The parking lot in front of my local Trader Joe’s is always a bumper-car mess. It’s easier to drive past it to park on one of the mall’s parking decks. From there it’s a quick walk through the inside of the mall, finished by ducking outside again to access the grocery store entrance. The mall…
Juggling
Years ago, if you’d looked up “multitasking” in the dictionary, my picture would have been next to the entry. I was good at it. Practically flawless, in fact, and proud of it. Of course, I was not the only one. So many women I knew juggled care, schedules, and appointments for four or more people,…
Island of Misfit Manuscripts
When I was very young, I looked forward to the Christmas special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Back then, I was most interested in Rudolph and Hermey the Elf, lovable characters rejected by the Establishment because they didn’t fit an expected mold. I’ve grown up. The part of the show that sticks with me the most…
Autumn Leaves
My parents met in 1953 at the Garden House Hotel in Hurleyville, NY, where they were both employed for the summer. My father was a program director/performer in charge of entertainment. My mom, who’d done everything she could to get out of spending the whole summer in the Catskills away from her friends in the…
Probability of Winning
My brother talked me into joining his fantasy football league last year. “You’re ready,” he said. “And you’ll love it.” On the face of it, those are funny statements. Up until maybe ten years ago, I knew nothing about football. Other than the marching band, nothing anyone did on that field made any sense to…
Can’t Put It Down
My mom was an inveterate reader. Reading “a book” was for amateurs. She usually had three: the current book-club selection, the book she really wanted to read, and something light on the nightstand to fall asleep by. It didn’t take much to sweep her into a story. A page or two and she was gone,…
Grave Matters
Once upon a time, people stayed put. They lived and died in roughly the same geographical area in which they’d been born. It made sense to bury them there as well, where family and friends who’d celebrated and mourned with the individual during his or her lifetime could stop by the cemetery on holidays and…
Summertime Blues
Summer and I don’t get along. We never have. It’s just that I thought we had a deal: August. August was when summer got to soar into the 90s, cranking up all the humidity it wanted. In return, August was when I got to give up all hope of accomplishing anything of substance. I was…
Wrote the Book, Hated the Movie (Part 2)
“If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the movies. Don’t even mention them to me.” (The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger) Last week I wrote about the daggers that rip through an author’s heart when an actor perceived as all wrong is cast in the movie version of their book. But as much as…
Write Boldly Badly!
Are you a good enough reader to write badly? I mean, really, really badly. If you are, it’s time to prove it by submitting to the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest. This fiendishly alluring competition asks contestants to create a first sentence to an utter bomb of a book. With enough skill, that sentence will equal or…
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