What is On the Fly?

People often ask me, “So . . . what is On the Fly really about?”

At its heart, On the Fly is about noticing—the small, easily missed moments that quietly shape our lives.

Mission Statement:
On the Fly is dedicated to the art of seeing. Through personal stories, family heritage, travel, music, and creativity, we explore the extraordinary beauty hidden in ordinary days. It’s a reminder that the most meaningful moments in life are rarely planned—they’re discovered on the fly.

Rather than fitting neatly into a single category, this blog lives at the intersections of a few enduring themes:

Mindfulness & The Pause
Many posts—like the Friday Morning Pause or reflections on the Aversion Trap—invite readers to slow down, step away from digital noise, and rediscover silence, wonder, or awe.
Storytelling & Heritage
This blog often returns to family stories and personal history, exploring how memory, place, and the people who came before us shape our sense of home.
Creativity & Music
From the magic of a guitar shop to the discipline of great musicians, On the Fly celebrates the creative process and the quiet joy of making something meaningful.
Travel & Observation
Whether walking the streets of Paris or drifting along the rivers of France, travel becomes a lens for observing patience, connection, and the ways technology both connects—and complicates—human experience.

In short, On the Fly is for the curious and the reflective—for readers who want to look up from their screens, slow down, and rediscover the extraordinary hiding in ordinary moments.

Join me–explore the search feature and discover over 480+ previous episodes.

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Boy on a Beam

In this special bonus episode, Boy on a Beam. In a world long ago, when the days moved quite slow, Before buzzes and beeps and the fast things we know, A boy sat quite still on a very fine day, Just staring at nothing . . . and thinking away. No tablets! No gadgets! No screens shining bright! No earbuds stuck in from morning till night. No lists, no charts, and no chores to be done. He just sat there thinking—that's quiet-time fun! His name was Young Albert. He sat in his chair, Thinking of things that weren’t really there. “Suppose,” said Young Albert, with eyes open wide, “I ran super fast with my arms by my side! Suppose I ran faster than anyone knew, And caught up to sunshine that zoomed past me—too! If I hopped on its back for a light-speedy ride, What secrets would I find tucked away deep inside?” “Would stars look like sprinkles, all shiny and small? Would UP feel like sideways? Would BIG feel like Tall?” He giggled and wondered and thought, and he dreamed, Till his head fel...

When Fear Becomes the Default

In this special episode, When Fear Becomes the Default. Early Sunday morning, I was cycling past a small veterans’ pocket park in San Marcos. The air was still, the streets nearly empty. On one corner stood a young woman, alone, holding a hand-painted sign that read: “Be ANGRY. ICE agents are murdering people.” I pedaled past, but the words stayed with me. I knew the context—the footage and headlines from Minneapolis the day before, already ricocheting through the country and hardening opinions. Even in the quiet of the ride, the noise followed. Two miles later, I stopped at a red light. A black car with dark windows pulled up inches from my bike. My heart jumped. My first instinct wasn’t neighbor —it was threat . I found myself bracing, scanning, and wondering if the person inside was angry, armed, or looking for trouble. Then the door opened. A well-dressed young woman stepped out, walked to the trunk, and pulled out a sign that read “Open House.” She turned, smiled brightly, and sa...

The Thought Experiment–Revisited

In this episode. The Thought Experiment–Revisited The Boy on a Light Beam In 1895, a sixteen-year-old boy did something we rarely allow ourselves to do anymore. He stared into space and let his mind wander. No phone. No notes. No “Optimization Hacks” for his morning routine. Just a question: What would happen if I chased a beam of light—and actually caught it? That boy was Albert Einstein . And that single act of curiosity—a Gedankenexperiment , a thought experiment—eventually cracked open Newton’s tidy universe and rearranged our understanding of time itself. Not bad for an afternoon of daydreaming. Imagine if Einstein had been “productive” instead. He would have logged the light-beam idea into a Notion database, tagged it #CareerGrowth, and then promptly ignored it to attend a forty-five-minute “Sync” about the color of the departmental logo. He’d have a high Efficiency Score—and we’d still be stuck in a Newtonian universe , wondering why the Wi-Fi is slow. In a post I wrote back in...

Sweden Called . . . They Said No.

Have you ever wondered about the Nobel Prize? Let's look at Where Genius Meets “Wait—Where’s My Medal?” Every October, the Nobel Prizes are announced, and humanity pauses to celebrate the "greatest benefit to mankind." And every year, like clockwork, a specific type of person appears online to complain—at length—that they were robbed. (Well, maybe this year more than most.) The Origin: A Legacy of Guilt The prize exists because Alfred Nobel, a Swedish inventor, had a crisis of conscience. Nobel held 355 patents, but he was most famous for inventing dynamite. When a French newspaper mistakenly published his obituary, calling him the " Merchant of Death, " he decided to buy a better legacy. In his 1895 will, he left the bulk of his massive fortune to establish five prizes (Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, and Peace). Because he was Swedish, he entrusted the selection to Swedish institutions, such as the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. The only outlier...

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