The Luminist

#173: From the mouths of hecklers.

28 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever experienced a heckler at a book event? Yep, me neither… until it was mine.Two weeks ago, I boarded a plane on a blustery Virginia Mond...

#172: Tchoupitoulas.

21 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Kendall and I stood in exhausted silence, inching forward a half-step a time in the glacial line for Barracuda, her favorite taco joint. I’m wrung o...

#123: When the future you ordered doesn't arrive.

14 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

“You know... it’s nice to share.” Three-year-old Daniel stood at the foot of my chaise lounge, eyeing my painted parrot bookmark like it was the...

#171: Polish?

07 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Polish? The question catches me off-guard; it feels overly personal given the context. But reflexively my mind reaches into my memories, digging for a...

#170: The Loss Canon.

28 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Dear listener, pinch me (not hard), because Do Loss: A New Way to Move Through Change is released this Tuesday, March 3rd in the US, and Thursday, Mar...

#169: More Easter Bunny than I thought.

21 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

My inner critic spends a lot of her time on holiday these days. The universe of opportunities for her has shrunk: no muti-million-dollar deals to lose...

#168: Time traveling at the Denver International Airport.

14 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

“Yo ma! Super busy work day, so pickup may be a little later, around 5 or so!”The text reached me at 35,000 feet, seat 9D, somewhere between IAD a...

#69: I've been playing small.

07 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Hello dear reader!I’ve just returned from my first trip of the year: a jaunt to the Mile High City to see Connor, followed by a below-sea-level adve...

#167: Singing in the storm.

31 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Six inches of snow and counting, and my backyard menagerie is MIA.My meadow’s usual cast of characters — the hawk, the fox, the spindly-legged dee...

#166: I walk the IKEA maze every time I go.

24 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

The College Park IKEA on a Saturday is a zoo. Families fanning out into fake living rooms. Couples testing mattresses, sitting on the edge and bouncin...

#165: I won’t let my anxiety be my daughter’s burden.

17 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

“Did you ask the guy at the front desk about the breakfast hours when you checked in?”It was 10pm on a January night. Six hundred miles separated ...

#164: The strange feeling of outgrowing a beloved ritual.

10 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Toby’s Word of the Year fit like a glove. He was the first in our group chat to share his WOTY way back at Thanksgiving. He’s going through a majo...

#163: A reluctant ode to slow.

03 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

“What do I have to do to get on next year’s list???” I laughed and patted my friend on the shoulder, “I’ll see what I can do.”We weren’t...

#35: Enough waiting to "rest in peace”.

27 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Happy holidays, dear listener! The kids and I spent Christmas in the throws of chaos and merriment, which no one does quite as well as our Texas famil...

#162: We like to think we make choices, but often they make us.

20 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“What am I down here for again?” It was 1975. Beaver Falls, PA.My mid-20’s parents had their first home, three kids, a silver Vega in the drivew...

#161: Waiting for the encore.

13 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“You seem a little quiet, is everything okay? You went on that hike today and were gone a long time.”“Oh, sorry ma. After the hike I actually en...

#160: The lighthouse effect.

06 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“I thought you were at a board meeting… what’s up with the tutus? I always pictured you as anti-tutu.” Kendall was baffled. No lie, so was I.I...

#159: The Ghost of Margarita Wednesday.

29 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“Let’s go get a margarita before we go to the emergency room.” Mike looked at me like I’d completely lost it. He knew better than to say anyth...

#158: An imperfect offering.

22 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

My mom and I like to hang out in an office park. The drab, three-story buildings house doctors’ offices, title companies, civil engineers. They also...

#157: Three years later, I finally understand what I’m creating.

15 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“The empanadas make that much of a difference??” Kendall and I were exchanging texts across the Atlantic, me at a Scandi-style coffee shop in my f...

#156: Taking what you can get.

08 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Back in those silent days, I didn’t know how it was going to turn out. It was 2020, the height of COVID. The kids and I were trapped in our rental h...

#155: Travel isn’t always about seeing something new.

01 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I heard the commotion before I could pinpoint the source. My daughter Kendall and I had stowed our luggage, pulled out our phones, and were sitting si...

#154: Fresh eyes on a never-ending project.

25 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Fall light flooded our eyes as we popped out of the grimy darkness of the tunnel onto the Golden Jubilee bridge.Alice, Nic, and I had shared a haven’...

#153: People want to show up (even when you’re fine).

18 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When I was a kid, birthdays meant breakfast in bed. My mom would rise early. She’d pull the waffle iron from its top-shelf roost, plugging the cord ...

#152: Inshallah, aka why I knock on wood.

11 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“The Buffalo Bills might go 17-0 this season!” Connor said admiringly, wishing his flailing Baltimore Ravens had a shot in hell of doing the same....

