Memoirous

I’ll be leaving my job soon at the bike shop and starting at a local version of REI in Okemos called Playmakers. This coincides with an effort on my part to get out more and meet people and broaden my network. A 2024 goal of mine after being in the area for two and a half years. Using Facebook, I joined a women’s hiking group that meets multiple times a week all over the area. So on any given day I can locate a walk and meet up! Before starting my new job, I wanted to take little break and planned a trip to Ohio. I’ve already got my bus/train tickets. I arranged an itinerary that takes me in a loop from East Lansing to Detroit to Cleveland where a college friend will pick me up. After a few days she and I will drive to Athens, Ohio for me to meet up with an old high school friend. After a few days there, I’ll bus to Cincinnati to see friends from my Chicago days. My grandfather lived in Cincinnati; it’s where my Dad went to high school. His school still stands. The couple told me the...

If you like what you read here, please click in the upper left corner and become a follower. Recent posts will come into your email box. That way we can start a conversation about NOTHING! And, don’t forget my reading on Tuesday, April 30 at 7 pm EASTERN with other contributors Of Rust and Glass. Print copies will be available April 30,  go here:  https://ofrustandglass.com/ ZOOM for writing contributors. April 30, Tuesday, at 7 pm EASTERN time. Go here for ZOOM link:  https://fb.me/e/ 4mjb9vL5t My story is called The Yellow House loosely, and I mean loosely, based upon a visit I made to Sweden in 2014 . I keep a mental and physical notebook of story ideas—often very random, never knowing how I might tie something together to make a narrative, a beginning, middle, and end. All writers, unless they are liars, must confess that real life speaks into their writing life. So I hope the real life people, my friends, don’t think this story is about them. After reading...

 Mating Dance A few days ago while shivering as I was running from my house to my daughter’s, across the deck, I caught out of the corner of my eye, movement in the backyard. A bit of color. There was a furious flapping of wings, a joining and sunder, reminding me of Renaissance dance. Courtship. It was two robins. While on the fence, an onlooker to the sexual tension, sat a cardinal. We both were voyeurs to this springtime revelry.

This post is to announce my latest acceptance. A piece called Yellow House was taken by the Midwestern literary journal Of Rust and Glass. I’m proud to be part of this. Print copies will be available April 30,   go here:  https://ofrustandglass.com/ ALSO on April 30 th there will be a reading on ZOOM for writing contributors. April 30, Tuesday, at 7 pm EASTERN time. Go here for ZOOM link:  https://fb.me/e/ 4mjb9vL5t Thanks. Cover image below.

This is always fraught as I do not have a car. Years past I lived in Chicago and carpooled, usually in a minivan and could bring my bike. This time I live in Okemos/E. Lansing and could have possibly rode my bike to Grand Rapids had I not been out of shape and worried about the swings in weather we’ve been having. Which was never more evident at the Festival. Huge amounts of walking back and forth between venues, despite there being a shuttle, new this year, and a stormy Friday where winds exceeded 30 miles per hour. All this to say, I booked tickets on Indian Trails. Which, as it turned out, was a GREAT option. One never knows, and I emphasize the word never, what a driver or transit company thinks about bikes. They can decide to give you a hard time no matter what. I had called ahead to see what the regulations were. They told me it needed to be boxed (more on this later). I showed up at the E. Lansing pickup point by the Marriot and hugged my daughter good bye. Pray for me I sa...

Soooo back from Grand Rapids and the Festival of Faith and Writing. It has been 6 years since we met in-person. I was last there in 2018. Boy, has a lot changed. Of course, I’m/we’re older. I missed seeing some of the Calvin University faculty (Gary Schmidt, Karen Saupe) that used to introduce the speakers. Some of the intros were more informative than the actual speaker. This year, as the festival continues to regroup after the pandemic-induced hiatus, there were some measurable differences from past years. As I mentioned I missed seeing some faculty—and, especially on Thursday, I noticed venues were half full (I’m being generous in that observation). In past years I saw way more of the student body taking advantage of the festival. Maybe there are just less English majors. The humanities have certainly taken a hit. There is a “new” financial/business department supported by the DeVoss/Amway family fortunes that I walked through to access the Prince Conference Center. I doubt the ...

