Category Archives: Uncategorized

Mom and Dad up front. Me and my sisters in the ’48 Olds back seat. Everyone loving a road trip. Destination unknown. Dad’s routes take us over Georgia: out to the next county to visit his tree farm; south to Savannah where the beach, the fort, the horseflies, and the Spanish moss and pulp millsContinue reading “Driving with Dad”

Nineteen sixty-three, end-of-year school-wide pep rally. An assembled horde of young white Athens High Trojans going home, or to work for the summer, or to war. A gym full of kids with nothing to do but work off hormones and jitters. Cheerleaders winding up the crowd, which didn’t need any help. Athletic letter-winners recognized, theContinue reading “School’s Out for the Summer”

Sallie Ann dusting in her white-collared blue maid’s dress. And I, still in short pants wandered following. A question in mind. Sallie Ann, down from footstool top-shelf dusting,  paused. I pounced. Sallie Ann, how come the palms of your hands are white and the top sides brown? So different. My hands much the same, oneContinue reading “Palm Reading”

A diner off rutted dirtroads on the Tennessee-Georgia line, breathing a sigh far outside the urban edge. A creek along the road. In the equally rutted lot a Chevy 5-window pickup—not battered, not pristine. A neon light atop a much-scarred and leaning utility pole. If it were night the light would buzz and wink inContinue reading “The Diner”

I still pray. Having much to be thankful for, it seems right to give something back to the universe. But I always stumble at the start. I need an address. Dear who? Dear what? And then I lose the thread. Sometimes I find my way back. But once I wound up in an infinite universe,Continue reading “Something’s Got a Hold on Me”

Settle-in, breathe deeply, close your eyes if you want. We’re going on a trip. We’re traveling back to the Dixie of 1959. I’m your guide, and you’ll be safe, but you’ll see things and hear things that may offend you and dismay you. For comfort I offer only a moment of magnolia flavored grace, atContinue reading “Whatever Happened to Jimmy?”

For those of you who thought there might be a love story. I met Bertie one evening in the waiting room at Group Labs, a therapy outfit on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The waiting room was comfy, upholstered, and carpeted, with soft lights. People chatted easily, at least those who were experienced with the drill,Continue reading “A Love Story. Complicated.”

Compost Rose. A rare, delicate flower found only indoors in winter, when its normal ecological niche—mounded decaying vegetative matter—is frozen and lost among the snow drifts. Rosa composta should not be confused with the Compass Roses (rosa humanica nautica and rosa humanica aeronautica), or the Windrose (rosa humanica meteorica), more poetically known as the RoseContinue reading “Compost Rose”

Cassette Player stack: Various—New England Christmastide; Odetta—Christmas Spirituals; Emmy Lou Harris—Light of the Stable; Lisa Neustat and Jean Redpath—Shout for Joy. CDs: Wes Weddell (compiler) (www.wesweddell.com ) Saturn Songs XIV; Wes Weddell Band—Nobody’s Flag; John Denver and the Muppets—A Christmas Together; The Effi Netzer Singers—A Festival of Jewish Song; Amanda Winterhalter http://amandawinterhalter.com—Olea; John Waters (compiler)—AContinue reading “Writing Contest & Gingerbread”

On the Turntable: Jim Croce, Greatest Hits; followed by Bob Dylan, Nashville Skyline; cued up, David Mallet, David Mallet. In the Cassette Player: Patsy Cline, Greatest Hits. In the CD Player: Saturn Songs IV, (2006 indie singer/songwriter roots/folk compilation by Wes Weddell); William Pint & Felicia Dale, Blue Divide (maritime); David Ingerson, My Lovely MountainContinue reading “Rafts (scroll down for story)”