Memoirous

There is nothing like tent camping to make a person hate storms. From the comfort of a home or even a trailer, storms can look like a lot of fun. The sudden fireworks-burst of lightning and the concussive boom of thunder. A powerful display of God, nature, the helplessness of mankind. There are three instances that come to mind when I think of storms at Cornerstone Festival. One was just after midnight. We were just settling down to go to sleep when Sally Watkins came by. Her meager flashlight bounced off the sides of the tent like a meandering firefly. From inside I heard her going from tent to tent warning occupants that the police had informed them that a powerful storm was coming. I didn’t know whether to be thankful or freak out. There was actually nowhere to take cover. So all I could do to prepare was stay awake and listen for distant thunder moving closer. I’d seam-sealed and laid down a ground cloth. I’d even taken the pre-caution of setting up beneath the wide cano...

For 28 years summer meant Cornerstone Festival. Beginning in 1984, I and my family would make the familiar odyssey out to the festival grounds. This year would have been our 32 nd festival. More than half my life was Cornerstone Festival. My engagement picture was taken at the fairgrounds in Lake County following Cornerstone ’86. I was EXTREMELY pregnant while at Cornerstone ’89, aptly named Family Reunion. https://vimeo.com/43124052 By the time my daughter was a year old we had moved the festival to Bushnell, Illinois where we had purchased some property for the express purpose of holding the festival there. It seemed like we might be able to stay forever. 2012 was the end of the run. Chalk it up to a downturn in the economy, an aging Jesus population, other concert options—but we had seen a significant decrease in attendance after our peak years of 2000 and 2001 where the festival drew close to 20,000. Cars lined up days in advance of opening day. There evolved a whole ...

I’ve blogged here before about Unique Thrift store. It has been part of my Chicago experience ever since I moved here in 1982. But, like a lot of things as we age, there are hard losses. Yesterday Unique Thrift closed its doors. The shop had recently undergone a brain-dead upgrade. I mean the whole reason people shopped there was to save money. Instead the new owners decided to make it into more of a boutique. Less choice and higher prices. Please tell me—is this good sense? In the thrift store market you need to overwhelm the customer with crap. So much of it that eventually you make money off of it. It used to be you could go into Unique on payday and come out with 3 – 4 grocery sacks of stuff and pay as little as $20. But that was a steady flow of money—until the upgrade. It was sad really, you’d go in and the aisles would be clear, the clothes arranged according to size (WTH!) not just color, and you could actually hear the musak. No more sloppy aisles with clot...

One of the most interesting books I’ve read since becoming interested in the puzzle within a puzzle of meta-fiction is the GRAPHIC NOVEL The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye by Sonny Liew. Okay let’s just begin by talking about Singapore. That was quick, right? If you’re like me (semi-engaged and somewhat geographically astute) then you know basically where Singapore is, but not much more. Such as I did not know it is a city-state. One of a very few cities that act as nation states. They are what they are. Then I went to Wiki and read a GLOWING account of Singapore’s history. Mt first reaction was WOW, I did not know this—but then, on second thought, why does EVERYTHING sound great. Sonny Liew born in Malaysia, lives in Singapore. (What’s the difference? Well, now I know.) But the biggest question is this: What does history and geography have to do with comics???? I can’t answer that except this book works. On so many levels. One hand you have real history and...

  This is not so much a review as an aside. If on a winter’s night a traveler . . . . is a novel by Italo Calvino. An experimental novel that explores the intersection of meta fiction and fantasy=surrealism. It is about readers and writers and Italo Calvino. It is an interesting thought experiment though not an engaging read. Thus, I started but did not finish it. I did find it fascinating. Books like this often feel, to me at least, like a gimmick, where technique is valued over story. AND, believe me, I often think plot is overrated—but at some point I want to be able to begin the story without having to flip back and forth to know what’s happening. At some point I need to begin to care about characters—not wonder in a realm of symbols and metaphor what they represent. Nevertheless, If on a winter’s night seems way ahead of its time.

Since this blog is organized around memoir/memories I began to wonder if animals are sentimental, long for the good ole days, wax nostalgic. From National Geographic : Dogs forget an event within two minutes. Chimpanzees, at around 20 seconds, are worse than rats at remembering things, while the memory spans of three other primates—baboons, pig-tailed macaques, and squirrel monkeys—exceeded only bees . . . Exercises with captive animals revealed that while some had great long-term memory they flunked at the short-term and visa versa. Elephants are known for having remarkable memories. From Cracked.com : Whenever they encounter the scent of another elephant's urine, an elephant can record in its computerish brain the location and direction of the pisser. This enables them to devote a sizable portion of their working memory to maintaining these expansive mental maps. Now if only my husband could pay that much attention . . . But the winner was a real bird...

