Needle Drops

Short, sharp stories. Set to memory. Told like they matter.

Short, sharp stories. Set to memory. Told like they matter.

These aren’t essays. They don’t build to a tidy point.
They’re moments—fractured, vivid, unresolved.
A name tag with the corner colored in.
A red mohair jumper that survived everything but the girl.
A broken-down Mini, towed home by a dad who didn’t need to say much.

Each one drops you mid-scene:
A party where everyone thinks you’re gay.
A Russian psychologist with cheese from last Christmas.
A tour that never happened, but still made the papers.

Some stories are funny. Some bruise a little.
All of them hum with something real.

They come in clusters—every few weeks, I send a mix.
A handful of Needle Drops stitched together.
Not to explain the past. Just to let it play.

Because memory skips.
And sometimes, the scratch says more than the song.

—RobertThese aren’t essays. They don’t build to neat conclusions or tidy arcs.
They’re flashes. Fragments.
A face in a crowd. A chorus you didn’t know you still remembered.
A feeling you can’t explain, but somehow still recognize.

Sometimes they show up dressed in joy. Sometimes, regret.
But always with the static of something real.

This space is for those moments—the ones that land like a lyric or a gut punch.
The ones that play again when you least expect them.
The ones you thought you forgot.

They won’t go out as newsletters. But every few weeks, I’ll send a mix—
A few Needle Drops stitched together.
Not to make sense of them, but to let them spin.

Because sometimes memory is just sound and silence and feeling—
and something in you still knows all the words.

— Robert