About the work

A closer look.

Someone you love says a certain thing. A phrase your grandmother always used. A line your dad repeats at every dinner. A motto two people in your family now share. Send it to me, with whatever you know about where it came from, and I'll trace it. I look through old newspapers, books, letters, and archives for the earliest real record I can find: the first time it appeared, what it meant then, and how it drifted into the version your family uses now. You get a short written piece, a few hundred words, with the exact source and date, that you can keep or print and give as a gift. If the phrase turns out to be recent, or nobody can pin it to a real record, I say so plainly and you do not pay. One phrase per order. Tell me the phrase at checkout, or message me first and I'll start there.