Between the Cracks

I used to build things. Not always the right things, and definitely not with a proper calendar, but I built.

In my twenties, I was empire-adjacent. LLCs. Degrees. Side hustles layered on side quests. A climb here, a map gig there. Sometimes the money stacked fast enough to convince myself I was close to stable. Close enough to call it a life.

Now? I’m not broke, I’m just stuck in the 10K hole. That tiny, stupid gap between what I bring in and what I need. It’s like trying to climb 7C with just a little less skin and just a little too much sun. You know you can do it, but every hold feels just out of sync with your brain’s timing.

And yeah, I’ve got skills. Degrees plural. A business that still limps along. People think I’m doing fine because my photos have palm trees or granite or whatever. But the Wi-Fi I posted it from probably cut out twice while I was uploading.

I’m in a cheap place on purpose. Rent is low, food’s affordable, I can work with patchy income and still breathe a little. But breathing and building aren’t the same.

It’s weird watching something you built stop working. Not fail. Not collapse. Just… stop responding to the things that used to spark it. Like the world shifted while you were off belaying.

And then there’s the family part. Parents who helped me with a mortgage when I couldn’t catch up fast enough. A mom who said yes but delivers guilt in interest payments. A dad who said no and silently blamed me for the argument that almost ended their marriage. I didn’t ask for all that, but I carry it anyway.

I don’t need millions. I just need a little runway. A month or two of clean air. An extra 10K. But it’s the hardest 10K I’ve ever tried to climb.

I don’t know what this blog is for. Maybe I’m just mapping my way out loud. Maybe someone else out there is sitting in a rented room with a broken fan and a full mind, wondering if they’re the only one too smart, too weird, too wired to make it make sense.

If that’s you…yeah, same…

I used to tell myself…no matter what happens, I’ll always know how to make money. Like, maybe I’d be broke. Maybe distracted. Maybe stuck in a foreign country with one bar of Wi-Fi and a fever. But not dumb. Never that.

I had systems. I had clients. I had six email accounts and the kind of momentum you can only build when you’re slightly delusional and chronically unmedicated. I wasn’t thriving, but I was clever.

Then I hit my 30s. And I woke up thin. Not stupid exactly. But… thinned out.

Like someone had quietly siphoned off all the easy wins, the cheap flips, the hustle-energy that got me through my 20s. And left just the shell. The form of someone who used to be sharp.

I used to run a mapping company. Remapping Services. Best client Vivint ever had. Then Covid happened and so did a full collapse of everything that felt like it might one day stabilize. ADHD went untreated. My skin broke out. My living situation devolved into a glorified garage with a broken 1983 Vanagon that I called my “project.” I was the project.

That’s around when my sister stopped speaking to me. Because my best friend…who lost his dad, then found my sister at the funeral…decided to take comfort in her married body. Now they have a kid. I never got the memo. He was my best friend. She was my sister. Now they’re a couple with a toddler, and I’m a guy in Thailand trying to decide if he should sell a yurt stake to fix a $4,000 hot tub to stay ranked on Airbnb.

The condo I bought for $79k with seller financing, back when I was still believing in passive income and magical spreadsheets, sold during Covid for $129k because of a $17k special assessment. It made $4,200 a month. They sell for $280k now. That one still stings.

I still have the triplex. And the illegal backyard yurt that wasn’t supposed to be real, but kind of is. I couldn’t afford to build the whole thing, so I gave my friend 25%. Then the hot tub died, so I gave him another 25% just so he’d buy a new one. Because if you don’t have a hot tub, you don’t show up in the Airbnb algorithm. And if you don’t show up, you don’t exist.

I made $37,000 this year. More than last year. Still didn’t help. The $3,800/month mortgage repayment plan just ended. I’m out of foreclosure. Technically.

But I still feel like I’m failing. Like a used-up business card.

Now I sit in a rented hotel-style room that kind of feels like mine, wondering what version of me still has earning power.

