What do you think? Text me and let me know!

Brad is back, and this episode is an honest account of where he's been.

• After months of silence, Brad returns to the mic to share what's kept him away: the death of his mother in late October, a brutal flare of his ulcerative colitis, and his daughter's unexpected health issues, all compressed into the same brutal stretch of months
• He reflects on grief that is "clean but massive." The ache of losing someone you genuinely liked, not just loved
• Why he couldn't bring himself to theologize at his own mother's funeral, and what that revealed about Christianity's complicated relationship with sitting in pain
• The slow thaw from creative hibernation: the precipitation cycle that froze, and what it feels like as it starts again
• A shift in posture: from authoritative teacher to honest processor, and why he no longer needs to cap every thought with hope

This one isn't a history episode. But it is human. And it might be what you need to hear if you've also been somewhere dark and quiet lately.