Life Aligned to Purpose

 

I recently took part in a workshop at work called “Life Aligned to Purpose.” It was one of those rare sessions that holds up a mirror…sometimes uncomfortably. It asked us to look honestly at who we are, what we carry, and what we’re called to offer the world. As part of the process, we had to write a personal purpose statement.

 

What came out of me was a truth shaped by every moment I’ve been told to shrink, to quiet down, to blend in, to make myself easier for the world to digest. Because society punishes difference, and works so hard to dull the light in anyone who dares to shine differently.

 

This purpose statement is the result of that workshop… but it’s also the result of a lifetime of being told I'm of lesser worth:

 

My purpose is to be of service — to offer hope, courage, and a reminder of worth in a world that works overtime to convince people they have none.

 

We live in a society that increasingly trying to bully us into submission; that rewards conformity and punishes authenticity. It tells people to quiet down, blend in, stay small, and never shine too brightly. It shames difference. It mocks tenderness. It treats uniqueness like a flaw instead of the miracle it is.

 

But from this moment forward, I refuse to let my light be dimmed. I refuse to shrink so others can stay comfortable. I refuse to participate in the lie that any human being is “too much,” “not enough,” or “unwelcome.”

 

My purpose is to live openly, honestly, and without fear — not for attention, but as an act of resistance in a world that benefits when we doubt ourselves. I want my life to be a reminder that we were never meant to fit into the narrow boxes society builds for us. We were not meant to fit in. We're meant to stand out. To shine. To take up space. To be fully, beautifully ourselves.

 

I want to spend my remaining days lifting people up, reminding them that they are loved, that their story matters, and that their presence is a gift. If my voice, my courage, or my authenticity helps even one person feel less alone, then I am living my purpose.

 

Because hope is contagious. Courage is contagious. And when one person refuses to dim their light, it gives others permission to let theirs burn brighter too.

 

So, in the immortal words of Shrek: Let your freak flag fly, people!!

Spring in the Pacific Northwest: A Season of Renewal

 

Spring in the Pacific Northwest has a way of sneaking up on you. One day the sky is gray and brooding, and the next it’s as if the whole region exhales—cedars brightening, rhododendrons bursting into color, and the air carrying that unmistakable scent of rain‑washed earth. This year, that sense of renewal feels especially personal.

After months of planning, dust, decisions, and more trips to the hardware store than I care to admit, my kitchen remodel is almost finally complete. There’s something deeply satisfying about watching a space come back to life—new cabinets, fresh light, a layout that finally makes sense. It feels like a metaphor for the season: clearing out what no longer works, making room for what’s next, and rediscovering joy in the everyday rituals of home.

This April, we celebrated our sweet Lucy turning fifteen. Fifteen. In dog years, that’s a lifetime of loyalty, naps in sunbeams, and quiet companionship. She’s in good health, still bright‑eyed, still wagging her tail with that gentle enthusiasm that only an old soul can muster. Watching her age with such grace has been a blessing—one more reminder to savor the small, sacred moments.

My husband and I have been spending a lot of time together lately as we continue renovating our mid‑century home. There’s something intimate about shared projects—choosing paint colors, sanding old wood, discovering the quirks of a house that has lived many lives before ours. It’s messy and beautiful and grounding. These projects have become a kind of spiritual practice: patience, teamwork, laughter, and the occasional “Why did we think this was a good idea?” whispered into the abyss.

This spring also marks my first season with my new church community in Montesano, WA. Joining a congregation is a bit like planting roots—you don’t always know how deep they’ll go or how quickly they’ll take hold. But this community has welcomed me with warmth and sincerity. I feel held, seen, and invited into something meaningful. Singing in their choir is a spiritual experience all its own.

Perhaps the most profound part of this season is my journey toward becoming a Certified Lay Minister in the United Methodist Church. It’s a path I’m walking with humility and hope. I feel a deep call to bring encouragement to those who feel overlooked or forgotten—to be a voice of compassion in places where people have learned to expect silence. Spring reminds me that new life can emerge in the most unexpected places, and I want to be part of that work.

So here I am, standing in the middle of a Pacific Northwest spring—kitchen nearly finished, dog joyfully aging, home mid‑renovation, heart rooted in a new church, and spirit leaning into a call that feels both tender and bold.

This season is teaching me that renewal isn’t always loud or dramatic. Sometimes it’s the quiet shift of light in a room you’ve just remodeled. Sometimes it’s the steady heartbeat of a dog who’s been by your side for fifteen years. Sometimes it’s the courage to say yes to a calling that’s been whispering to you for a long time.

Spring is here, and I’m grateful—for the growth, the grace, and the gentle reminder that life keeps unfolding in beautiful ways.

Remembering Kathleen — The Queen Who Helped Raise Me

 I’ve been thinking a lot about my friend Kathleen this month. Funny thing is, I can’t tell you the exact moment we met. You’d think I would remember, because Kathleen was not the kind of person you missed. She was large, loud, confident, and gloriously impossible to ignore — a drag queen who could command a room just by breathing in. But somehow, the moment itself is fuzzy. The friendship, though? Crystal clear.

I met her either through my friend Rodney — and trust me, there’s a whole other story coming about Rodney one day. Or it may have been through my friend Lee. But for now, this is about Kathleen… or, as she was born, Kenneth Wayne Pittman, March 16, 1957. To me, she was always Kathleen first.

Rodney and Kathleen - New Years' Eve 1987

We crossed paths sometime in 1983 or 1984, back when I was still playing keys for the Rex Nelon Singers. When she found out I played for the Nelons, she absolutely lost her mind. That queen loved gospel music with her whole heart, and she loved the Nelons even more. Suddenly, I wasn’t just some shy, scrawny evangelical boy trying to figure out who he was — I was a VIP in her world.

