Crispy Doc

I took a walk this week – it was perfect California summer day of clear skies and sunshine illuminating the Pacific. It was made even better by the company of a tier one friend. The friend and I both have kids applying to college, and the process is a grind. Part of what we discussed was that in high school, …

Back in 2016, I fired my financial advisor and moved all of our assets to Vanguard. It took just shy of 2 years of intensive reading of books and blogs (and not a little bit of chutzpah) to toughen up and assume accountability for our retirement portfolio. 9 years later, we have reached a unique and exciting milestone in our …

I’m making myself an iced coffee on a lazy Thursday afternoon. I am off on a weekday, which feels luxurious. It’s not just having more time – I live like a baller. Let me explain the many ways, small and large, that my life feels abundant. I added some oat milk to my iced coffee just now. Oat milk is …

This morning brought a solid 2-3 foot swell to my local break, a sandy reef. I was out among a dozen surfers, the lone bodyboarder in the (just after) dawn patrol crowd. I should clarify a couple of points at the outset. First, I do not surf the chest-thumping, testosterone-heavy breaks that make the headlines for hooliganism and size. My …

I spent the holiday weekend visiting family, and a central part of the experience was spending time with my 4 month old nephew. To hold a newborn as a parent of adolescents is to open a firehose onto your limbic system. The memories can overwhelm and leave you in a state of emotional diarrhea. My first morning back, I woke …

I’ve always nursed a secret author crush on Jonathan Franzen. His tales of dysfunctional families, timely narratives dissecting interpersonal politics and his writing as a committed birder have endeared him to me over the years. After devouring his novel Crossroads, which mentions the area where I live, I sent him  an email via his publisher pointing out that a bird …

We’ve had a couple of major knucklehead moments among the men in our household this past week, and they are remarkable enough to be worth noting – we’ve earned the public shaming. The first belongs to my son. A month ago, his all frosh high school team overcame the odds to beat an all-star senior team in the school trivia …

A friend and I took a walk on a perfect spring afternoon, the first of the season where I wore shorts outside.  During the course of our conversation, my friend inquired about my definitions for what it means to be an introvert or an extrovert. My friend built his definition on whether being around large groups is experienced as depleting …

It’s now three and a half years since I left clinical medicine and leapt at the opportunity to put my population health hat on for an administrative position within the hospital system that I’d devoted my clinical career to. What does my life today look like? How have I navigated going from what was 6 shifts per month to a …

I am fortunate to count among my friends a few people outside of my cohort. One older friend is a physician colleague I’ve known, liked and trusted from my prior life in the ED. We grew closer as we worked together in administrative roles over the past several years. This friend has known financial success and now pals around with …