Do I:

• Use my Dive Master cert and guide tourists in a language I half-speak?
• Go back to school for a network analyst cert just to qualify for federal loans that keep me afloat while pretending it's for the education?
• Teach English online, pretending I’m doing it “for now”?
• Sell the only income-generating property I have just to breathe?
• Fix the Vanagon engine and rent it out like it's 2017 again?
• Push the GIS company one more time, this time with a virtual assistant and marketing budget I don’t have?
• Sell climbing guides?
• Go viral on Instagram?
• Run illegal retreats until the visa gods smite me?

Meanwhile my mom wants me to just “get a normal job.” My dad pretends to forget what I do entirely. And I pretend to be okay with both.

I don't know what I do. I only know I used to.

Some mornings I think I’m living twelve lives in one…and still somehow behind. Other mornings I just want to sleep through them all.

This year, the woman I made a daughter with emailed me. Said she wants our daughter to know me. But not call me father. Not until she gets her Norway passport. In two years.

I responded gently. Haven’t heard back.

I’ve only seen my daughter once. Sweden. Age 1. DNA test in-hand, waiting for results from Thailand. I flew in for 72 hours, maybe less. Now she’s almost 9. Her name’s Naya.

She was made on Koh Tao in January 2016. Born in Sweden. Lives in Norway. Has a mother from Spain and Colombia who climbs and dives and writes broken paragraphs in government forms that don’t translate grief very well. The system punished her for having a child with no Swedish father on record. Took her housing and aid away. Handed her a bill. Then did the same in Norway.

So now she waits…until a passport. Until the world decides I’m allowed to be someone. Until a stranger calls me dad.

I want to help. I want to send money. But the systems we’re trapped inside keep mutating faster than our intentions.

And it’s not just that. It’s the triplex I still own, technically. The one that’s worth $300k more than I owe. The one I nearly lost in foreclosure. The one I hold onto like it’s my last act of fatherhood, even though I’m barely allowed the title.

It hurts more to keep than to let go. But I don’t want to let go. It’s supposed to be hers. I don’t know her. But I think about her more than I say.

I wonder if she likes maps. Or water. Or waking up late. I wonder if she’d understand how someone like me loses everything twice and still builds new things in old dirt.

I don’t know how to climb out of all this. I made $37,000 last year. More than the year before. Still couldn’t beat the $3,800/month mortgage payment that almost broke me. Now the plan is over. The foreclosure is closed. But the weight didn’t lift.

And now it’s just me again, staring at options like:

• Sell the property I want to give my daughter to survive a future I haven’t earned.
• Use my Dive Master cert and become someone’s underwater tour guide.
• Get a federal student loan to fake stability through a Network Analyst certificate.
• Sell the Vanagon, or fix it and rent it out like I didn’t age ten years since that dream first started.
• Push my GIS company again, this time with help, this time for real.
• Write blog posts like this and hope someone Venmos me five bucks with a “same” in the note.

Start a climbing company in Thailand, or host illegal retreats with whispered disclaimers.

• Be the father no one officially calls a father.

I used to think I’d always be sharp. Like, no matter how broke, I’d never be dumb. But I don’t feel sharp anymore. I feel tired. Like maybe the version of me that could pull this off is somewhere underwater, asking me to come find him.

What do I do. What do I do. What do I do.

I’m not writing this for sympathy. Not to guilt anyone. Not to perform some curated hardship for strangers to clap at.

I’m writing this because it’s 1:42 a.m. And I’m not okay.

And even though I’ve survived harder moments, I don’t think I’ve ever felt this lost in my own story. Not because I don’t know who I am. But because I’ve become too many versions of myself too fast to hold on to any one of them.

I used to be the guy who could juggle six businesses and still make time to bolt a climbing route or cook a proper breakfast. Now I eat cold fruit from a hotel fridge and wonder how I became a ghost in my own life.