And somehow, in the middle of Atlanta nightlife, drag shows, and the chaos of our twenties, Kathleen and I became family. She became my drag mom — the one who painted my face, cinched me in, and sent me out into the world for Halloween 1986 looking like someone who had no business looking that good on their first try. We partied together, got way too drunk together, celebrated birthdays and holidays, and laughed until our ribs hurt.

My drag alter-ego, Christina Carlisle

She even met my mother in full drag, and my mom thought she was a woman. Kathleen dined out on that story for years.

But she wasn’t just fun. She was steady. She was protective. She was the kind of friend who showed up in the small ways that end up being the big ways. She cut my little brother Michael’s hair when he needed to look respectable for a part‑time job. She comforted me when I left the Nelons — a loss that gutted me more than I let on at the time. She held space for me when I didn’t know how to hold it for myself.

When I moved from Atlanta to Sacramento in 1988, we stayed in touch the way people did back then — a phone call once a year, maybe twice if we were lucky. I visited her in 1991, and that ended up being the last time I saw her in person. Life has a way of stretching the distance between people you love, even when the love stays put.

In 2010, I was planning a trip to Atlanta with my friend Anne‑Marie. I told everyone I was coming, and word made its way to Kathleen. We were so excited — after nearly twenty years, we were finally going to see each other again. I could already hear her voice in my head, loud and dramatic as ever, giving me grief for taking so long.

But on May 1st, 2010, Kathleen — now going by Kenny again, long retired from drag — was killed in an automobile accident near Centre, Alabama.

Just like that, she was gone.

But here’s the thing: she never stopped being Kathleen to me. Not once. Not for a second.

This month, she’s been on my mind more than usual. Maybe it’s the season I’m in. Maybe it’s the way grief circles back around, tapping you on the shoulder when you least expect it. Or maybe it’s because I’ve been thinking about the people who helped shape me — the ones who stood guard around my tender, terrified younger self.

Kathleen was one of the fiercest protectors I had when I was coming out — a scrawny, shy, naïve young evangelical gay boy who didn’t yet know how to stand up for himself. She stood up for me until I learned how to do it on my own.

I like to imagine her now, flying high with the angels, teaching them about hair and makeup, showing them how to contour for the heavenly spotlight. I hope she’s laughing that big, booming laugh of hers — the one that made you feel like everything was going to be okay.

I miss you, Kenneth Wayne Pittman.

I miss you, Kathleen.

Thank you for loving me into myself.

Happy 64th Birthday, Craig

 

I haven’t written much about my middle brother, Craig. Maybe because some stories take a lifetime to understand, and even longer to tell with any kind of tenderness. But today is his 64th birthday, and it feels right to honor the whole truth of who he is — who we were — and who we somehow still are to each other.

Craig was born on March 12, 1962, just fifteen months after me. We were so close in age we might as well have been Irish twins. I don’t remember a life before him. In those early years, he was simply Bubba — the name I called him until I was six. Then he became Brother for a while, until I finally graduated to calling him by his actual name around age eight. His full name is Dewey Craig Fisher, named after our paternal grandfather, Dewey Christmas Fisher, who really was born on Christmas Day in 1902. Our family never did anything halfway.

Some of my sweetest memories are of the two of us growing up in Weldon, North Carolina, in that tiny duplex that somehow held our whole world. We played together constantly. We had a photo album full of Christmas mornings — the two of us tearing into presents, laughing so hard the camera practically caught the sound. Those pictures still feel like little windows into a time when everything was simple and we were just two boys who adored each other.

But something shifted when we hit our teenage years. Suddenly we were oil and water. Craig had a temper that could fill a room and then blow it apart. We fought — loudly, often, and sometimes dangerously. Once, during one of those explosive arguments, he leveled a loaded shotgun at me. That moment is burned into my memory, not because I believed he would pull the trigger, but because it showed how far we had drifted from those laughing boys in the Christmas photos.

Craig got mixed up with the wrong people. Addiction took hold. He spent time in juvenile facilities, then adult ones. At 26, he had the first of his two children with an underage mother. He fought constantly — with others, with himself, with the world. He’s been beaten, stabbed, and wrecked more cars than a NASCAR driver on a bad day.

And then came 1998.

Craig murdered a man — struck him in the head with a hammer, stabbed him repeatedly, hid the body in the woods, and walked around for weeks as if nothing had happened. He was high on drugs. He was out of his mind. And yet the consequences were real, devastating, and irreversible. He was sentenced to life in prison. He’s lucky he didn’t get the death penalty, though if we’re being honest, that had more to do with him being a white man in the South than anything else.

He’s been incarcerated for 28 years now. Nearly half his life.

And here’s the complicated truth: I talk to him every week. I send him money for his trust fund. I haven’t seen him since our mother died in 2017, but our conversations have become a strange kind of lifeline — for him, and maybe for me too.

Prison has taken a toll. He’s had five or six heart attacks and a stroke. But it has also forced him into sobriety, into mental health care, into reflection. He is remorseful. He is clear‑headed. He is facing death with no real future ahead of him. And yet, in some ways, I feel like I have my brother back — the one from the Christmas photos, the one who laughed with me before the world got its claws in him.

I’m sharing all of this because families are complicated, and love is complicated, and sometimes the people we come from carry both light and shadow in equal measure. Craig has done terrible things. He has also suffered. He has also loved. And he is still my brother.

So today, on his 64th birthday, I want to say this plainly:

Happy birthday, Craig.
Even with everything — maybe because of everything — I’m still glad you’re my brother.