Hi, I’m Jen. If you want the encyclopedia version of my life — dates, court records, footnotes, the whole saga — that lives over at JensWiki, and it’s all true. This page is different. This is just me, talking to you.
The Short Version
I’m a photographer, a coin dealer, a jewelry maker, an artist, a blogger, a university student, and a mom of four. My friends call me the Jen-of-All-Trades and honestly, guilty as charged. I was put in front of a computer at one year old — same with a camera — and I never really put either one down. I’ve been writing my life in public since December 2000, and my rule has never changed: the truth and only the truth. No need to hide. The real story.
Downriver Forever
I live in Palm Bay, Florida, but I’m from Southgate, Michigan — Downriver, south of Detroit — and that’s home in the way only home can be. I love the whole area, Detroit included, and I will defend it to anyone. I miss camping in northern Michigan and jumping into the cold Great Lakes on purpose. Florida got me because of Raynaud’s — Michigan winters were literally hurting me — but between you and me, someday I’d like to find my way back.
What You’ll Catch Me Doing
Chasing things. Lightning, storms, waterfalls, gators — if it’s dramatic and photographable, I’m probably too close to it. There’s a reason I’m @LightningHunter. My husband claims I was “close to death” climbing a wall in Puerto Rico for a nature shot. The photo was worth it. It’s always worth it.
Rock hunting. A true love of mine that Florida — a state made entirely of sand — has cruelly starved. Any time the opportunity affords it, I’m out there happily digging.
Making things. Jewelry with silver, crystals, and pearls. Mixed-media art with my husband Jason, pieces we both sign. Silversmithing and silver refining, my newest rabbit holes. Currently also teaching myself Spanish and piano, because apparently I collect skills the way I collect rocks.
Selling history. I own Space Coast Coins & Crafts in Melbourne — silver, coins, and paper currency from Ancient Rome to modern day. Come find me live on Whatnot or at Renninger’s.
Making mashups. When I have feelings that need somewhere to go, I take to YouTube or TikTok and make video mashups with my favorite artist — Eminem, a fellow Detroiter — because sometimes he says it exactly how it feels.
Road tripping. I love to travel and I especially love to travel by road. I’m scared of flying — genuinely — but if I have to fly, I’ll fly anywhere. The fear doesn’t get a vote when it matters.
How I’m Wired
I’m sweet, I’m friendly, and I am so full of humor, because laughter heals everything. I say random things at random moments and people crack up precisely because nobody saw it coming — including me. I try to make my kids laugh, sometimes too much (sorry, Andrew).
I have ADHD and I don’t hide it. It’s a real daily struggle, and it’s also the engine behind everything on this page. People sometimes read me as a know-it-all, but here’s the truth: if I don’t know something, I want to know it, and I will go verse myself in it until I do. I’m an information sponge. What looks like showing off is just me, wringing the sponge out, thrilled about whatever I learned an hour ago.
And fair warning: when I get angry, I yell, and I curse like a sailor. It’s loud, it’s honest, and it’s over when it’s over. It comes out most when someone touches the two things I protect hardest — my family and my name.
What I Stand For
I support causes with everything I’ve got: ending child abuse — a fight I know from the inside, and you can read that whole story on this site — fighting human trafficking, and giving whenever I can to those who need it. I will always rather give than receive. The look on someone’s face when a random gift or a bit of unasked-for help lands — that feeling is the whole point. I grew up never receiving, and I decided a long time ago that the way you beat that is by becoming the person who gives.
The Household
I married Jason on May 1, 2018, and I’m still ridiculously in love with him. Between us we have my four kids — Chris, a Marine Corps veteran turned sheriff’s deputy; Andrew, an Army combat medic; Caitlyn, a high-school senior and talented artist; and Ava, my competitive cheerleader — plus a small chaotic nation of animals: Walter the bob-tailed Hurricane Ian survivor, Rosie the golden retriever, Boots the skittish one, Carrot Cake (a.k.a. KK, a.k.a. Smashmouth), and Callie, the Little Weirdo — tiny body, crazed eyes, zero explanation. The girls are sweet and sensitive right up until the Roblox servers come online after dark, at which point I regret ever teaching this family its vocabulary.
The Ink
Forty-six tattoos, nothing scary. A cross with a purple hurricane swirl and my kids’ names on one arm, Deadpool on the other, and a mishmash of forty-four random ones across my legs and back. Sometimes I do them myself. Purple, if you haven’t noticed by now, is my color.
Why This Blog Exists
I’ve been keeping a journal since I was eleven, when my favorite teacher handed me one in seventh grade. This site is that journal, grown up: twenty-five years of it, including my entire Facebook history folded in, every post on the day I originally wrote it. Every New Year I write a letter to my future self here. The good years, the unbearable ones, the funny stuff in between — it’s all here, unfiltered, because I write and punctuate exactly how I think, feel, and speak.
Stay a while. Start anywhere. It’s all true.
— Jen