I'm so happy to be here!

The Ties That Bind: Stories of Love, Family, & the Legacy We Leave

darin

We Are Family

The tension between Shari’s mother and I ratcheted up when it was time for her daughter to choose a college. Shari wanted me included in her search. Her mother didn’t. She tried to steer Shari to colleges further away from me. It really didn’t matter. We were determined that our relationship would continue no matter her final college choice. Our plans for the future always included Shari going on and finishing her education. In fact, we’d planned that when she graduated, I’d go back to school … somehow. That’s how our story would go. 

In the end, a school’s proximity to me wasn’t as much a deciding factor as affordability was—another challenge for our budding relationship. Thankfully, Shari was an honors graduate and captured much in the way of scholarships and awards to help offset those costs. 

Shari’s family did their best to let her know she was throwing away her future for me. I’d prove them wrong. I resolved—Prove it All Night would become prove it for the rest of my life.

I proposed. 

It was a joyous Shaw family gathering at my brother Dave’s house when I officially asked Shari to marry me. It became even more celebratory when Shari said ‘Yes!’ 

I’d hoped announcing our engagement would help my relationship with Shari’s mom, that she’d realize Shari and I were very serious, that our love was a forever-love, and that I was in this for the long haul, no matter where the road took us. 

It didn’t go the way I’d hoped initially.  

Our wedding was a dream come true. Well, all except for my mother’s Courthouse Cut-ups storming the dance floor in homemade ‘Legal Eagle’ costumes to lip-sync “We are Family” at the reception. I was embarrassed. But that was Mom being Mom. 

She’d had a front-row seat to all the drama—ours with Shari’s mom; Shari’s parents’ court battles; the tension between Shari and her father’s new wife, and so on. Always one to cut tension with laughter—wrapped around a not-so-subtle lesson—she felt We Are Family was apropos.

If nothing else, the Franklin and Henderson families got a taste of Shaw family antics. God help them! 

In the months and years to come, tensions did begin to slowly ease with my mother-in-law. Not because of the legal eagles mind you. I think she started to see more of Shari’s and my resolve to make a life together—college and … babies. Yes, nothing brought more healing to our relationship than my mother-in-law seeing how much I loved my daughter, and my seeing how much she loved her granddaughter. 

Unfortunately, things didn’t go so well with Shari’s dad’s side of the family. Although there were a few weeks of hope—a little post-marital bounce, perhaps—difficulties with Shari’s stepmother returned and amplified shortly thereafter. Eventually, she forced Shari’s dad to end their relationship.

I dare say my dear wife’s loss of her dad was even more painful than my own. He was still alive, and yet chose rather to be dead to her.   

I held her as she cried herself to sleep. Watching Shari’s dream for a reconciled family story die such a painful and so totally unnecessary a death … it’s a helpless feeling. 

Sometimes it might seem like it was planned
For you to roam empty hearted through this land,
Though the world turns you hard and cold
There's one thing, mister, that I know,
That's if you think your heart is stone
And that you're rough enough to whip this world alone,
Alone, buddy, there ain't no peace of mind
That's why I'll keep searching 'til I find,
My special one.
Two hearts are better than one;
Two hearts, girl, get the job done;
Two hearts are better than one.

The only remedy would be to move on to our new dreams, to writing our family story. Thankfully, I’d seen this done before. And I give thanks because I realized it starts out, We were our way forward.

To be continued … 

Writers Write

Pull Up a Chair: The Storysmithing Table Is Forming

darin

There are a lot of people walking around with something they want to write.

A book. A memoir. A devotional. A family story. Maybe something harder to name—just a story that has been rattling around inside for years, waiting for somebody to finally sit down and put words to it.

And then there are those who have sat down. They’ve started. They’ve written pages. Maybe even chapters. But somewhere between the excitement of beginning and the satisfaction of finishing, things got messy.

That’s why I’ve created The Storysmithing Table.

Six Writers. Six Weeks. One Table.

The Storysmithing Table is a live, six-week, small-group writing workshop built around a simple idea: Bring your story. Let’s get to work.

Not someday. Not after you’ve read three more books about writing or finally figured out the perfect outline.

Now.

The founding Fall 2026 Table will include just six writers, and I’m delighted to say that three of those seats have already been filled. Three remain.

Over our six weeks together, each writer will have two private, one-on-one Story Assessment sessions with me and participate in four live, 90-minute small-group workshops via Zoom. We’ll talk about what you’re really trying to say, who you’re trying to say it to, finding and strengthening your voice, getting words onto the page, making good writing better, and—perhaps most importantly—finishing well.

But I don’t want this to be four lectures about writing.

I want us to work with writing.

With permission, we’ll put actual pages on the Table. We’ll look at scenes and dialogue, description and structure, sentences that sing and paragraphs that aren’t quite doing what their writer hoped they would do.

We’ll critique writing.

We won’t criticize writers.

Why a Table?

I’ve spent well over a decade making my living with words—writing and ghostwriting books, collaboratively developing stories, editing manuscripts, creating hundreds of devotional reflections, and producing professional long- and short-form content.

But somewhere along the way, I discovered that one of the things I enjoy most isn’t simply writing my own words.

It’s helping other people find theirs.

Good collaborative writing requires listening closely enough to understand what someone is trying to say and then helping them say it more clearly, more effectively, and more themselves. I don’t want your story to sound like me when we’re finished.

I want it to sound unmistakably like you—only better.

That’s the idea behind The Storysmithing Table. And that’s why I’m inviting you to pull up a chair.

The Founding Table Is Forming Now

If there’s something you’ve been wanting to write—or something you’ve already begun but can’t quite seem to finish—I’d love for you to take a look at what we’re building.

The founding group is limited to six writers. Three seats are already spoken for, and three are still open.

Come see how the six-week experience works, what we’ll cover, and whether one of those remaining seats might have your name on it. Bring your story. Let’s get to work.