A Life-Long Friendship Now Forgotten
I’ve posted pictures of my mother as a child (see here and here) and others of her as a young woman before I knew her (see here and here). Some stories behind the pictures I know. And others I wish I knew. Mostly, I wish I’d known my mother better. What was she like as […]
The Manhattan Project at Home
I wrote a couple of months ago about how the Manhattan Project preserved the natural beauty of the Columbia Reach in eastern Washington. In addition to preserving this unique part of our nation’s landscape, the Manhattan Project also enhanced the development of my home town of Richland, Washington. 2015 is the 70th anniversary of the […]
Which Is More Awesome—Mount Rainier or the Blue Angels?
After the Cannon Beach portion of my recent trip west, my husband and I spent a few days in Seattle with our daughter. For these days also we had lovely weather, and Mount Rainier appeared on the horizon most days. I always marvel at this mountain, which looms thousands of feet above anything around it. […]
Cannon Beach, Oregon: Then and Now
I was fortunate to spend several days at Cannon Beach, Oregon, in late July. We stayed at a resort just north of Haystack Rock, right on the beach, and the weather was perfect—mid-70s, and lots of sunshine. I can’t say I got my fill of walks on the beach (see here and here), but I […]
Stories I Couldn’t Tell Before: I Don’t Know How You Do It
My last post was a story I couldn’t tell until after my parents were gone—about how my father told me to get a “nice part-time job” when I complained of the difficulty of managing both a full-time job and two small kids. The other half of the story is what my mother said. As I’ve […]
Stories I Couldn’t Tell Before: A Nice Part-Time Job
I told one story recently that I couldn’t tell until after my parents were gone. Here is another: I’ve described before how my mother was a stay-at-home mom. I, by contrast, worked as an attorney when my kids were little. It wasn’t too difficult with just one child, but the year right after my second […]
Hospitalized for Homesickness
I wrote in my last post about my son’s first experience at summer camp. When I was eleven, I went to summer camp myself for the first and last time. It was 1967, the summer after my sixth grade year. Three fellow classmates and I—girls I liked, but not close friends—signed up for a Catholic […]
Mud: A First Experience at Camp
One morning earlier this month I read Emily Parnell’s column in The Kansas City Star, entitled “Letting Out the Wild Child Within” (July 14, 2015). I laughed at her humorous account of her son’s time at summer camp, which she compared to Lord of the Flies. Her story took me right back to my son’s first experience […]
Sacramento in July 1849
As I searched for a topic on the California Gold Rush to write about this month, I came across issues for the Sacramento Placer Times in July 1849. At that time, Sacramento was a burgeoning outpost at the confluence of the American and Sacramento Rivers. It still was not an incorporated town. The location had […]
Boating and the Moon Walk
My husband recently bought a boat. It’s a very functional patrol boat that he plans to use with his Coast Guard Auxiliary unit on local lakes and rivers. But it is available for our personal enjoyment as well. Last week I drove our boat for the first time—I’ve rarely driven a motor boat for the last […]