Hello My Name Is ＿＿＿＿＿
A reintroduction of sorts
In Miscellanea today:
A long-form re-introduction to myself and (mainly) this newsletter
Setting expectations for future issues and their contents
Everything I’ve read in 2025
Opportunities to financially support this thing
I think it may be time for a brief reintroduction around these parts, as Miscellanea has seen some modest growth since I last spoke with y’all directly. Substack, too, has grown quite a bit.
My name is Michael. I’m a photographer newly embedded in parenthood with my wife — our daughter’s name is Hallie. We’re from Louisiana and we live in New Orleans, a place as special as it is dysfunctional.
I started writing Miscellanea in 2017 as a way to share what was on my mind and other things I was enjoying. It has evolved over the years; it has always been a bit erratic in its delivery.
I write mainly about the mood of Care, what it means to ask questions and live earnestly, which means I comment upon fairly normal and ubiquitous things, like social media and phone addiction or family and friends.
But as a photographer who likes to write, I also muse on the practice of art, which feels to me a blatantly spiritual path. Naturally, photo essays make their way into the mix.
In the words of Montaigne, “Bees ransack flowers here and there, but then they make their own honey, which is entirely theirs and no longer thyme or marjoram.”
This is the essence, and the heart, of Miscellanea. In a world devoted to niches, Miscellanea is purposefully wide-ranging and curious. If there is a focus it is this: I am intent in my devotion to the thoughtful pause, the bee hovering, just above the petals, pre-indulgent and satisfied in searching.
I believe that the nature of life is transformative, and all of our varying interests and creative works inform our experience of growth and change. Miscellanea is a distillation of these interactions.
When we allow ourselves to be inspired by not just our proximities but their constellations as well, we begin to see a bigger picture. Our world widens. Miraculously then, our trinkets and our totems gain an equity of spirit. It’s the little things. It’s the big things. Everything collides.
As a photographer, I deal in abstraction and paradox — with what seems apparent and what actually is.
As I show up in your inbox or feed or wherever, I ask that you grant me these moments to share this perspective: of everyday beauty, of silver linings, and of that which glitters but is not gold.
Thank you for being here.
What’s to come
I hope to build a rhythm here that you can come to rely on. Everything should fall into these categories:
Prose and photo essays
Artist profiles and interviews
Reading life and book talk*
Scraps and thoughts and inspiration, leaving a little room for experimentation with format and content
The occasional recommendation(s)
*You might notice this as a natural extension of this space, but you also might recall that I’ve never truly written about reading or books. This is true. But my reading life has grown exponentially this year and is now virtually inseparable from everything I think about and write about.
Bookshop.org is still hosting their anti-prime sale till the end of the day. You can visit the newly opened Miscellanea Book Shop here, and expect me to talk about this more in the future. It’s basically just an affiliate account (if you buy books through my link, I earn a percentage), but truly, every bit helps. Until I build out more lists and make specific recommendations, I’ll keep it simple:
How you can support Miscellanea
Until I can maintain a consistent schedule here, I will hold off on seriously pushing subscriptions.
But if you feel so inclined, I’ll offer a discounted subscription over the course of the summer — many of you have been subscribers for years, even some nearing a decade. Your support, of course, would mean the most.
Better than that, however, you can always share this newsletter with a friend. Sharing is caring. This probably isn’t the issue you’d want to share, so here are a few others that y’all seemed to vibe with:
This has been my long-winded way to recalibrate around these parts. Thanks for sticking around. I’ll be back soon with words less administrative. Photos, too!