I used to write job titles in the signature line of my emails. Now I dodge those forms entirely. Because I don’t know what to put.

I’m not a victim. I still have choices. I still have assets, technically. I still have friends. Sort of. I still have teeth in my mouth and air in my lungs. But it’s not fine. It’s just not as catastrophic as it looks on paper. And that’s somehow worse.

My daughter’s out there somewhere, not calling me dad. I’ve got a house I can’t afford but can’t let go of. I’ve got a Vanagon with a dead engine and a hot tub that cost me a piece of my future. I’ve got a business that was once promising and now feels like a missed call I never returned. I’ve got friends I co-own things with but rarely see. I’ve got a mom who helped me, and now resents me for it. I’ve got a dad who avoids conflict so well, I might as well be a spreadsheet line he refuses to click. I’ve got a brain full of good ideas and no runway. I’ve got a body that’s tired in ways I don’t fully understand.

And I’m supposed to make a plan. Pick a path. Pitch a service. Sell a thing. Get a job. Apply to school. Post a reel. File a form. Move forward. Smile politely when asked, “So what do you do?”

But what if I don’t know what I do anymore? What if all I know is how it feels to wake up smart, and fall asleep wondering if I imagined it?

I know I’ll get through this. I always do. But right now I don’t want solutions. I just want to be seen, even if it’s through the screen of a blog no one reads. Even if it’s just me seeing me for once.

I’m not asking for help. I’m asking for space. To be this version of me…unimpressive, unsure, unsteady. And still worth something.

used to say “good enough” and mean it.

Like, I didn’t overthink the plan…I just moved. Did the thing. Built the system. Bolted the route. Took the client. Broke up with the girl. Took off in the van. I ran my life like a climbing topo. Sketchy in parts, but still got you to the anchor.

During Covid, I got it in my head I’d swap Subaru engines so I could finally fix my Vanagon. Because of course I did. Because I believed that if you just put in the time and turned the wrench, you’d get there. But by the end of it, I had to sell the Subaru just to make a mortgage payment. The van never ran. It still doesn’t.

I used to date a woman who broke me open. Not in the bad way. Not even in the romantic way. Just in that blunt force truth way that wakes something up.

After the breakup, I somehow learned emotional intelligence and network security in the same year. She had a stolen gun on her property. I got kicked out of her garage. She taught me more than she knows, probably. She’d probably hate that I wrote that.

Covid year, I drove the Vanagon from California to Key West on borrowed time and tools. Somewhere in Naples, I met my biological grandmother for the first time. She doesn’t talk to us anymore.

My mother broke up with her mother over email. Just like we’ve broken things, all of us, again and again, because we don’t know how to fight clean. My mom won’t talk to her. She helped raise me. Now she’s a ghost in a story none of us have the courage to rewrite.

And all of this…these women, these vehicles, these almost homes they swirl around a version of me that used to just say “good enough” and get back to building.

But now I don’t know what’s good enough anymore. Not in work. Not in love. Not in forgiveness. I’m not sure what counts as “done” or “worth it” or “fixed.”

The van isn’t fixed. The relationships aren’t fixed. The family tree is a shredded PDF. And my skills are half packed in a digital glovebox I can’t always access.

But I’m still here. In a body that remembers how to build, even when the brain forgets.

Good enough.

Maybe.

Perhaps…

I used to be ahead of the curve.

Not in a polished, LinkedIn approved kind of way. But in the scrappy, half wild kind of way that only kids who once sold weed out of dorm rooms understand.

I quit dealing and turned that same skillset into a real estate license. Same hustle. Same math. Cleaner margins. By my late 20s I was selling houses during the day, rock climbing after work, and finishing a master’s in GIS online because I believed in stacking skills, not hours.

I got fired a week before my 401k match would’ve hit. But I was told I didn’t have to repay my tuition, so I took it as a win. Laughed it off. Moved on.

