Love and Tattered Spines

March 6, 2020.Reading time 5 minutes.

I met the love of my life in a bookstore. Though plain to most who would look her over, the depth of wisdom within her brought a beauty to her homely visage. She is quiet, yet brilliant. Once you peel the layers away, you learn of the trauma she survived in her youth. The scarring […]

Edna Claypool

December 22, 2015.Reading time 10 minutes.

My great grandmother lived in Springfield, Oregon all my life and I had the pleasure of knowing her for the first ten years of my nearly thirty. When I look back on the times I spent at her house the memories are of blurred bodies moving in and out of bedrooms, indiscriminate laughter, and snippets […]

My Favorite Holiday

November 17, 2015.Reading time 4 minutes.

I don’t dress up for Halloween. I don’t throw a barbecue on the fourth of July. I can be festive on Christmas and I love to exchange gifts, but it isn’t my favorite holiday. No, that right falls on Thanksgiving for three very simple reasons: 1.) We gather for the sake of gathering – […]

Don’t Say His Name – Remember the Place – Remember the People

October 2, 2015.Reading time 10 minutes.

Today I am supposed to write a flash fiction post…. and perhaps later I will. But in the meantime I offer a special post – something special and close to me. Between 2011 and 2014 my husband and I lived in the Roseburg, Oregon area where we taught and worked at Umpqua Community College. My […]

What to Expect When They’re Expecting

September 13, 2015.Reading time 23 minutes.

I’m of a certain age now where all avenues of my social media are blanketed with photos of my friends in various stages of parenting. Some who are trying, some pregnant, newborns, and school aged. You know the photos – the “first day of pre-school” or the “baby’s first hiccup” and so on. I’m also […]

Feature: "It’s Only Hair," Part Two

August 18, 2015.Reading time 13 minutes.

Part OneStory Time – When I was growing up I was quite the Tom-Boy. I played hard on the playground with the boys, dressed in jeans and t-shirts… I hated dresses! My mother even had to bribe me with jewelry to get me into a dress for photos… but that’s another story. However, I wasn’t so […]

Feature: "It’s Only Hair," Part One

August 16, 2015.Reading time 13 minutes.

In January of this year I had an itch to do something drastic to break the mold of my daily routine. I felt like I was in a rut. Every morning I woke up, ironed my husband’s work clothes, showered, dressed, and dried my hair. By mid-day my hair would be in a pony tail […]