#151: Defending punctuation like it’s the Revolutionary War.

04 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last October, when I scribbled my sloppy signature on a book contract with a British publisher, I jumped for joy. Thirty-six years of Great Britain sh...

#150: Taking credit where credit is due.

27 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

NFL Red Zone blared on the TV as I looked down at Connor’s attempt. “You are failing at Mike Deagle shirt folding school,” I cracked.Connor laug...

149: Scaffolding season.

20 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I stood in misting rain, like a cucumber in the produce section at the grocery store, lightly coated on regular intervals by a nearly imperceptible sp...

#148: The Japanese art of spaciousness.

06 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I lay awake on the bottom bunk in my tiny Swedish cabin, the glow of the midnight sun lighting its shoebox-sized windows. I stared up at the slats cri...

#147: Finally, someone gets it.

30 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"I just can't imagine," Sarah said, her hand fluttering to her chest like she was having a cardiac event herself. "I mean, losing your husband and rai...

#146: Not today, TikTok.

23 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I was ten pages into How to Think Like a Philosopher by James Baggini when my brain started smoking. Imagine little metaphorical curlicues of white fl...

#145: Resurrecting the lost art of remembrance.

16 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I was sitting in an armchair in the living room of the Treehouse, Connor sprawled on the sectional with his laptop. We've been calling it "Deagle We W...

#144: The place between stubborn and smart.

09 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“Mom, you know there's a screen right there, right?" Connor is shaking his head as I fling my right arm across his chest, craning my neck to peer th...

#143: Learning to find satisfaction in work that is never finished.

02 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"I just don't know if it's any good," I confessed. "I mean, I hope draft two is better than draft one, but honestly? I have no idea."I was on the phon...

#142: The problem with having everything planned out.

26 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Connor came home from George Mason University talking about his day like he’d discovered buried treasure. “Mom, you should see this library — it...

#141: The art of making a mistake, gracefully.

19 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It happened in the Quiet Car. That's my happy place on the Acela Train — library-level voices only, peace and quiet with a view. On the ride from DC...

#140: Wait, this feels familiar.

12 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As I stood in the 200-year-old vaulted glass train station, eyes scanning the departure board, a voice cut through the crowd: "Sue?" Who the hell know...

#138: What we can’t find in our comfort zones.

28 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"If they don't have an almond croissant, I'll take a cheese danish." Cary's voice crackled through my phone as I stood in the rain outside Flour & Sal...

#137: How to love a life you didn't order.

21 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Guess where I am!" I texted my son Connor the picture of myself with a heart emoji. He was headed to bed halfway around the world, exhausted after fo...

#136: From newsletter pro to book-writing beginner.

14 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Wait, but you are SUE DEAGLE!" It was Day 10 at my kitchen table. Books were everywhere, sticky notes were breeding like rabbits, chargers were stagi...

#135: Playing it safe isn't keeping you safe.

07 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The rectangle was supposed to keep me safe… It was the Spring of 1985, junior year sociology class. Mr. Perry passed out a worksheet with one instru...

#134: The boy who glowed like a candle.

31 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“Can I touch your baby’s hair?” Two decades ago, I used to wheel a six-month-old Connor through the aisles of Trader Joe’s. His dough-boy hand...

#133: From farm to table, from grief to growth.

24 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On a Friday night in early May, I was collapsed on the Treehouse sectional next to Kendall, both of us wiped from our whirlwind trip to New York City....

#132: Beyond resilience: why we need a new way to talk about hard times.

17 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Please answer this question at your leisure: how do you think you'd do in an apocalypse?" I was in the midst of an asynchronous text convo with Alice...

#131: How AI might let us be more human.

10 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"I think you can eat regular food tomorrow… if ChatGPT agrees." I was texting Kendall, curled up in her dorm room four states away, just after survi...

#130: Hope is not a spectator sport.

03 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I used to be anti-hope. Not just skeptical — actively opposed to the very concept. Hope was for people who lacked discipline. People who couldn't ta...

#129: Possibility factories.

26 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Ten months from now, that will be me. I was standing in a Chelsea brownstone at a book launch, having a full on out-of-body experience.I clapped as Ji...

#128: Screw self-reliance.

19 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As the miles unfolded on my six-hour drive to Colgate this past weekend, I watched spring transform through my windshield.At my Virginia jumping-off p...

#127: What do you say when there's nothing to say?

12 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Don't cry." Two words that capture everything wrong with how we're taught to console… and yet, when my friend Takis said them to me across our corn...

#126: The myth of remaining unchanged.

05 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"I'm so glad I can take a break from using my brain!" Last Sunday morning, Kendall and I were slumped at French Truck Coffee's narrow counter, waiting...

#125: Learning to trust the cycle of loss and new growth.

