Memoirous

Labor Day weekend. School was right around the corner. Which meant autumn was coming, falling leaves, and change. But things would never be different. Freshman year I was a nerd. As a sophomore I was a more experienced nerd. Junior year I entered school thinking halfway done, only 2 more years of being an ostracized nerd. Finally as a senior, I knew it was my last year. I'd never be popular but forever a nerd. But at least a nerd on her way out. The only good thing about Labor Day weekend was the Holiday at Home Parade. I looked forward to getting there early and finding a seat along the curb. Friends of my parents lived close to the parade route, so I rode up to their house and parked my bike in their garage. The Centerville Elks marching band and Coed Drill team would be in the parade along with both Fairmont high schools, East and West. Schools from as far as West Carrollton and even ones from Dayton, the big city, might show up. There were the floats and people I had no...

I’ve been busy working on another e-book related to writing—and always am intrigued by prompts or how writers can trick themselves into producing something we wouldn’t normally think of. There is an on-line journal asking for submissions of 375 words maximum—but here’s the catch: dialogue only. From the website guidelines : Dialogual publishes quality dialogue-only stories. Any genre, except erotica. However, we do not take anything that has been accepted before, or that has appeared on blogs or similar sites. In other words, we want fresh material. We are looking for stories that say something, but we are not looking for one-liners, two-liners or whatever else-liners. That's only a small punchline best left for something else. Also, refrain from sending things that tell, such as "Janice said," or "Brian advised." Basically, anything that is not dialogue-only will not be accepted, regardless of how good it may be.  We publish two to four tim...

Sort of in a sentimental mood today. As I mentioned last week my anniversary is coming up. Twenty-eight years. So I composed this as a tribute, not so much autobiographical but a poetic imagining. We’ve had a life. I was thinking about it the other day when I was washing clothes. I took them warm out of the dryer and quick picked the shirts out of the basket. I like to snap them by the shoulders to make sure the wrinkles fall out. I drape them over a bar or hang them on hangars. We’ve seen and done a lot.  The hems of his pants are frayed, and we’re both going to need to upgrade our wardrobe just as soon as there’s money. I matched the socks and was careful to fold them over so the elastic doesn’t get stretched out. Just the other day, he remarked what an old couple we are. Not too old, I replied. It wasn’t too long ago I was trying to get baby barf out of the shoulders of my shirts or washing tiny bibs stiff with rice cereal or rubbing Fels...

So we went away for the weekend and outside of coming home to find out my computer had re-started and Internet Explorer had replaced Firefox as my default browser--everything went fine. Great, in fact! I got several signs . One of which was before we even left and I was packing up the car. It was early and no one was around when I saw 2 cardinals on the fire escape, a male and a female. My husband wasn't quite convinced. What were they doing? he asked. I wasn't sure what the right answer was, so I responded: mating. Then while swimming in our own private cove on Lake Michigan I saw a bald eagle fly over and settle in the tree top of a dead tree. He watched out over me. The weather was so perfect--perhaps even a bit on the chilly side--which made nighttime fires so pleasant. The above pic shows a hearty oatmeal I prepared over an open fire with thimble berries growing wild in bushes around our campsite added in!

My wedding anniversary is rolling around--the first week in September. This weekend my husband and I are planning a camping get-away. We actually spent our 15th wedding anniversary at the same place--a few days after 9/11. It was a crazy time, to say the least. You felt like anything could happen--because it had. The unthinkable. We were out by ourselves in the dark woods, which sounds romantic, except not right after being attacked. Well, not me, but the US of A. I was still working through a lot of emotions. And, though, you might think it would be great to get away from the endless news cycle and media loops showing the two towers falling, turning to dust, and thousands of New Yorkers fleeing on foot--it also had the affect of making me feel stranded, without a safety net. All I wanted was to know everything was going to turn out okay. But I had a feeling nothing was ever going to be the same. Thirteen years later, we now know that was exactly the case. Two unresolved wars lat...

Hey! Check out my guest blog called Ugly Mugs at In Some Measure. AND go out and enjoy the sunshine!

My experience on a clean-up at Lollapalooza this past weekend has helped to remind me of that iconic Dorothea Lange photograph that became known as Migrant Mother.     Dorothea Lange was contracted by the Farm Security Administration from 1935 to 1939 to bring to the nation’s attention the plight of sharecroppers, displaced farm families, and migrant workers. Lange was funded by the federal government and had no rights to the pictures nor did she collect royalties. The Library of Congress titled the photo “Destitute pea pickers in California. Mother of seven children. Age thirty-two. Nipomo, California.” Lange’s own notes were sketchy and riddled with errors. In 10 minutes she took 6 images and left. She never got the subjects names—only the woman’s age, 32. It was a photograph that would change lives. Notices had been sent out for pickers but when the workers showed up they learned the pea harvest had been destroyed by freezing rain. There would be no h...

  I just got done with Lollapalooza this weekend and am exhausted. BUT, before you think I am some hip rock’n’roll mama, let me clarify: I was on a clean up crew. Actually Saturday started out like any other weekend—a little bit of relaxing and a little bit of catching up. I was just taking a pie out of the oven when some people staying in our building said they needed 3 more people to fill out a clean up crew for Lollapalooza. I asked how much they were paying and thought they said $10 an hour, which sounded about right. The shift was 2 pm until midnight. I wasn’t doing anything else that couldn’t be done Sunday, so within ten minutes I was in the back of a van and being shuttled downtown. It felt a little bit like human trafficking—though I haven’t had any first-hand experience (up to this point, I mean.) We were escorted quickly through a staff gate and wristbanded. The guys in the grey shirts were our bosses and they divided us up into crews. I had someon...