Recovery
< 1 You gasp for breath.
Journal – All Posts
-
-
The Price of Fried Chicken and Bacon
6 MINThree months of summer fun came at a high price. Another 3-day stay at Aunt Rosemary’s. I wondered what I had done that was so bad I deserved this punishment. The belt, the switch, three hours alone in my room, writing a hundred times ‘I will not be mean to my sister Jo ever again.’ I would’ve endured them all in exchange. And I had turned 9, the rite of passage year, big enough to help with ‘the chore.’
-
I Took Care of It
2 MINEpilogue: I found the grinder and I took care of it. Chapter Eight: So…after thirty years of marriage, we separated. Although it was probably brain damage that caused him to say the breaking words, I…
-
Tell Me Father
< 1 Tell me again
-
Across Continents
18 MINEvery Sunday morning they drive to Surfer’s Paradise. By sunrise they are out on their boards. He teaches her to wait for the wave pocket that generates the most speed. She paddles furiously, stands, feels…
-
Broken
2 MINBroken In the five star restaurant I drank a strong cocktail, sipped at a second. I pretended the modern chair was comfortable, our silence was companionable, and smiled when the server set the platter between…
-
Grade Eight Prom
2 MINPriscilla fussed with her hair. Of the 20 or so products that she had saved her money for and had carefully assembled, she’d curated five for this evening’s dance. Designed to tame her curly masses…
-
Twiggy’s Mini-Skirt
4 MINMy grandma looks like a flapper in her wedding photo from 1919. She smiles coyly into the camera, her large round eyes looking up from under the fringe of her bangs. Her hair is bobbed…
-
Storge Love
< 1 Embrace the vague memories that are now bittersweet,those moments when you awoke to your fathercarrying you off to bed, lulled back to sleep by his body heat.Or when you would stand in the cold on…
-
I Don’t Like Roses
2 MINThe thorn drew blood before I saw the flowers. “Open it from the top,” the delivery man had said, handing me the long rectangular box. I slit the tape and reached in. A sharp sting…
-
Heart of a Hen
14 MINThe doctors had told him to be prepared for strange dreams and even nightmares, but such a slight warning had not prepared him for this. He woke, first, in the recovery room, so called, which…
-
Marcescence
< 1 In you is the stubbornness of withered oak leaves,