29 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"What is that word??" I was sitting in the Amsterdam Public Library when a slide flashed an inscrutable word: gezellig.I nudged Nadia, my break-time c...

#124: In defense of the long way around.

22 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"If you want a hack, go listen to a podcast. Here, we do the work." I was sweating on my treadmill when Peloton instructor Robin Arzon leaned into the...

#123: When the future you ordered doesn't arrive.

15 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"You know... it's nice to share." Three-year-old Daniel stood at the foot of my chaise lounge, eyeing my painted parrot bookmark like it was the last ...

#122: Sunlight, not fireworks.

08 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Hey, Sue, come here, I need your face." It was 7am on a winter Sunday so bright it hurt my eyes. Richie my brother-in-law was downloading the garage ...

#120: Sometimes letting go sneaks up on you.

22 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“Everything okay, Sue?” It was a chilly October spring day in the Southern Hemisphere, waaaaay back in 2018.Patches of snow dotted the pampas. The...

#119: Why even good changes feel hard.

15 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"You are getting younger... and everyone else is getting older." The words slipped out as I watched my mother buzz around her back garden in western P...

#118: The year I finally stopped fighting Dry January.

08 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"This lady is insufferable." You can see it all over their face when I decline a cocktail and mention my yearly Dry January ritual. They're imagining ...

#117: What can’t be explained.

01 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Let’s get one thing straight: I'm a deeply rational person. I can explain NATO's command structure, quote Fairfax County's baffling building codes, ...

#116: The measuring stick problem.

25 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

"Your uncle is iconic!" I am pressed against the makeshift coat rack in a postage-stamp-sized DC dive bar, watching my brother-in-law Richie work his ...

#115: What quarterbacks know about hope that greeting cards don’t.

18 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It was clutch time and the Commanders were down. Two yards from glory, their rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels was bent double, gasping for air after ...

#114: The Blank Canvas Effect: Finding yourself by starting over.

11 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

I can’t decide if it feels like yesterday or an eternity since my last day as a corporate American. Maybe because it feels like both. I’ve found t...

#113: Living well requires admitting what we’ve outgrown.

04 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

“You’re still going??” A few brave and caring souls said this to me out loud. Everyone else was surely thinking it.It was December of 2016. My h...

#112: The secret to making all your dreams come true in 2025.

28 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“What the hell am I doing here?” It was a frosty day in February 2024 when I posed this question to my editor Leona. By ‘here’ I didn’t mean...

#111: Why I’m totally fine with my nonsensical habits and beliefs.

21 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Do you still use a paper boarding pass???” I could hear Kendall’s raised eyebrow through the phone.I was perched at a high table in the back co...

#110: Waiting, preparing, considering, overthinking... ourselves into oblivion.

14 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Can you just wait? Wait to break up until I get home?” It was Day 11 on the pilgrim trail. I’d gotten my bearings, my routine, and my cheese sa...

#109: Black moods and coping mechanisms.

07 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Is there anything worse than being grumpy when you expected to be happy? That’s how I felt this Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday —...

#108: If happiness is our goal, why aren't we tracking our progress?

30 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Sue, our podchat is ready!” Even though I was reading the words, in my mind I could hear Gareth’s lilting accent wafting across the Atlantic. T...

#107: This deathiversary I mostly smiled.

23 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Last Friday, I set my alarm for 5:30am. Blinking my bleary eyes as if that would help them adjust to the pre-dawn dark, I changed from my PJs into my ...

#106: What makes a grown man willing to cry on national TV? His dog.

16 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

As a kid, I was never the begging type. I wouldn’t pound my parents with incessant requests. No pleading. No pouting. I was persistent, but at a lo...

#105: Life is about feeling alive, not looking perfect.

09 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“This is not the Smithsonian, sir, this is the National Gallery of Art.” The sharp-tongued docent spread her hands out on the gallery map, and lea...

#104: Integrating loss into life.

02 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Where is that damn book!?!” Head tilted at an angle, I stood on the back of my office couch, sliding my fingers across book spines, scanning the ...

#103: The one thing we can control.

26 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“What is all this crap??” I blurted into the crisp Swedish air. I was sitting on the tiny porch of my even tinier log cabin, strides away from an...

#102: Flipping the script on life’s unpredictability.

19 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We talk a lot here about the hard times of life, the out-of-the-blue tragedies that leave you shell-shocked in a pile of rubble, wondering what the he...

#101: An ode to crying.

12 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Willing and able to assist?” I rotely responded “yes!” to the flight attendant’s FAA-required question about my mindset and capabilities w...

#100: It’s major milestone time.

05 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“If your writing disappeared, would it matter?” David Hieatt — co-founder of the Do Lectures and online writing guru — rhetorically asked this...

#99: What's on the other side might surprise you.

