it’s silly to thank your partner for kisses. It does the trick.

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The authors of Professor Mommy (Link) — one of which happens to be my own mother — needed a website to promote their new book. The wanted it to be simple, content focused, and to include conversation as a key aspect of communication.

This book is autobiography amended, expanded and explicated, replete with buckskin, bar fights and encounters with boat thieves. But Di Silvestro transforms the pulp of the classic Western adventure into a richly textured document that helps the reader understand the deep respect afforded to Roosevelt — evidenced by the fact that in the spring of ’85, when he disembarked from the train in Medora, N.D., still wearing his Eastern “city garb,” nobody shot the derby hat off his head.

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A simple WordPress design (Link) to house information and videos for a continuing project to create an oral folk epic in Newfoundland.

Designed without colors to avoid party connection, this was a site (Link) built to highlight growing inequality in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Produced for UPPERCASE to accompany a printed profile.

Now retired, Mr. Riggs was a school teacher for many years in communities all around Newfoundland and Labrador. He is still an active member of the Glovertown Lion’s den, and an active fisherman.

Invisible War is a book about the devastation caused by UN sanctions in Iraq, so the site (Link) had to reflect the tone. I designed it using a super simple WordPress theme, which centered on the content.

The author Bill Fitzhugh found himself in need of a new website, and I was happy to do the design and development (Link). Bill needed a website where he could share a lot of material but in a way that was easy to navigate. I built his website on WordPress, using custom post types for his books and XM Radio set lists.