The gun had always been there, in the brown leather shaving kit on the top shelf of the linen closet. I think he put it there when we moved into the house and we kids were small enough that we couldn’t reach it. Then he forgot about it. It wasn’t even his. It had belonged to my mother’s father, and it had history that was better
Continue reading… "Mirrors"Whenever Neva drops by, I think she has come to get her turkey out of my freezer. She bought two for the price of one a year ago for the holidays, and since she had no room in her fridge for an extra turkey, the bird___ all frozen, featherless, and pimply-skinned___ came to live with me. I hardly knew her when she asked me if she
Continue reading… "Two for the Price of One"The mule deer come so close to the house during winter that you notice their coarse hair and the thinness of their legs. They have descended from the higher elevations to forage in hay fields and to knock birdseed from our feeder. When they are this close, you see the physical marks of their season-to-season existence, scars from barbed
Continue reading… "February"The edge between land and sea may be the world’s oldest border. Walking by the shore, where the ocean grinds against sand and rock, you see how life thrives along this boundary. Algae grow on the rocks, seaweed grows in the shallows, and animals feed on both.
Continue reading… "Borderlines"Sitting next to Miss Sweet Senior Sunshine in the tour bus is dangerous, but she’s rarely given me a choice, finding time on each drive to scoot me over and plop down, leaning close, a tanned claw on my pale wrist. Sharp and hard, the pins on her beauty contest winner’s sash and the plastic points of her bejeweled silver crown
Continue reading… "Her Crown on My Head"It wasn’t just his aching tooth that made him call twenty different dentists in the hope that one would see him on a Sunday. It was his chance to show that he was no chicken when it came to sitting in a dentist’s chair—that those days were over.
Continue reading… "Almost Like Steve McQueen"The first time I met Brian Doyle, he said, “To catch and tell stories: it’s so holy.” I’d heard people call stories many things, but I’d never heard someone call them holy. Never divine or near God.
Continue reading… "The Currency of Human Consciousness"
