Different perspective: What it’s like going blind at 17

By Jake Harris | Published Saturday, April 11, 2015 This article originally appeared in the Wise County Messenger. Tristan Hastings is an average 17-year-old high school student. He enjoys sports, loves to talk about fast cars and usually makes more time for his hobbies than he does for school. He wants to become a chef […]

Cult of personality quizzes

This post originally appeared in the Jan. 17, 2015 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Screenshot grabbed from this Buzzfeed article. It seems 2013 was the Year of the Introvert. Psychologists, journalists and sociologists published multiple news articles and thinkpieces about the merits of introverts in the workplace, at school and at home. Author Susan […]

Reflect, then move forward

This post originally appeared in the Dec. 1, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Featured photo found here. This year has been a whirlwind. Since last January, I have gone to Thailand, been confirmed into the Catholic Church, graduated college, traveled to Korea to watch my brother graduate high school, helped my family move […]

Christmas Eve robbery leads to 4 arrests

This article was originally published in the Wise County Messenger on Dec. 27, 2014. Photo submitted. Four men spent Christmas in the Wise County Jail after being arrested just blocks away from the Bridgeport convenience store that two of them robbed at gunpoint. Pedro Ibarra-McDonald, 18, and Julio Betancourt, 18, both of Bridgeport, are currently being […]

A Thanksgiving ode to West Bewick Avenue

This post originally appeared in the Nov. 22, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Photo from Facebook. There is a house on West Bewick Avenue in Fort Worth, near TCU’s campus. It’s not fancy — just a regular three-bedroom house with a fenced backyard. On the outside, there’s nothing special about it. The yard always needed […]

Oh, Canada

This post originally appeared in the October 25, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Photo found here. This time last year, I was in Washington, D.C. for an internship. I got to witness some interesting parts of U.S. history while I was there. I saw the government shut down in response to the Affordable […]

Name your price

This post originally appeared in the October 11, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Photo found here. When I got into trouble when I was younger, my parents always made sure to make my punishment fit the crime. I can remember one time when Mom found out I paid the child’s ticket price for […]

iPhones, iWatches and free music

This post originally appeared in the September 13, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Photo found here. Apple’s been in the news a lot lately. First, it was the whole iCloud-leaked celebrity photos business, now it’s the latest iPhones and the iWatch. This is a new record for the most people to own any album at […]

It’s football time in Texas… and Tennessee, and Hawaii, and New York…

This post originally appeared in the September 6, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. Photo found here. Football season is finally in full swing, which means it’s fall – no matter how hard the Texas weather may work to convince you otherwise. Fall was always my favorite time of year growing up, because it had my […]

Living in the present tense

This post originally appeared in the July 30, 2014 edition of the Wise County Messenger. I’ve decided to start posting my columns from the paper on my blog. Photo found here. I spent last weekend visiting family in east Tennessee. Friday night was a party celebrating my TCU graduation and new job as well as my brother’s […]