I was thinking the other day while out on a run about the novel by Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop. I know, I know—how abstract. But, not really. It had to do with friendship, between unlikely characters, and their steadfastness—even that word seems antiquated—and how our lives are impacted by the love and support of one or two faithful companions. I reread Death Comes for the Archbishop every couple of years. I miss it, the story, like an old friend. We have been together since high school when I went out to New Mexico to visit my sister who was working at Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu. Many scenes from the book are inspired by the landscape of this area. In fact, one of the driving themes of the novel is the Archbishop’s desire to build a cathedral in Santa Fe. The plot is sort of a string of scenes out of Father Letour’s long life. Some don’t even involve him and are merely retold stories of parishioners or myths that support the theology, local folklore. It is not a nov...

The Festival of Faith and Writing taking place in Grand Rapids, Michigan on the campus of Calvin University. Which used to be Calvin College when I first started attending the festival in 1992. The conference began in 1990, inaugurated by the Calvin English department, The first few festivals leaned academic with the presentation of papers, but evolved into a mainstream celebration of all kinds of literature that resonates with Reformed Theology—from their mission statement: [rooted] in common grace and the goodness of creation, the Festival of Faith & Writing creates space for meaningful discussion and shared discovery among people with different religious beliefs and practices. The festival is now hosted by the Calvin Center for Faith & Writing. Through the years I’ve changed pews, but I’ve always held onto the belief that reading will save the soul. This year I will be presenting at a Festival Circle, basically a lunchtime discussion. My topic is Slow Looking: Freeing ...

I no longer reside with gulls. This is hard to believe after so many years. Thirty-eight years by a fresh water lake, Gulls were everywhere. Eating out of the trash barrels, scavenging in the streets, circling the sky overhead, resting on fence posts, in the vacant soccer field, skipping over the sand beach. From a distance their white bodies looked like sails. Like the pigeon, they are a bit of a pest—especially when picnicking. If not careful, they would swoop down and rip the bun out of your hand. With cautious hops they’d edge closer to your blanket to see what they could steal. These are Chicago gulls, cagey, street-smart, running in gangs.   Now, living in Michigan, I am struck by the fact that there are no gulls. I live in the interior, no longer by open water. The woods are full of birds—but no gulls. I’m feeling ambivalent, not sure I miss them or merely the idea of them. After so many years . . . Shouldn’t I wax nostalgic, reveal a hidden longing, be b...

I was reminded the other day of something that happened when I was a teenager, before the “new” Woodbourne Library in Centerville was built, when they rented space in a strip mall near PK Hardware, where my mother worked part-time. Anyway, I tried to check out a book and the librarian at circulation told me in a prim voice that “this book is for adults.” I believe I was in high school. The book was The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley. Published in 1953 it had a Victorian feel and theme of illicit love at the plot’s center. I say feel because it wasn’t as explicit in its treatment of sex as D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover . You see, I checked it out anyway.   I remember being a little lost while reading it. I knew something was going on between the adult characters. In fact, it made me wonder if adult material was discouraged because it was so oblique. Because the story is told from the naïve point of view of a young boy used as the lovers go-between we only catch glimpses ...

We’re past the equinox, officially spring—even though we had one of those probable snow storms that always sweep through this time of year. You know, the ones that make us bow our heads in despair, that dashes our hopes. But not the firm and steady stalks of daffodils or grape hyacinth. They know what to expect and are prepared. Oh, we of little faith. With the time change, there’s more light at the end of the day. Thus, I can come home from work and feel like doing something, rather than switching out of work clothes and into pajamas. But the time change has wreaked havoc on my young grandson’s sleep schedule. Remember the Big Boy Bed ? He’s now an apostate after a quick conversion. He will not stay in it for the entire night. No one is getting sleep these days, as the baby is also teething. My son-in-law told me that Jack climbs the stairs up to their room and takes the blankets off his feet and says: It’s looking like daytime. When actually it’s 3 a.m. There’s no invitin...