Unedited

A Basecamp Dispatch taking stock before the new year

Welcome to Basecamp Dispatch — my weekly check-in from the woods, the homestead, or somewhere else with spotty cell service.

I’m leaving 2025 feeling deeply grateful.

Not in a forced, year-end recap kind of way. Not the kind of gratitude that shows up on a list or a social post. The quieter kind. The kind that settles in your chest when you finally stop moving long enough to take stock.

It was a full year in the field. I killed my first elk. I fell in love with Idaho, even while it was kicking my ass. It still feels like one of those rare, once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Only I’m counting the minutes until I get the chance to do it again.

My first Idaho sunrise. Can’t wait to see another one.

I killed a solid whitetail buck while hunting with my son. It was the kind of hunt that will stick with me in ways far more meaningful than the rack (which also wasn’t too shabby). That deer put a good bit of meat in the freezer. The hunt will be a good story for years.

In the final weeks of the year, I killed a black bear (full story coming soon). It carried more weight than I expected — meat, fat, fur, and something heavier, harder to name. Standing over it, I felt the whole season press down. Long hikes. Early mornings. Missed shots. Small victories. Things that leave you wide awake in the dark. None of it felt casual. None of it felt small.

Somewhere in between those moments, I learned something less comfortable. I have a habit of sanding down the sharp edges of my life so I fit better into polite society. It shows up in conversation, but it also shows up in my work when I’m writing for a paycheck. I know how to make things palatable. I know how to smooth the raw parts to make room for SEO, affiliate links, and keyword density. All the things that people controlling the purse strings care about.

I’ve started to notice when it’s coming. The moment a sentence gets trimmed or twisted because it’s too personal or has “too much voice.” (An editor once told me that. Which still blows my mind.) The moment when a harder truth gets swapped for something easier to digest.

I tend to make myself smaller in rooms that don’t know what to do with me. Sometimes those rooms are literal. Sometimes they’re editorial.

That tension finally caught up with me this year when I lost what I thought was my dream job.

In the moment, it cut like a razor and sent me into a spiral of self-doubt, real grief, and an endless loop of Fleetwood Mac at full volume. But once the cord was cut, I could see the difference between loving the idea of working for a major legacy publication and actually working there. What felt like a loss turned out to be a strange kind of gift. After I pulled myself off the floor and out of the fetal position, my professional life opened up in ways I couldn’t have predicted.

After that, I’m heading into the new year wanting to live authentically both on and off the page. To say what’s true, even when it makes the room uncomfortable or doesn’t hit all the SEO bullet points. To carry the raw moments in the field and the weight of everything I’m grateful for into 2026 without editing them for anyone else.

Here, on Take It Outside, I get to do what I love. Without corporate strings. No affiliate obligations. No SEO to shape the story. Just the messy, honest work of writing about the outdoors. And I get to share with people who value the same thing.

That’s the real gift I’m carrying forward into the new year.

Thanks for coming along for the ride.