You didn’t unsubscribe.

Which means one of three things:

Either way, you’re still here. And honestly? That’s kind of touching. Or terrifying. I haven’t decided.

Every Sunday, I open the floodgates of whatever’s rattling around in my head—usually somewhere between an existential crisis and a rant about the marketing industrial complex, with pit stops at personal overshares, dead media models, and why “attention” is the new “impressions” (but no one knows what either actually means anymore).

Why do I do it? I ask myself that most weekends. Right after I’ve written 2,000 words about supply chain opacity or yelled into the void about holding companies duct-taping their margins together with agency consolidation and denial.

And yet, you keep opening these emails. Clicking. Reading. Sometimes even responding. Which either means I’m making sense—or you’re just in too deep to stop now.

So yeah, welcome back. The coffee’s cold, the takes are hotter than they should be, and at some point, I’ll probably say something that gets me quietly uninvited from someone’s Hamptons panel.

Let’s begin.

Let me rewind.

Starting this publication wasn’t some grand strategic play. It was boredom, wrapped in a midlife shrug, dipped in too much free time. I had already made my money. Advertising. Adtech. Owned a few of the big ones. Cashed out.

Moved to New Mexico with some half-baked fantasy of becoming a cowboy rabbi with good Wi-Fi.

The plan was to retire, raise some goats, maybe write cranky Substack posts from a porch with a view.

Then, plot twist. I got married. Two adopted kids joined the ride, both from backgrounds so gut-wrenching it makes most corporate trauma look like a TED Talk on resilience. I’d already done the single dad thing—raised my son mostly alone for a decade.

I knew what that meant. The sleepless nights. The appointments.

The trying to heal things you didn’t break.

And I said yes anyway.

Because here’s the thing: life doesn’t send you an iCal invite before it upends your neat little spreadsheet. It just shows up like a pissed-off intern with a grudge and drops a stack of surprises on your desk.

And then, somewhere in that chaos—mid-diaper, mid-emergency room, mid-me-trying-to-make-sense-of-it-all—came the real kicker: I found out I was dying.

Not in the dramatic, movie-montage way. In the slow, grinding, “why does my body feel like a rigged Ikea shelf” kind of way. Turns out all those injuries I shrugged off? The broken ribs, dislocated joints, constant bruises from doing nothing more than existing? It wasn’t because I’m reckless.

It was because I’ve got some shitty Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. My body doesn't produce enough collagen—aka the stuff that keeps your insides from feeling like a sack of glass shards.

It had always been there. Quiet. Creeping. But something flipped the switch. And suddenly, I went from climbing mountains to measuring my day in upright hours. From Cannes to catheters. From back-to-back meetings to back-to-back MRIs.

And that’s when the silence started.

See, when you’re the guy picking up the check in Nice, everyone’s your best friend.

When you're not flying in, not hosting dinners, not posting selfies with the industry’s walking press releases—suddenly your phone gets quieter than a ghosted Bumble match.

The industry didn’t change. I did.

And it showed me who was real—and who was just there for the ride.

Last week, someone I genuinely liked—a guy who once called me a “brother in the business”—sent a legal threat over a passing mention that he might’ve had a drink at a networking event. Not a roast. Not even a dig. Just a throwaway line about the heat.

Apparently, he’s sober now because of a medical issue. And that line? It triggered a five-paragraph scorched-earth response.

It wrecked me. Not because of the threat. Please. I’ve been threatened by better.

But because I thought he was… a friend.

I sat through Shabbos stewing. Wondering what I’d done wrong. Was I careless? Did I cross a line?

And then it hit me.

He’s sick too.

Maybe not the same diagnosis, but the same descent. The same body betrayal. The same grief in disguise. And when you’re that raw, sometimes you throw a punch just to feel like you still can.

So no, I’m not mad anymore. I’m sad. For him. For me. For this industry where too many relationships are built on open bars, not open hearts.

And that brings me to the part no one wants to say out loud:

💡 If your entire identity is built around being “that person” in advertising—the schmoozer, the fixer, the late-night Cannes whisperer—then I’ve got bad news: your stock has an expiration date. And it’s probably closer than you think.

Because one day, you’ll stop being useful. Or fun. Or ambulatory. And when that day comes? You’ll find out real fast who actually gives a damn.

I’ve seen it. Lived it. Stared it in the face from a hospital bed while the industry kept spinning without me.

So here’s my unsolicited advice: Build something real. Make friends who’ll sit with you without an RSVP. Tell people what you’re going through. Apologize when you screw up. Forgive faster.

And never—never—mistake proximity for intimacy.

Because when the music stops, when the flights dry up, and your name stops showing up on the invite list… you’ll want to know who’s still in your corner.

I do.

And I’m not done fighting yet.

But hey, maybe that’s the plan.