Did You Miss Me? I Sure Did.

My last post on HFOW was a year and a half ago. I don’t know about you, but I feel like some big shit went down between December of 2019 and July of 2021? Like maybe something fundamentally shifted worldwide for a whole year? I just can’t quite put my finger on it… If you […]

Head On Over to Entropy

Happy Publication Day! Please make your way over to Entropy to read my essay, “The Last Family Vacation.” Let me know what you think!

Oh Hey

It’s me. I know what you’re thinking. It’s been forever, Whitney. We’ve totally forgotten about you. And I get it. I’ve largely forgotten about the blog, too, but mostly because the cycle of grief and work and depression has really made doing something fun like this seem absolutely impossible. But guess what? I’m not too depressed […]

Resting in Pieces

Today is my sixth year anniversary with this blog. I’ve been writing here for longer than I have ever shared my heart with another person, though I could easily say I’ve been sharing my heart with the people who still read this. All six of you (seven, if you count my mom). When I started […]

Perspective

Missing out on the job I’ve wanted for five years knocked the air out of my lungs. The Big Breakup Heartbreak pushed me to the ground and rubbed my face in the dirt. It left me feeling disoriented and unsure of myself. The Little Breakup Heartbreak gouged open old wounds and left me scared of […]

Our Voices Matter

I stopped writing after the election. I didn’t write my morning pages. I only wrote poetry when I had to, which was once every other Friday for work. I didn’t touch my book. I couldn’t even look at my blog. I mean, no one else was looking at my blog, either, so I didn’t feel […]

You’re A Writer, Aren’t You?

I have tried to sit down to write this post like a zillion times and then my Anxiety Voice kicks in and gives me the sweats. Like this: Hey, Whitney. No one reads your blog anymore. Literally, no one. You’ve fallen from your position as a recommended humor writer and everyone thinks you suck because […]

National Blog Writing Month

This is like a month of panic attacks handed to me on a nice silver platter by an old white (and obviously) British butler whose name is Failure. (Imagine Michael Caine as Alfred perpetually disapproving of everything I do, and you’ll see what’s in my brain.) But, since I’ve had trouble with follow through lately, and […]

The Neverending Panic Attack Story

Things No One Tells Anxious People About Owning Their Own Home: Buying the home isn’t the expensive part. I mean, yes, it costs a lot of money and the down payment is scary and the mortgage is this looming paper mache monster (made out of bills, obvi) that looks like the sand dune at the […]

The Problem of Urgency: Stories from #AWP15, Part One

A week ago, I was on a panel at the AWP Conference. That panel was Why Did You Write That? The Problem of Urgency and I honestly think the Universe wanted to give me some good writing material to work with, as my whole goddamned weekend was a problem of urgency. Let’s get the easy stuff […]