The blueprints tell me the once new house would never be as it was in 1964. The thin white lines drafted on blueprint are no longer virginal. The floors have been released of their coverings and footprints are disintegrated into the now thin air. The furniture has been relocated out of the house to new rooms and inhabitants are sitting [...]
Here I am sitting in the back room of my modest 1800 square foot (that includes the screened-in porch) home with my two beagles, “beagle bookends,” I affectionately call them. I notice how quiet the air is, cool with some dryness autumn evolves, seeping through the ambience of my otherwise cozy and comfy ranch house. I find the stillness of [...]
Is it a watercolor, or an oil? The color, even, deep, everywhere. It makes you pick your head up, hold it high and turn round and round filling your self with the best blue you’ve ever seen. It is an optical illusion It can be seen for miles in the open air. If you stare at it, you can’t tell [...]
The Carlisle house. The upstairs bathroom, the kid’s bathroom, was at the top of the stairs and in the middle of the hall. A bathtub with showering capabilities and a toilet were provided on the opposite side of the double sinks and counter. I experienced life’s measurements in the bathroom. The muddy blue double sinks were separated by a light [...]
As the hours of daylight slowly lessen and the heat of sun directly overhead shifts to a dim lower angle, I acknowledge the evolving seasons as summer evolves into fall. As a schoolkid on summer vacation, time was my companion and I used it to live in those moments. My summer memories on Carlisle were made outdoors where I had [...]
I heard the call. It wasn’t a whisper or a delicate voice or loud words urging me to transcribe thoughts to paper where I hoped to see ideas born into stories. The call went off like an alarm, telling me it was time to awaken my spirit. I received my calling when I was fifteen, accompanied by a pink hardcover [...]
My tree attraction wasn’t for just any tree. It was a particular birch tree I had grown to know in my early years – developing a kinship with its youth – planted on the same plot as I. Its delicate arms played in uncomplicated innocence, inviting me to circle around it. The poet Robert Frost wrote, “Birches” where, “I like [...]
Starting from right to left, “Let’s go ahead and flip that switch, then the next two to the left, good,” until we got to the far left on the panel. The ignition. “Here’s the key, go ahead and turn us on,” he said. I chuckled because hey, at least I knew where to put a key. The engine ignited in [...]
“Oh hi fellas. Good morning,” I said, interrupting a male threesome. Conversation stopped and heads lifted. No sound came from their mouths except for the short cropped, dark-haired man seated. “Hi, Nancy,” he said as he stood up from his desk. The remaining two turned heads first to him and then to me. They walked out of the office, passing [...]
I’m no longer fifty. I was no longer fifty about eighteen days ago.At the end of my fortieth decade, I finally felt at peace in my own skin and proud at earning a perspective of seeing my world as half full, not half empty.But who was I kidding? I used to say after turning the half century, I would count [...]