“It’s Fourth of July weekend, or, as I call it, Exploding Christmas.” – Stephen Colbert

Jim Shooter is gone. Cancer.

He was the first writer I ever recognized by name. As a kid flipping through my Dad’s old Silver Age comics, it was his stories that stuck with me. Even then, something about his voice on the page just landed.

He was just 13 when he sent in stories for the Legion of Super-Heroes at DC Comics. At 14, he wrote the story in which Ferro Lad died – the first “real” death of a Legionnaire (although Lightning Lad had been believed dead for a while before) – and introduced the Fatal Five.

Looking back, I think reading his stories helped me understand the role of the writer. Comics is known predominately as a medium for artists, but if the story is crap it ultimately doesn’t really matter how good the art is. A writer has to collaborate with the penciller to make magic.

I always found that collaboration invigorating. When I was making Slip Kid, I loved the interaction I had with my penciller.

Maybe someday I can get back to that kind of writing. But first… I have to have a story to tell.

There’s something about July that suggests possibility. Maybe it’s the heat, the long days, or the way the world seems to slow down just enough to notice the cracks in our routines. For years, I’ve thought of summer as a time to reset, to try again at the things I’ve let slip—unread books, unwatched movies, neglected friendships, and this blog. The myth of the “second chance” is powerful, and yet, as I get older, I realize how rarely we grant it to ourselves.

Yesterday I blew up the blog. I deleted every post. I still have everything as Markdown files, so I didn’t lose anything. Still, it’s all gone.

Time for a new beginning.

Second chances aren’t about erasing the past; they’re about carrying it forward, learning from it, and daring to hope. The world doesn’t always offer do-overs, but sometimes, in the quiet of a summer evening, we can offer them to ourselves.

The world is crazy. Get the popcorn.