Memoirous

I was invited to Michigan’s Night for Notables at the main Capital Library—a wonder on its own. My friend Lisa Sukenic was being awarded for her Middle Grade novel in verse Miles from Motown. SEE my review here:  http://memoirouswrite.blogspot.com/2021/10/miles-from-motown-book-review.html It was a gala affair—but MOST NOTABLE was the fact that I haven’t been in a roomful of people in about 2 years! I actually took a video on my phone while in the auditorium waiting for the “event” to start. The whole thing was an EVENT. For some reason, though it wasn’t mandated, I wore a mask. I hate wearing them, not sure how I ever was able to keep one on for like forever a while back. After the awards part of the evening we ambled over to an area for a great catered reception where we stood at bar tables and ate—unmasked. All of these details are leading up to the alert I received a day or two later that people I was with tested posted for Covid. I immediately felt sick. The appropriate n

Derby Day was always a big day in my family. My dad would put all the horse's names in a hat and have us kids pull out a name or two and we would root for that horse.. It made us pay attention when the gates opened and gave a backstory to that particular horse. My dad was from Bluegrass country where the number of thoroughbreds are raised. This year’s winner included was a hometown hero. Sort of. The owner and the trainer were from just down the road which isn’t always the case. Also different this year was the fact that the winner was an 80 – 1 longshot. He wasn’t even supposed to be in the race. This is a story of endurance, not giving up, of being at the right place at the right time—as the videos prove. But first, how Rich Strike got into the Derby. On Friday before the deadline for any more additions a horse was scratched which allowed Rich Strike into the race: in the 20th post position, the farthest on the outside. Rich Strike was given an 80 - 1 chance of winning. R

Began with warmer temperatures. I wasn’t the only one waiting for this to happen. There were days early in calendar spring when I wondered when it would actually feel like spring. This weekend at the bike shop proved that I wasn’t the only one—we were packed out. People suddenly needing bike repairs bringing in their steeds left out to pasture. Or needing to buy a bike because their old one was beyond repair. Suffice it to say I was happy for a day off. My daughter is also in a busy seasonal business. She is a design florist at one of the biggest flower shops in East Lansing. Mother’s Day and Prom caused a surge in orders. Friday and Saturday she probably worked a total of 22 hours trying to get bouquets done. We started the day with a brunch, then gardening and a bike ride, ending with a brat grill out. Nice family time. Jack discovered the joy of throwing sticks into water and we eventually had to distract him from Lake Lansing as he decided he wanted to climb in. Still too c

In My post Baby Games http://memoirouswrite.blogspot.com/2022/05/baby-games.html I realized later after writing about playing with my grandson—how much this approach is similar to my writing process. 1)       Starting with a kind of structure or form, such as standard hide n’ seek 2)       A plot twist, baby changes games by putting on a hat 3)       Story spins off into make believe, pretends to hide in plain sight In fact upon rereading some notes I’d made a couple years ago about activist/artist nun Corita Kent I happened upon this: Learning By Heart. “Try looking the way the child looks—as if always for the first time—and you will, I promise, feel wider awake.” In her book Learning by Heart: teachings to free the creative spirit, was published in 1992, six years after her death. The first chapter is devoted—simply but significantly—to “LOOKING.” She starts by conjuring the lofty ghost of her forebear Matisse: “Matisse said that to look at something as though you had