I Think I’d Rather Dance

February 28, 2012

That blood-curdling scream coming from my shower was not Janet Leigh. It was me taking an icy cold shower to speed up my sluggish metabolism. That cold shower is excruciating! “It’s 42 degrees outside! Is she Psycho?” you might be asking. The question is open for debate, but actually you can blame that cold shower [...]

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A Scots-Irish Lass With A Hispanic Soul

October 26, 2011

It’s true that the only word I can remember from my High School Spanish class is “albondigas.” That means “meatballs” … I think. At least I hope it’s not a dirty word. I just can’t understand why I didn’t learn an important word that was useful. Like “bacon.” Why didn’t I learn that? And, what [...]

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The Collection That Rocks Me

October 5, 2011

It is one of those collections that make me wonder, “Why in Thunder do I have this?” I am betting that you have a collection like that, too. It doesn’t have much monetary value. I have no way to properly display it, and it isn’t even visually spectacular. But, I keep it. You keep yours, [...]

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The Christmas Ornament That Melts My Heart

December 30, 2010

I know y’all aren’t going to believe this, but the mannequin that resides in my dining room actually broke into a grin when I took the Santa hat off of her head and packed away all the Christmas doodads. OK, maybe I stretched the truth a little, but I know that she is as happy [...]

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The Fading Sunset; A Prayer

October 10, 2010

On a crumpled scrap of paper I had saved for thirty years, I found the fading penciled words of a Navajo prayer. At least, that’s what I was told at the time. I’d found it on the program at a small church service in some nameless town while we visited on vacation. The words had [...]

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The Beginning

October 4, 2010

I often find myself turning on the television to distract me when my hands are busy. Otherwise, my thoughts are unleashed and they ramble past the “Do Not Disturb” sign into memories I’d rather not contemplate. This weekend as I worked on afghans for Share A Square, I had no distractions. Momma came to mind, [...]

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Back On The Horse

September 29, 2010

Like a fickle lover, Sleep refused to embrace me last night. I dutifully nestled my head in the pillows and closed my eyes, but he eluded me. Perhaps he had no power over the voice I heard in my head. It was not “the voices” about which I usually joke … it was a voice [...]

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Not So Yucky Yukon Golds

September 6, 2010

I hoped that the farmer’s sign was not a commentary on the quality of his produce. At the Dallas Farmer’s Market, I spied these Yukon Gold potatoes and lusted for them, despite the label proclaiming them “Yuckon” Gold. I figured that farmer was busy growing food and didn’t have time to spell. I didn’t care, [...]

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Her Favorite Flower

July 30, 2010

Although sunflowers are pretty (and I enjoy eating their seeds) they are not my favorite flower. However, this morning an enormous bouquet of sunflowers adorns my desk for Only The Good Friday. I’ve placed them there to honor my husband’s favorite aunt, who died one year ago. I’ve told you about Aunt Cleo before; she [...]

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Who Do You Want To Be?

July 28, 2010

As a child I always envied our neighbor, Ruthie Walkendorfer. She was, in truth, an unlikely source of envy. As I remember her she was a small, very self assured child with dark hair that framed her face like a bubble. Her black eyeglasses were almost as big as she was, with lenses as thick [...]

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Long Gone

July 12, 2010

Perhaps I expected to see remnants of my Grandfather’s farm in Styx … although I knew it couldn’t look as it did in the pictures that have survived. This photograph of Granddaddy and his oldest children must have been taken in the summer of 1924, since my mother is not in the picture. She came [...]

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Cookies Enabled

July 8, 2010

I recently had an uncontrollable desire for cookies. Not the ones on the computer; I needed a batch of homemade treats! This surprised me, because ordinarily my food cravings run to things like chocolate, or bacon … or chocolate covered bacon. However, cookies it had to be, and I required Snickerdoodles! Do you know those [...]

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Dripping Doilies

June 23, 2010

My grandmothers (and their mothers before them) crocheted doilies. I must have inherited every single one of them, because two drawers are overflowing with this dainty stitchery. It was hard to appreciate the beauty of them, because they were wadded into the drawers. Most of them hadn’t been washed in half a century … and [...]

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The Daddy Doll

June 20, 2010

On this Father’s Day, I’m thinking a lot about my Daddy. He died many years ago, but I still think about him all the time. My childhood memories of him are somewhat hazy. You see, in the 1950s (when I grew up) my Daddy was building an electrical contracting business. He wasn’t around a lot, [...]

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Going Home

June 12, 2010

A totem pole towers in front of his home on the cliffs over Mendocino. Don created it with his own hands when his children were small back in Ohio. One day, he saw a telephone pole that looked like it needed a raven on top, so he pulled out a knife and began to carve. [...]

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No Strings Attached

May 5, 2010

Cousin Tyrone, who is tracing our family history, visited last November for a family reunion. Because he had no “family heirlooms,” I decided to share some of the many that I possess to give him a link to the past, you see I knew I was only the caretaker of them. Besides, my house is [...]

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It’s Not A Cigar Box, It’s A Treasure Chest

April 20, 2010

Although cigars hold no appeal to me, I adore cigar boxes. I consider them to be “treasure chests.” I like cigar boxes when they are empty of cigars but full of prized possessions. That’s what I use them for these days: the tiny treasures. I have several “vintage” cigar boxes dating from the 1950s and [...]

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Wistful Thinking

March 5, 2010

Two garments live side by side in my closet. Hanging together … as they did many years ago. Neither is particularly attractive or stylish; both have seen better days. Their fabric is “pilled,” as so often happens with knits that have been washed many times, although I have washed neither of them since they have [...]

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The Playhouse

February 23, 2010

[I've been working on a project that I'm finding difficult, but I have to finish it. I MUST! You see, I heard my mother's voice telling me, as she often did, "You are just like your father." She didn't necessarily mean that in a good way. Every time I think those words, my memories are [...]

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Are Encyclopedias Extinct In The Digital Age?

February 6, 2010

When I was about eleven or twelve years old, a group of us stopped our heated debate over which Beatle was the most adorable (my favorite was Ringo, of course) and moved on to the more cerebral topic of books. The question arose: “If you were stranded alone on a desert island and could only [...]

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