Technology. Creativity. Communication. Family.

I am a lifelong resident of scenic Bucks County, PA, and can't imagine living anywhere else. I grew up in Lower Bucks but moved north to Doylestown to settle down. It is a vibrant community, and a great place to live and work.

Bucks County is notoriously beautiful. The trip from Upper Black Eddy to Washington Crossing is one of the prettiest drives you can imagine. Bucks is a place where city folks meet farmers, artists co-exist with contractors, and biotech researchers work next to the Wawa. It is a consequential crossroads where serious history happened and major elections are still decided.

I graduated from Princeton in 1984 with a degree in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. I chose this photo because the windows on the top floor, to the left of the arch, were my freshman dorm. Ah, 332 Lockhart. Memories...

Princeton is a profoundly gorgeous and intimidating campus, with resources that can overwhelm the not fully-baked teenage brain. It still seems like a dream that a kid from Penndel could go there. But I formed friendships that remain dear to this day. In the end, that's what's real.

I spent six years as an Aerospace Engineer and manager, while completing a master's degree in applied physics. My first job was at a Navy R&D center that incubated ideas and produced technology that mattered. In the end, this work wasn't my passion, but I have undying respect for the folks who lived and breathed it. Check out the link for a sample of the technologies that were invented at this place. Incredible stuff. The renowned centrifuge, long abandoned as a victim of a round of base closures, is now an event space for rent by the public.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that I enjoyed the software side of engineering more than the engineering side. And so I embarked on a software consulting career and never looked back. I am particularly proud of the product in the photo. It has been used for emergency management at utilities and other mission-critical installations. I invented a unique knowledge distribution engine for this that replaced a commercial expert system.

I have always been fascinated by audio. When I graduated from college, I spent the first $10,000 that I earned on a recording studio. That passion has never waned. If you need audio editing or production help, please check out XMS Audio. After years of hiding my audio engineering habit and near-daily obsession behind an avocational curtain, I decided that it was time to offer my skills to commercial markets. I also work with a network of sub-specialists, ensuring that even boutique requirements get an expert touch.

I developed a gardening addiction as a pre-teen, and it never waned. I run the most popular online gardening group in Bucks County. If you enjoy gardening, regardless of where you live, please check out Central Bucks Gardeners on Facebook. For my story as a gardener, have a look at Chapter 1 of my online book.

The photo is lettuce and chard in my vegetable garden, which I look forward to every spring.

I love to write. Please check out my substack, Garden of Words. You can find my online book, Life Lessons of a Backyard Gardener, and lots of other things, including many humorous essays.

Through my formative years, teachers and friends insisted that I was a talented writer. That can go to one's head. Looking back, I would have to disagree with their assessments. Oh sure, I knew the mechanics. But I didn't find my voice, I didn't learn to be my own harshest critic, I didn't demand the best I could give, until later in life.

Music is in my bones. I love to write, record and perform it. The writing and recording side is strictly avocational, but it means a lot to me. It has also helped to hone my audio engineering skills over the decades. Here's an example of a song that I wrote years ago, but arranged and recorded more recently.

I've also played in many bands over the years, both secular and church-based. So I am no stranger to live performance. After a five-year hiatus post-COVID, I am once again playing live, this time in a trio that focuses on the music I love -- jazz, country and international rhythms.

Although I left engineering as a profession early in my career, I have a build / fix / invent mentality. I do most home improvements and maintenance myself. Friends often argue that this makes no sense -- and I see the argument. But this instinct is built-in for some people as a feature, not a bug. And so it is for me.

I also enjoy inventing solutions to the frustrating inefficiencies of life. For example, as a musician frustrated with tiny music stands, I invented the StandExtender. As a gardener frustrated with inadequate plant support systems, I invented a new way to grow tomatoes and other vine crops.

I leave you with the things that really matter to me -- food, faith and family. I suppose that "Italian-American guy who loves to cook" can be a stereotype. But some stereotypes are steeped in truth. While I am not a chef, I did learn to cook at a young age, and that love for the culinary arts never faded. From baking bread on a winter weekend afternoon, to crafting a bouillabaisse for a special dinner, to making pinwheel cookies for Christmas, there is nothing more human and social than making great food, sharing it with friends, and honoring tradition.

I often say that I don't have enough faith to be an atheist. As a young person with a great technical education, I found materialist arguments hopelessly inadequate. They ignored mountains of inconvenient evidence and made a lot of unjustified claims. Decades later, they still do. In fact, the gap between reality and materialist understanding of it has widened, not closed. I discovered the historical Christian faith as a young adult, finding that it offers answers for those willing to discard the simplistic wishful thinking of materialism, and appreciate the deep beauty and complexity of who we are as humans, and our purpose in the created universe.

I'm married with five adult kids, all of whom are contributing to the community where they were born and raised. Most of my extended family lives within 30 minutes. This is increasingly rare and weird, in an age when many families scatter around the country. And I can understand why some people want or need to do that. But I do wonder if a nation of wanderers can long endure... a conversation for another place. I consider it one of life's great comforts to have my immediate and extended families in the same or adjacent communities. With so much uncertainty and alienation in this life, having family nearby is a huge blessing.