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The Corn Whisperer
In the depths of interminable winter, there was no sound. No words schussed across the silence, no song delighted the heart. No voice, mysterious and enthralling, beckoned willing and wary alike into...
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Oddments
As settlers and pioneers, Suffragettes, union organizers and war workers, women always have played critical roles in American history. On the other hand, I don’t recall hearing the word “feminism”...
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Zero’s Chances
Sometimes it grieves me that so few photos remain from my years in Liberia. The realities of West Africa at the time – inadequate film storage, poor processing, the nature of the film itself – have...
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The Runaways
No, that isn’t me. And no, that isn’t my pet elephant. On the other hand, it could have been me and it could have been my elephant, or so I imagined as a toddler when a serious infatuation with Dumbo...
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The Tale of Godot & Godette
Readers know the truth. Closing the cover on a well-told tale is one of the most satisfying experiences in the world. Breathing a sigh, caught between worlds, still oblivious to the clamor of unmade...
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Serendipity, Beasts and the Southern Wild
In the slow, sinking, reptilian darkness of the Louisiana swamp, mysteries abound. Along the Great River, down the Atchafalaya, through interlacing bayous and across fringed wetlands mystery flows,...
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Fiddlesticks, Footsies and Spoons
Stern. Reserved. Strict. Perhaps even judgmental or cold. So she appears in this photograph from an indeterminate time and an unknown place, but as she herself might have said, appearances can be...
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Sleepers, Awake
As a child, I never slept through a story by Hans Christian Andersen. Whether the tale was light and playful (“The Princess and the Pea”) or darker, more complex, and just a little disturbing (“The...
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Traveling Light
Grain Elevator in Floydada, Texas Some readers will remember this story. It’s sweet and quirky, and so amusing I occasionally re-read it just for the smiles it brings. I hope this re-post brings you a...
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Going Up the Country
Had I known what lay ahead, I might have chosen a pith helmet and khakis for my evening attire. Instead, I opted for what I imagined to be Country Casual: a denim skirt, a white piqué blouse, and...
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The Great Graham Cracker Miracle
First Methodist Church, Newton, Iowa What John and Charles Wesley would have thought of my youthful Methodism, I can’t say. To be frank, I’m not certain I knew during childhood that John Wesley had a...
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The Ghosts of Camels Past – Part I
The Camp Verde Store ~ Then Like donning a pair of well-worn boots, easing into rural Texas elicits sighs of pleasure. Scuffed in places, streaked with mud, even a bit run-down about the edges, the...
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Swimming Upstream
Detail from “Woman Before a Fish Bowl” ~ Henri Matisse (1922) Walgreens is an impulse shopper’s paradise. Established in 1901, after Charles R. Walgreen purchased the Chicago drugstore he’d served as...
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Remembering Ismael
Becoming a varnish worker isn’t difficult. With a vehicle to serve as a combined company headquarters, warehouse, and service fleet, about $200 to invest in sandpaper, varnish, and brushes, and a...
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Dandelion Days
Texas dandelion (Pyrrhopappus pauciflorus) No matter which dandelion species comes to live in the neighborhood, everyone has an opinion. Some consider them weeds, taking the emergence of even one...
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Panhandle Pandemonium
Grain Elevator in Floydada, Texas Long, long ago, before the arrival of the VCR — let alone Netflix and TiVo — there was something called the summer re-run. It offered a chance to view episodes of...
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Auntie T and Anti-T ~ Part I
Julia Child and friends The familiar voice — an absurd, bird-like trill of enthusiasm — pulled me toward the living room. Irrationally hoping that the doyenne of dough had raised herself from the dead...
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Lagniappe and Life
There should have been no reason to cry. In the house on the road to the Amite river, with memories of Verlinda Harrell’s ferry stirring in the breeze and the old Baton Rouge-Springfield road still...
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Lunch At The Miracle Cafe
If I hadn’t stopped to chat with Jeffrey Casten as he loaded soybeans into his semi, or been drawn into the woodworking shop by the aroma of fresh sawdust, or taken time to wander the field behind the...
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Benton Harbor: A Man For Our Time
Steamship “City of Benton Harbor” Near St. Joseph/Benton Harbor, Michigan Lighthouse For nearly two centuries, the legacy of Missouri’s Benton family has continued to spread. Maecenas Benton, United...
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