Then I got hired again. Then fired again. A week before probation ended. My boss never said it out loud, but I knew she saw something in me she couldn’t control. The day before, I bought a new car. Because I’d totaled the old one driving to that same office. Timing, huh.

It was the same office that once gave me a $10 Starbucks gift card after I interned unpaid all semester. And somehow, I still came back. Still believed the ladder led somewhere.

That job gave me a lot, though. It gave me Todd Hammond. Best climber I’ve ever met. Most emotionally stable person I know. Guy who wears shoes until they fall off and never brags about a single one of his 8b+ ascents.

Anyway. That job didn’t last either. Neither did the startup after it. Seven months into Nearmap, they cut me loose. That’s when I left. Abroad. No more cubicles. No more performance reviews. No more pretending I wasn’t too much for the room.

So did I lose that go getter?

Yeah. I think I buried him somewhere in the wreckage of the second firing. Right around the time the second engine swap failed and I learned how easily an “almost” can cost you everything.

But something else got born too. Something slower. Less heroic. More honest.

I still don’t know what I do. But I know what I won’t do again. And maybe that’s enough for now.

I don’t always show up polished. I don’t always show up early. I don’t always show up paid.

But I still show up.

To the climbing trip I said yes to last year, even when I couldn’t afford the ticket until the week before. To the van rental in Australia I couldn’t cover the deposit for so I persuaded them to only charge me one day. To the ferry terminal I reached with just enough cash in my account that morning to buy a one way. To the hotel with no money for a prepayment…so I booked something else, or nothing at all, and figured it out when I got there.

That’s the part of me that still burns: Passion. And delusion. But mostly passion.

Climbing drags me toward the version of me that still believes in effort. The one that will hangdog, cramp, overgrip, and scream on the redpoint go. The one that maps a route not by the topo, but by the chaos it takes to get there.

I’m learning to embrace the chaos. To stop resisting it like it’s something shameful. To let it be my method.

Because this world? This system? It’s all apps we can’t delete layers of automated loops dressed up as logic. And most people treat them as truth.

But I see the flaws. The glitches. The loopholes. And I navigate them the only way I know how: charmingly, rawly, sometimes manically real.

I’m not trying to break the system. I’m just refusing to pretend it’s sacred.

Just like the rock that’s never supposed to break off but sometimes does. Or the stainless steel bolt that held longer than the fancy titanium glue in.

I trust what I test. Not what I’m told.

Climbing has taught me that. Living has tested it.

And I’ll keep showing up. Late. Broke. Scratched up. But present.

Because the passion? Still burns. Even in the dark. Even when the anchor’s rusted. Even when the topo lies.

My Sister He’s always doing too much. Says he cares, but then disappears. He’s reckless. Unreliable. He broke my toilet on purpose. I swear he did. He acts like nothing is his fault…but I’ve seen it. He makes messes and leaves. But then… he texts “hope you’re okay” like we’re still family. I don’t know what he wants.

Her Partner…the Plumber, the Father of Her Kid Guy’s got no idea what real work looks like. A house is held together by what you don’t see. And him? He’s duct tape. Not foundation.

My Ex Boss at the Government Job He was smart. Too smart. Didn’t respect the process. Kept skipping steps because he thought he knew better. Maybe he did. But people like that don’t last in government. They go rogue. They get fired.

My Startup Boss at Nearmap He was a risk. A passionate, chaotic wildcard. He lit up in meetings. Clients liked him. But we couldn’t pin him down. That energy? Doesn’t fit in a quarterly report.

Todd He’s complicated. But when he’s on, he’s on. Belays with heart. Tries hard. Doesn’t quit easy, even when he says he will. I don’t think he sees how much better he’d be with structure. But I get it. He’s built for open air, not cubicles.

My Mother He always had potential. But he wastes it. I gave him help…real help…and he made me feel like the enemy. I didn’t raise him to be this unstable. But he’s still my son. Even if I don’t always like the version he’s become. Even if I cry when he emails me instead of calling.