28 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

If there hadn’t been so many people on the escalator with me, I would have cursed the billboard out loud. I was in the Dulles airport, my home away ...

#98: Cowbells, fear, and an overshare.

21 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Is that a freaking cowbell??? A few Sundays back I was up in Great Falls Park. I stick to the outer edges and seldom-trod paths on weekend days, with ...

#97: It's more fun when you don't know I'm a widow.

14 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The incoming text from my pal Todd flashed on screen.  “Here’s a link to Angie’s bio. See you later tonight.” A cut-off portion of Angie’s ...

#96: Travel insights meet homecoming ruts.

07 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On the last day of my pilgrimage, Ruben texted, “Don’t you feel like you could keep walking forever?” I didn’t have the heart to tell him but...

#95: Responsibility is not the enemy of possibility.

31 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We loaded the last of Connor’s stuff into the bed of his shiny black Chevy pickup truck. Suitcases, black garbage bags, a gargantuan gaming monitor,...

#7: The art of receiving.

24 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Happy end of summer, dear reader! As you can tell from our latest posts, I’ve been taking August slooooow. I’m learning how to exist at a reduced...

#94: The secret ingredient of self confidence: self knowledge.

17 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

I didn’t know I could face a transition this unbothered. Though these August weeks are almost identical to those of last year, I feel completely dif...

#93: Well, this is different.

10 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The lull rolled in with the August heat. Connor, Kendall, and I found ourselves sitting on the gray sectional, watching the Olympics on mute and shari...

#92: Identities that limit and identities that liberate.

03 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This summer I spent 28 days hoofing it from one twin bed to the next, sleeping in bunk rooms with strangers, and sharing my bathroom, which was also s...

#91: Superpowers or soft spots.

27 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

I can’t believe I’ve made it this far without writing about vulnerability! At least not directly. Maybe it’s because Brené Brown said it all, a...

#90: Golden handcuffs and opportunity cost.

20 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Loss is an example of our environment changing, and our psyches being forced to catch up. But sometimes change happens the other way around — our ps...

#89: Rest as reinvention. Stability as revolution.

13 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s been six weeks since I last sat on this grey sectional, and now I have no desire to get off it. After a month-long pilgrimage, followed by a cr...

Pilgrim Letter #4: Retiring robot mode.

22 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

My fortitude battery was running low. Rain-soaked feet, a run-in with a herd of surprisingly intimidating cows, and a low-voltage zap from an electri...

Pilgrim Letter #3: Momentum, mistakes, and making it up as you go along.

15 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

On the seventh day of my pilgrimage (so biblical!) it rained. Hard. All damn day. At moments, the deluge would dwindle to a sprinkle. Then I’d whip...

Pilgrim Letter #2: An ode to slow.

08 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It was 8:06 am and Connor was still talking. My precious baby boy was regaling me with tales of his final exam in public economics, then transitionin...

Pilgrim Letter #1: The comfort zone has been left behind.

01 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Greetings dear readers from… Stockholm! I’m spending a few days as a city girl, acclimating to the timezone, walking the gator (streets in Swedis...

#82: Vikings, pilgrims, catharsis.

25 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

"In case I don’t see you before you go viking, ALL THE BEST!” My face split into a wide grin at my mentee Mark’s email; his words felt like a ca...

#81: Gratitude as participation in life.

18 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

I spend a lot of time sharing about how much I love my life… And overthinking how I share about how much I love my life. I was reminded of this as I...

#80: Human connection, the easy way.

11 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Over the last seven years, I’ve turned into a human connection machine. This reading recluse traded in her isolation for the ability to reach out to...

#79: Emerging from what life asked of me... into what I want for me.

04 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“Don’t walk away, boy… I’ll be right there for you!” I was perched on a high stool at a bustling Italian restaurant in the heart of Welling...

#78: Alive, awake, participatory, and engaged.

27 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Another word for loss is transition. I like it because it’s neutral. We’ve probably lost a thing or two, and we’ve probably gained a thing or tw...

#77: The stage of loss that often gets overlooked: reinvention.

20 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“I want to feel relevant… I want to BE relevant.” ~ Julia Child (played by Sarah Lancashire) in the HBO Max series Julia. The series starts in...

#76: The reason winter precedes spring.

13 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

“I am indebted to all my friendships. The abiding ones and those which, for whatever reason, ran their course.”I stumbled upon this quote in the a...

#75: We’re on a rollercoaster… blindfolded.

06 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Writing online about grief and loss is nothing like what I had imagined. Even though I’d thought I had it all figured out.(By the way, you can have ...

#74: Role models, relatability, and the aftermath of the four-minute mile.

30 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

"Why are you hiding your success?” I can't remember if these exact words came out of Leona’s mouth or if my brain just heard the veiled question u...