wouldst thou join me on the dance floor?
I stalk denim and I know why.
In the early 1980s, nothing was more fashionable in my small town than Levis 501s paired with Chippewa boots and a powder jacket. My elementary school was overrun by kids with parents who thought it totally awesome to outfit growing children in expensive leather work boots and expensive jeans topped with expensive ski jackets. My parents didn’t. Perhaps they could have if my dad didn’t drink the clothing money…read more
Every time we have stepped out the front door the past few days, a small rabbit was hunkered a few feet down, trapped. Earlier in the week, one of the kids saw the rabbit dart into a small hole under the concrete front porch. It would have made an excellent home, but my husband filled in the hole with dirt and packed it tightly. The rabbit’s only hope rested solely in digging itself out.
I wasn’t happy when I heard. I have a soft spot for rabbits. My first non-fish pet was a rabbit I won at work when I was a senior in high school. I worked at Target and they were giving away a rabbit as a prize in a trivia contest at the store’s Christmas party. As an adult, it occurred to me a co-worker must have wanted to unload the rabbit and believed the Christmas party was just the ticket. There is no way they obtained a rabbit to be a prize when they had an entire store of items to choose from. That’s why God invented Requisition Forms… read more
The email I composed to my daughter’s teacher was eloquent and angry. It was arch, crisp, devastating. I wrote words I knew would wound a person who dedicated her life to teaching elementary school children. She was a monster, a liar, a manipulator beyond reason. I was fierce and poetic, conjuring a vision of a little girl with a passionate love of school and learning left terrified to enter what was once a beloved place. I seethed and hammered keys. I marveled at how bitterness inspired twisting, clever phrases, even congratulating myself on one particular paragraph. My daggers were lined up and smartly punctuated…read more
Tom Petty laid out the criteria for a good girl.
She loves her mama, Jesus, and America too.
She’s crazy about Elvis. She loves horses. Last on the list, she loves her boyfriend, too.
I was driving with my teenage daughter. We were taking off on an adventure related to impending post-high school life. I pushed the seek button on the radio repeatedly. “Free Fallin'” was just starting. I assumed she wouldn’t want to listen to a down-tempo song from the 1980s, especially from the likes of Mr. Petty. When I tuned away, she screamed, “Hey! Turn it back!”…read more
In early September, one of my sons returned home from school one day with multiple plastic grocery stacks stuffed with dirt-covered vegetables, gourds, potatoes, and onions. His science class spent a day at a working farm where they were shuttled from field to field and told to gather what they could. He went overboard on the onions and could have harvested a few more of the fragrant, gorgeous peppers. We were proud of his haul and he was, too. It was a contribution to the wellness of our family as a whole. We’ve enjoyed the bounty.
But one of the gourds he brought home perplexed everyone…read more