My Father He knows I’m proud of him, right? I just don’t say it much. We’re not the kind of family that talks about stuff. He’s always been intense. Always wanted more from the world than it was willing to give. Sometimes I wish he’d just… settle down. But he never really believed in settling.

My Daughter’s Mother He was magnetic. But not safe. I didn’t need him to be perfect…just present. And he wasn’t. I tried. Now I protect what matters most: our daughter. And I won’t let her call someone “dad” just because of biology. He can wait. Like I had to.

My Doctor He’s exhausted. But alert. The way he explains things…like he’s lived twelve lives and didn’t rest in any of them. Blood pressure’s fine, but something’s off. He doesn’t sleep right. Doesn’t eat like a person with roots. I asked if he wanted a referral. He said he didn’t have time. I believed him.

A Former Coworker He was always pacing. Always had a side hustle. Once he brought a climbing harness to the office and demoed it during lunch. People rolled their eyes. But he made you want to believe there was more to life than this place. He wasn’t built for cubicles. I hope he figured it out.

A Hostile Airbnb Guest The hot tub didn’t work. He responded too late. Place was weird. Energy was weird. But… he refunded me. Maybe he’s not a bad guy. Just a mess.

Someone I Ghosted He was always halfway here. Talked like a poet, vanished like a ghost. I never knew if he meant what he said. But it felt like he did. That’s what made it worse.

The Aussie in Krabi He’s a unit, man. Bit all over the place, but heart’s in the right spot. Turned up with no ferry ticket, no plan, still climbed hard. Never seen someone down so bad and still psyched to hangdog. Hope he figures it out, aye?

The Brit in Krabi Bit chaotic. But decent bloke. Talks fast. Thinks faster. Wakes up late but somehow gets to the crag. Bit exhausting to keep up with, to be honest. But he always makes you laugh halfway through a route. Could probably use a proper nap and a pension plan.

Rod We’ve been through it. Business. Friendship. Shared debt. Shared dreams. I know his heart. He’s got vision most people don’t. But sometimes he leaves fires half lit. I help where I can. We hold different pieces of the same mess…and that’s okay. I wouldn’t do this with anyone else.

My Daughter, Maybe One Day I don’t know him. But I know he writes. And climbs. And tries, even when he’s not sure how. I don’t know if I’ll ever call him dad. But I think he wanted to be one.

To My Sister You think I broke your toilet on purpose. I didn’t. But maybe I did break your image of me because I couldn’t pretend to be stable just to make you feel safe in your own story. You had a kid with my best friend after a funeral and never spoke to me again. You don’t have to forgive me. But you don’t get to rewrite who I was. I loved you. Still kind of do.

To Her Partner…the Plumber, the Father of Her Kid You build pipes underground. Respect. I build worlds with broken maps and held together dreams. I’m not duct tape. I’m the reason it held long enough to matter. Even if you never saw it.

To My Old Government Boss You wanted obedience. I gave you vision. That was my mistake. I interned for free and you gave me a Starbucks gift card. Then fired me the day before benefits. But sure tell yourself I was too much. At least I was something.

To My Nearmap Boss You said I didn’t fit your Q3. I get it. I don’t do quarters. I do epochs. I carry stories and solar flares and drive broken vans across continents for answers. You needed a row in a spreadsheet. I was a fault line. Still am.

To Todd You always saw me. Even when I spiraled. Even when I talked too much, climbed too little, trained like I believed I could still be great one day. You were steady. You never judged. You just climbed. Thank you.

To My Mother You helped me. And then you hurt me with the help. Every dollar came wrapped in guilt, like I should apologize for not being financially perfect by 28. I emailed you because I didn’t feel safe calling. You turned love into a transaction I couldn’t afford. And still some part of me just wants you to hold my face and say you’re proud.

