A Solitary Cabin

The days have been mostly quiet. The worst of the heat is behind us, and I’m looking forward to fall. Friday brought my first pumpkin coffee of the season. Not the sugar-heavy PSL, but my own version: coffee with cream and a single shot of pumpkin flavor. Just enough to remind me of crisp mornings and leaves underfoot without the candy rush.

So what’s been happening? A handful of things, unfolding at their own pace.

I’ve joined the crew at Neon Dystopia for their L0Wl1f3 podcast. We’ve recorded a few episodes already, including one on Cypherpunks & Cybertribes that I’m especially proud of. It has been a good time with good folks, the kind of project that lingers in your head after the mic is off.

But the place where I spend the most time with people, week to week, is at the game table.

At Darkhold Games, our Cyberpunk Red campaign has been running for six months. We have a core group of four regulars and a rotating cast of three more who drop in when they can. We just wrapped our first job, which should sound small but feels monumental when you have been building a world together for half a year. The Interface system has been a challenge, as much for the way it is presented in the books as for the mechanics themselves. R. Talsorian’s worldbuilding is unmatched, but the indexing is an exercise in patience. Still, there is something satisfying about watching everyone wrestle with the rules and then burst out laughing when it all finally clicks. It feels like Night City should: messy, improvised, alive.

Our homebrew Dungeons & Dragons 5E campaign has grown into something stranger and more personal. We built the world together using the Ex Novo system, sketching cities, ruins, and rivers on a map that has since turned into a living document. From there, I have layered in a deep and ancient history, scattering pieces for the players to uncover. What we have ended up with feels like a medieval version of Kids on Bikes: a story about young people coming of age in a land just beginning to understand itself. The tone shifts between playful and mysterious. One session we are stumbling into absurd village politics, the next we are staring down remnants of forgotten gods. The joy is in watching the players connect dots I only half expected them to see, and then running with it.

With my friend Thomas, I have stepped into Ironsworn: Starforged, and it feels entirely different from the other tables. The early stages of play are about defining Truths, laying out the boundaries of the galaxy we will explore. It is collaborative worldbuilding disguised as discovery, a series of prompts that somehow feel more like uncovering old maps than inventing new ones. Our characters are still sketches, but already there is tension and possibility in the spaces between them. What I love is that Starforged gives structure to improvisation. You roll, you interpret, and suddenly you are staring at a sector of space you could not have dreamed up on your own. It is play, but it is also a kind of writing, with the added spark of surprise.

And then there is Curse of Strahd, which Mike has been running with patience and grim determination. Strahd is infamous among D&D players for its difficulty, and I can see why. The campaign is relentless, a gothic meat grinder where balance seems less important than atmosphere. Mike has the impossible task of keeping us alive and engaged without softening the edges too much. There are nights when I wonder why we keep at it, and then something small, a gesture, a strange clue, a shared laugh, reminds me. We are not just surviving the campaign, we are surviving it together. The road is bleak, but it is ours.

The newest addition has been Everyday Heroes, a modern spin on the D&D 5E system. Josh, running his first campaign, dropped us into a present-day supernatural setting. My character is some blend of Jack Burton and John Constantine, swagger and cynicism held together by duct tape. The game is still young, but it already has its own rhythm. Part action movie, part ghost story, part late-night improv comedy. Watching a first-time GM find their footing is its own joy, and Josh is already making it his own.

Outside the game table, physical therapy is going well. Most days I can walk without a cane, saving the walker for longer distances. At the end of the month, I will get a spinal injection to ease inflammation that has been pressing on nerves and tiring out my legs. Progress is slow, but it is progress I can feel.

Looking ahead, the Preble County Pork Festival is around the corner, bringing friends into town and plenty of smoked meat. The landlord is also taking down the 150-year-old tree in the backyard before it decides to fall on its own. Both events, in different ways, feel like markers of time, reminders that things shift and settle.

Life right now feels less about endings and beginnings, and more about deepening and unfolding. Long games with friends, conversations that wander, old traditions like pork festivals, new ones like recording podcasts. They are ways of staying cozy and connected as the season turns, reminders that discovery is not always about chasing the new. Sometimes it is about finding warmth in the familiar, and letting it grow.