I’ve been thinking about revenge. In the southern branch of our family revenge was best served ice cold, saccharine sweet, locked and loaded. Tradition dictated that if you wronged us, you wronged the entire family and you would pay. If not today, tomorrow. If not this decade than the next or forever until your family
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Talking With The Family
What was dinner like when you were growing up? What did you eat? Talk about? My folks weren’t into traveling, they were into saving their money and eating out. And by the time I came along, they were over the whole kid’s food thing. If they wanted to go out to dinner they hauled me
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Meeting Great, Great, Great Aunt Sally
I met great-great-great Aunt Sally on a hot August day. She was the oldest surviving member of the family. I was 7. I’d never heard of her before. . She was in her late 90’s and was out in the garden sitting on the ground in her sunbonnet picking beans. She looked ancient to me.
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Little Red Convertible
I have a little red convertible story. Calm down, Prince fans. It’s not a little red corvette story. Crap, now I’ll be humming that song. ♥ My daughter was here for a month. Home for her is NYC, a place she adores. So interesting because she’s such an outdoorsy kind of woman who grew up
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Chicken foot dominos
Here in the Midwest, people still get together and visit on the porch, make music, play euchre, and have happy hour together. And they play chicken foot dominos. There are quite a few versions of chicken foot but it’s an easy game to play. Everyone makes mistakes, laughter can be uproarious and prolonged, the players
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The Tooth Fairy’s Assistant
The tooth fairy. What a concept. Apparently it’s French. My dad was the tooth fairy’s assistant in our family. He was in charge of pulling loose baby teeth. Dad was very sneaky about getting baby teeth out of my head. I thought I knew his latest trick and then wham! He’d find a way to
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Mannequin Maidens
There’s a house near me whose occupants have a sense of humor. In the country, lots of people have old cars, junk, and painted ancient farm equipment in the front yard. It’s rare to see statues or even gazing balls. These folks have three pregnant, headless, armless mannequins. When they first put these ladies out
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Weighty Wood Roach
When you live in the country, you live with the critters that invade your house. We have wolf spiders, Indiana wood roaches, no-see-ems, midges, biting flies, wasps, gnats, ants, etc. . If they’re inside, I take them outside. It’s a no-kill kind of house, at least from my point of view. Ken also takes out
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Holidays=Comatose=Our Relatives Did What??
Yesterday I was missing those holidays with my my dad’s family at my great aunts’ farm in Kentucky. There was no TV, no cell phones, no toys, no games. There was no running water and no indoor plumbing. . Water came from a farm pump on the back porch. The outhouse was in the chicken
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Am I Talking to Myself?
Have you picked up some pandemic habits you’re not sure you want? I talk to myself. Out loud. I consider, I argue, I vent, and I’m always surprised when people look at me strangely. “Oh, haha was I saying something?” Big mask covered eye smile. I was at the grocery store and started an intense
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Fabulous! You’re looking absolutely fabulous!
When my daughter Dakota came to visit, we went for our traditional manicure, pedicure and lunch date. We’re not really girly girls but we do like having our toes and fingernails looking groomed and snazzy instead or snagged, bitten, broken and neglected: our usual sad state. . For those of you unaware, manicures and pedicures
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Interrupting the Play
I have a confession to make. I can be a bit of a troublemaker. It’s put me in some dicey and some hilarious situations. When I was in college, I went to a lot of the campus theatrical productions. It was super cheap, usually good entertainment and a place to explore new ideas. Occasionally there
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