To My Father I didn’t need your advice. I needed your honesty. Your quiet became absence. Your absence became resentment. Now we orbit each other like men who’ve both failed to speak and don’t know where to start. You taught me how to keep moving. But not how to stay.

To My Daughter’s Mother You were right to protect her. You were right to not trust me yet. But don’t mistake my distance for absence. It was shame. And fear. And a deep, feral love I had no blueprint for. I’m here. Even if I don’t have the paperwork to prove it.

To My Doctor You were the first person in months who listened without assuming I was exaggerating. You saw the exhaustion behind my eyes and didn’t offer a diagnosis, just space. Thank you. I didn’t have time for the referral. But I remember the kindness.

To That Former Coworker Yeah, I brought a harness to the office. I wanted to remind you there was air outside. That we weren’t born for cubicles and parking lots. I wanted to live more than I wanted to impress. Maybe that made me reckless. But I was never asleep.

To The Hostile Airbnb Guest You were probably right. Things were breaking. So was I. I refunded you because that’s all I could do. Sometimes that’s all any of us can do.

To The One I Ghosted I wanted to stay. I swear. But I didn’t know how to explain the version of me that shows up so bright, then fades. I wasn’t trying to disappear. I just ran out of signal. And maybe self worth.

To The Aussie in Krabi Thanks for not judging. Thanks for loaning me gear and letting me climb when I couldn’t even afford dinner the night before. You called me a unit. That carried me longer than you know.

To The Brit in Krabi You’re right. I’m a lot. But you laughed at my jokes and pulled me out of the fog more than once. You don’t know how much I needed your dry humor and raised eyebrow at the crag.

To Rod You’ve seen more of me than most. The mess. The madness. The money stress. And still you stayed. You gave when you didn’t have to. You said yes when most people would’ve cut and run. You are the reason the yurt exists. The reason I keep trying. I’d trust you with the last piece of my story.

To My Daughter, Naya I don’t know what you’ll call me. But I call you hope. I’ve held on to this property, this heart, this breath for you. Even when I didn’t think I’d make it. I’ll wait as long as it takes. Just promise me you’ll climb something wild one day and think of me.

Let’s get this part straight: I’m not dying. I’m just being honest. And sometimes honesty feels like holding your own obituary in advance to remind yourself that you’re still breathing despite the weight.

This isn’t a cry for help. It’s a confession. A catalog. A proof of persistence. A record of what it means to still show up even when nothing about the path makes sense anymore.

Because in case you missed it…

Yes: I’ve been fired. Not once. Not three times. But from every single job I’ve ever had, except the newspaper route I started at 13 and the ice cream shop I scooped cones at in high school.

Every other job? Gone. Sometimes days before benefits kicked in. Sometimes because I knew too much. Sometimes because I said too much. Sometimes because I couldn’t pretend to be less than I am.

Yes: I used to sell weed, then houses, then maps, then scraps of dreams stitched together with charisma and adrenaline. I turned side hustles into real businesses until they stopped being real and just became ways to not fall apart.

Yes: I’ve lived in a van that doesn’t run, a garage I didn’t own, and a triplex I can barely afford. I’ve co owned yurts with friends because that’s the only way I could finish what I started.

Yes: I have a daughter I’ve met once. A mom who helped and hurt. A dad who says little and feels less. A sister who thinks I broke her toilet and her trust. A best friend who became her baby’s father.

Yes: I made $37k last year and still couldn’t catch up. I missed ferries, dodged deposits, booked one ways out of thin air. I still show up to climbing trips with no plan except get there.

Yes: I am a mess. But I am also magic. And still moving.

This isn’t a suicide note. It’s a survival manual. Written backwards. Written raw. Written by someone who’s failed more times than he can count but hasn’t given up on the idea that there’s still something beautiful left to build.

I’m not dead. I’m just cracked open.

And if you’ve read this far, maybe you are too. Good. That’s where the light gets in.