you walk away from the petty conflicts of the civilized where barbed comments masquerade as polite conversation where, even though you worked your way from the outside in, (the way your mother taught you) you still have one unused fork after the last course out back, under the stars, you slip off your stiff shoes…
At the University of Kentucky, in 1988, I enrolled in the Work Study Program to help pay my tuition. I staffed the desk in the journalism reading room, surrounded by newspapers from around the state, the country, the world. “Where are you from?” a co-worker asked. I secretly loved his black-framed glasses and marveled at…
Papaw said I was an artist. He was sure of it. Back when he worked back-breaking days installing pumps and tanks, Standard Oil Company gave him a calendar for Christmas. Above each month’s days, a nature photograph. One, in particular, was a favorite… a buck leaping over a branch, evergreens in the foreground, fall coloring…
my fingers slipped or maybe my focus suddenly surprised by my own empty hand glass met granite showering sharp stars minuscule in their menacing raining into the open dishwasher sprinkling the baby’s bottles glittering clean spoons landing like clear dust on the bottoms of cereal bowls one sandy grain leaping a remarkable distance reaching a…
Our yellow house perched at the corner of Spring and Pear, a bright finch in our tangled nest of a yard. Out back, a stubby hill tumbled then splashed into the spring on Spring Street. Cool, shielded by crumbling stone magical burbling. I was 8-years-old, with 50 cents for two goldfish, carried home in a…
During the summer of 1980, my dad and his brother, Uncle Ronnie, pooled their funds to buy a used blue go-kart for my sister and me to share with our three cousins, Steven, Angie, and Jason. Papaw made room in the garage for us to store the go-kart when we were off at our own…
Whenever we played Duck, Duck, Goose on the playground when I was a child, I squeezed my eyes tightly shut and prayed the tapper would declare me a “duck” instead of a “goose.” Though I was a pretty fast runner (when no one was watching), I was much too self-conscious to run quickly enough to…
Twenty-five years ago, my husband and I moved with our two small sons (a two-year-old and a newborn) to a neighboring county in order to live in the school district where we were both teachers. I insisted that our new home be within walking distance of a grocery store. It seemed like a strange prerequisite…
When I awoke from surgery and groggily asked the time, the nurse explained to me that the surgery had taken three hours instead of the hour and a half the doctor had originally anticipated. Apparently, despite the fact that my lab work showed no signs of infection, my gallbladder was “acutely inflamed.” Getting the swollen…
I’m an early riser, even after retirement; so when the surgeon’s office called me earlier in the week and told me I needed to arrive at the hospital at 6:00 AM for gallbladder surgery, I was relieved. My surgery was the first of the day. I prayed the surgeon would also be a morning person….