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Tornado Alarm
The blasting siren traveled to my six year-old ears, reverberating in every direction inside my skull. Maggie looked to the sky, pulling a Pall Mall out of the tanned, ancient folds protecting her toothless gums and declared, “There’s a tornado com’n!” Terror filled me. I ran in high gear, next door to my two-story red sandpaper-sided house and straight to my personal fallout shelter. Sitting on bathroom scales stuffed between the pipes of our small sink and stained bathtub, I clasped my ears and sobbed, knowing I would be blown to bits. I was a dramatic child. Like “the chicken or the egg” question, I’m not sure which came first:…
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Stonefort Reunion
This is the time of year I remember back to The Stonefort Reunion and the many years friends, classmates and I gathered to walk at least 100 laps each night around the fair midway. It was a time for us to reconnect if we hadn’t seen each other over the summer. We would run to check in with our families, who were sitting in lawn chairs clustered around the stage watching a variety of local music and dance talent, and ask for more money or beg to stay longer. In junior high and high school, it was a time for young love. Countless relationships surely began or ended between the…
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One Red-Headed Cuckoo in the Bush Worth More than Two in the Hand
While in college, my friends and I would take our Christmas break and spend a month in Big Bend, Texas, backpacking and camping. I’m not talking day trips up a little trail and back again. I am talking about carrying everything we needed to survive, on our backs–the guys would have packs ranging from 60 to 65 lbs. and my pack was upwards of 50 lbs. (not too lame for a 5’2”, 100 lb. girly girl). Because we were spoiled and accustomed to luxuries we just could not leave behind, we included things like toilet paper, toothbrush, novel, and flashlight alongside our necessities such as tent, warm clothes, food, water,…
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Welcome to My Blog
Welcome to my blog and thank you for stopping by! There has always been a writer in me screaming to get out, and like so many who feel that yank, it had to stay in the cocoon longer than I would have liked. The kids are raised, retirement from a lifetime of teaching is on the horizon, and it is time to spread my wings. Almost ten years ago I challenged myself to write a story every week and publish it to a blog site. While I am working on my first book, I will revive some of those stories and include some new ones here. My love is memoir:…
