Honor in the Gold Fields in July 1848: Few Reports of Thievery
As I review my novel about the California Gold Rush with my writing critique partners, they tell me to put more violence and tension into the book. They’d like to see a bloody claim jumping or bushwhacking in every chapter. A good novel must include a lot of conflict and tension, so I listen to […]
Sailing Along
A few years after we moved to Kansas City, my husband bought a sailing canoe. You have probably never seen a sailing canoe—they are rare, for good reason. A sailing canoe is a regular canoe to which a mast and a keel can be attached. Ours looked something like this picture, though the canoe was […]
A Summer Short: On the Value of Blogging
There are times when I wonder why I keep posting on this blog. Some months I’m pleased with the readership, and I watch the statistics climb day after day. Other months, the numbers plummet, and I wonder if I’m so boring no one will ever read what I write again. Some weeks the ideas pop […]
A Summer Short: Sights on the Olympic Peninsula
I recently returned from another visit to see family on the Olympic Peninsula. It’s a place: Where picturesque villages line ocean inlets Where mountains vie with evergreens for majesty Where Mount Rainier can be seen from the Wal-Mart parking lot (look through the cart rack) Where wildflowers grow as profusely as gardens Where subdivision streets […]
Liberation and Independence
One of the joys of blogging is finding other writers who touch your heart and soul. My last post was about my mother’s death on July 4. That night I was unable to sleep. The Independence Day fireworks screamed and popped throughout our suburban neighborhood, their celebratory bursts incongruous to my grieving mind. I wondered […]
Memories of Mother
A few weeks ago, my family started hospice care for my mother. She had been hospitalized, and when she returned to her assisted living facility, she had great difficulty eating and swallowing—a typical progression of Alzheimer’s Disease. She passed away on Friday, July 4, 2014. Needless to say, these recent weeks have been a time […]
Oh, Say, Can You See . . . ?
Last year on the Fourth of July, my son was traveling in the Netherlands. He walked past the U.S. Embassy in The Hague. Overcome with patriotism, he took this picture of the American flag waving proudly above the outpost of U.S. diplomacy. He wanted another picture, one with the Stars and Stripes unfurled to greater […]
Harrison, Idaho, and Summer Parades
I’ve written before about the idyllic summers I spent during my teenage years on Coeur d’Alene Lake in Idaho. Some of my memories are of boating to Harrison, Idaho, a small town across the lake from where my parents’ cabin was. Harrison had the most accessible Catholic church on the lake. We could drive to […]
Life Changes in California, June 1848
By the beginning of June 1848 there were around 2,000 miners in the Sierra Nevada foothills above Sutter’s Mill. Most of these men had been in California when gold had been found, as the news was just reaching the far edges of the territory. San Francisco practically emptied in the weeks after Sam Brannan ran […]
Politics: Some Things Never Change
I deliberately keep this blog away from politics. I’m told that writing about a hot-button issue is a sure way to increase blog traffic, but I’m not sure those are the readers I want to reach. I am bemused, however, as I do historical research, how little things have changed over the years. We think […]