A few days ago something or other I saw on the telly prompted me to hop onto the web and find out who’s living in my erstwhile home in Tennessee now—whether it’s the same people who bought it at auction in 2012, mere moments before the bank would’ve foreclosed on it, as it turns out. … Continue reading A Christmas Story: Holidays Are Hard
Family
Journal Entry: Sunday, Muddy Sunday
Yesterday Chef David made lefse, a traditional Norwegian flatbread. He comes by it honestly. And I can't resist it. While I was in the other room folding clothes he sailed in with a folded corner of it, steaming hot, butter dripping out of it and all over the floor, and crammed it into my mouth. … Continue reading Journal Entry: Sunday, Muddy Sunday
Dog Story: It Must Be the Biscuits
Whole wheat that gives shy persons the strength to get up and do what needs to be done. Heavens, they're tasty, and expeditious!—A Prairie Home Companion The shy Scout-the-Labish is coming into his own. Although lately I’ve been calling our tawny little guy of unknown parentage a Goldapeake Retriever, hijacking the clever adverts an Australian … Continue reading Dog Story: It Must Be the Biscuits
A Food Memory: Do You Cook with Your Kids?
“You must know a lot about Southern cooking.” Chef David’s voice came cracking across the miles, over the Green Mountains, through an iffy cellular connection that tied me to him, from the Upper Valley all the way down to the Southwest corner of the state. I barely knew him at the time, but we clocked … Continue reading A Food Memory: Do You Cook with Your Kids?
Journal Entry: The Earth Grows Restless and Begins to Shift
And the days grow notably shorter. It had to happen eventually, I suppose. But the poison parsnip is dead, and good riddance to it. “I don’t suppose your leaves have started turning yet,” mused my dad at the other end of a cell phone connection about a week ago. “No,” I said, “but just last … Continue reading Journal Entry: The Earth Grows Restless and Begins to Shift
Family Story: Baked Beans on the Ceiling
“Are those…baked beans…on my kitchen ceiling, Grandmother?” It was my mom’s perturbed voice. You could also tell when she was perturbed by how she called somebody. Granny Grace—my great grandmother—was always just Granny, or maybe occasionally Gracie, but ‘Grandmother’ was the moniker mom used when Gracie did something vexing. Come to think of it, Gracie … Continue reading Family Story: Baked Beans on the Ceiling
A Story about Humor: The Best Kind of Barometer (for Anything That Matters)
Is there really any better yardstick than humor for measuring, I don’t know, intelligence? Depth of character? General amiability in a person? I think not. I can recall several occasions where I forgot about this important metric when I was making an important decision that would palpably affect my life, and lived to regret it. … Continue reading A Story about Humor: The Best Kind of Barometer (for Anything That Matters)
Family Story: When Doing Nothing Really Is Something
Yesterday afternoon I video chatted with my twentysomething for a bit as we routinely do, if not every day, at least several days every week. Thank the universe (and the engineers) for the technology that allows us to do this. He was sitting at his desk at home in his bedroom, with a soft blanket … Continue reading Family Story: When Doing Nothing Really Is Something
Travel Story: Four Days in Charleston
Really, it was four days in nearby Mt. Pleasant, SC, with a single worthwhile diversion into downtown Charleston. This was the trip we planned last summer, to see my ex-sister-in-law-but-still-my-sister and her sweet Waco-the-Lab. But last year Hurricane Irma had other plans, thus derailing ours. Weather. It’s why we chose July this time around instead … Continue reading Travel Story: Four Days in Charleston
Travel Story: One Night in Charlotte
The plans to meet us in Charlotte unfolded exactly the way all the twenty-something’s plans do, fraught with angst, vacillating wildly between Yes-I’m-Coming and No-I-Can’t, and with no small measure of hand wringing and car polishing, I am guessing. Because when your mom-who-lives-a-thousand-miles-away comes within spitting distance of where you are right now, it’s obviously … Continue reading Travel Story: One Night in Charlotte
Sycamore Stories 