It used to be that I jumped headfirst into every crazy thing. If someone came in the middle of the night and said we need you to go to the suburbs to rescue so and so, I wouldn’t think twice but would pick up my purse. If someone needed driven to the hospital, I’d ask do I have time to use the bathroom? I can remember being asked to do a lot of crazy things. That’s why when I checked Facebook Saturday a.m. and saw that my daughter had posted about leaving her phone in an Uber, I knew my morning might not be lazy. She often works nights and takes a ride home instead of her bike. Mid-morning she stopped in and I immediately asked if she’d gotten it back—no, but I know where it is. The iCloud had tracked her phone to the far northern suburbs. Without batting an eyelash I stood up and said, We’re gonna go get it. But first I’d have to borrow a car, since I don’t have one. Not an Uber, though. A friend loaned us her van and we took off, tracking the phone to outside of Libert...

There are relatively very few tools I have in my tool box as a consumer. With Sports Authority’s liquidation sale—I mean, who cares if I wasn’t happy with their service or lack of—they’re going out of business. They are bankrupt in every sense of the word. But then my tweet ended up in an article on how people are feeling scammed—and I kind of felt validated. Shoppers Faked Out By Prices At Sports Authority . More like shocked by prices at the register. I had walked in and everywhere were signs advertising 10 – 30% off (most items). It’s the small print that I totally missed. I got to the register and asked her to scan the first two items. Hmmm, is that with the discount I asked? And she said yes, so I asked her to put those aside. (There wasn’t a discount, I would soon realize.) But the other stuff I knew how much they’d cost because there was a sign where I picked them up giving me the breakdown. I knew exactly what I’d have to pay. Except the reduced price did not...

I went to Cathy’s Comps and Calls to cull our Hot Flash Friday prompts. There are several journals looking for flash having to do with the 4 th of July/Independence Day/Freedom. *Indiana Voice along with its sister radio station is accepting submissions for a special July issue! The theme is "Freedom"-what does it mean to you? The deadline is June 12, 2016. http://www.indianavoicejournal.com/p/blog-page_3914.html *24th Jun 200-word stories on the theme of Canada Day/US Independence Day. PAYING http://ironsoap.com/200-ccs/submissions/ So right now write— Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose . . . as the line goes from “Me and Bobby McGee (Kris Kristofferson ) and sometimes that’s what summer is all about: long days, endless nights, lazy, hot days. But we also know that they will come to an end. School will start, the days will turn colder. We have this luxury right now. Warmth, sand, waves, barbeque pits, rollerblading, orange sunsets. Take ...

a summer time In Her Garden short story http://bit.ly/1r32OO2 thanks everyone!

This past spring has given me a harvest of acceptances. Very exciting. Bop Dead City has accepted a flash called City of Love, which will be out in their Summer Issue. Pennyshorts (The Best New Voices In Fiction) has accepted In Her Garden, a short story I've been rather fond of. Glad it has found a home. I'll let all my readers (both of you) know when these stories are up and out. THANKS.

Many of my blog readers know that I am a fan of the New York School of poets—which is not really a school at all but a collection of friends who inspired and collaborated with each other. It even spawned a second-generation of poets—who really weren’t a generation removed but only a few years younger. Trust me—these writers aren’t anything like you would expect! Frank O’Hara said that many of his poems worked as unmade phone calls. This was back before social media. Anyway his poetry could be interpreted as missives to friends, ideas, thoughts he wanted to convey. They were often short, full of innuendo, and shorthand that only those within his circle might truly understand. Sometimes Kenneth Koch might start a poem and then mail it to O’Hara who might in turn after adding some lines send it off to John Ashbery. And so on. Our idea is to do something with language That has never been done before Obviously—otherwise it wouldn’t be creation We stick to it and now I am ...

87 Bedford We’ll take any great story that can be classified under the umbrella of commercial or genre fiction (romance, mystery, crime, etc). What gets us excited is speculative fiction in all its guises (fantasy, science-fiction, magic realism, surrealism, slipstream, urban fantasy, horror, steampunk, silk punk, cyberpunk, etc). Flash Fiction We define flash fiction as stories between 500 to 1000 words. Submitted stories that fall within these limits will automatically be classified as flash. Just like a great short story, a great piece of flash ought to impress us with finesse throughout its entirety, instead of hinging solely on an unexpected twist at the end. Micro Fiction For a bigger (or smaller) challenge, send us a work of micro fiction (less than 100 words). Be sure it still tells a “complete story” that has a beginning-middle-end with conflict and resolution. M...