Bucket List: Making Music Again
I had my second first piano lesson last week. My first first piano lesson was more than fifty years ago, in September 1964, when I was in the fourth grade. I don’t remember that first lesson specifically, but I know I took piano lessons for six years from that point on, then stopped at the […]
Watching Soaps with My Grandmother
Today, February 12, would have been my paternal grandmother’s 108th birthday. She died in 1990 at the age of 78. I wasn’t as close to Nanny Kay as I was to my maternal grandmother, but when I was a preteen, I spent a week or so with her during summers. Just me, without my siblings, […]
On Hallmark, Haircuts, and the Persuasiveness of Grandmas
I thumbed through a photo album of my son’s baby pictures, trying to think of something to write as a birthday post for him. His birthday is later this week. In the album, I found two photographs taken by a photographer at Hallmark Cards when my son was almost a year old. A month or […]
The Grape Juice Incident
Long before the lemon juice incident or the orange juice incident came the grape juice incident. The grape juice incident happened in the early months of 1970, now fifty years ago. But it is indelibly etched in my memory. Some time in early 1970, probably around March, when I was in the ninth grade, I […]
The Forest and the Trees and Writing Affirmations
I am in the thick of writing my current work-in-progress, approaching the halfway mark. I am in the trees, and I cannot see the forest. I write each scene and feel good about it, but I have no feel for the whole. Each conversation between my characters seems real, but what am I forgetting? What […]
Random Photos: Making Maple Sugar at Middlebury
One of the fun experiences I had during my years at Middlebury College was making maple syrup. Friends of mine knew a local farmer outside Bristol, Vermont, and one winter day I was invited with my friends to visit the farm and watch them make maple syrup. I wouldn’t even have remembered when it was, […]
Memories of a Flat Tire
I’ve written before about the odd things that can trigger memory. I had another such experience last week. I drove to a meeting on a foggy morning after a snowstorm past a grove of red cedar trees. They are called red cedars, but they are actually members of the juniper family. But whatever they are, they […]
Research for My Next Historical Novel: Oregon in 1864
One of my goals for 2020 is to research Oregon history for my next historical novel. The characters of the book I’m planning will be the same families as in my earlier Oregon Chronicles novels, though I’m sure new characters will demand to be included as well! Part of the fun of writing is seeing […]
Learning To Ski (the Next Generation)
I’ve written before about my first experience skiing. I hated it, though I later learned to tolerate skiing, and even to enjoy it when the base was deep, the weather above freezing, and the skies clear. By contrast, my daughter couldn’t wait for her first time skiing. I think she was about five. There is […]
On Choices, Priorities, and Consequences
As my children were growing up, I told them frequently, “You have to make choices in life.” When my daughter wanted to play two sports, I told her she had to choose one sport per season, because I didn’t have time to cart her to more than one set of practices. She still blames me […]