The Second Time Around

“How lucky to have been twice blessed in marriage! It has been my belief that one loves only once. I am happy to be wrong.” –Harriet Smith, Emma
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This Saturday, my husband and I will be among the friends and family watching as my father-in-law, Mike, ties the knot with his new love, Yvonne. Theirs has [...]

5 Things I’ve Learned Today

1) Those signs on the gas pump that say: “Please don’t top off your gas tank!” are there for a reason. Does anyone know how to get a petroleum stain out of gabardine?
2) I’m not low-maintenance like I’ve always thought. In point of fact, I am an undulating, mutating, inexplicable bundle of moods and neuroses. [...]

When I’m an Old Lady

When I’m an old lady, I’ll live with each kid,And bring so much happiness…just as they did.I want to pay back all the joy they’ve provided.Returning each deed! Oh, they’ll be so excited!(When I’m an old lady and live with my kids)
I’ll write on the wall with reds, whites and blues,And I’ll bounce on the [...]

Sticks and Stones

I don’t know his real name, but around here they call him The Stickman. I’m pretty sure he’s some kind of superhero.
I first heard of The Stickman at Huckleberries Online, an internet gathering place for residents and friends of the North Idaho and Eastern Washington regions, where he and I are both regular commenters. He’s [...]

Conversations With Caleb

On the way home from taking Katie to school, Caleb and I stopped at the Walgreen’s pharmacy drive-thru to pick up a prescription.Caleb (yelling out the open window at the pharmacist behind the glass): I’d like some money, please!Me: Shhhh … this isn’t the bank, sweetie. It’s the drugstore. They don’t have money here.
Caleb: Yes, [...]

The Poetry of Pork

Can you believe that I didn’t bookmark the original SPAM-ku web page back when I first stumbled across it, years ago, before the art of creating Japanese poetry based on potted meat grew into a worldwide internet phenomenon?
Me neither.
However, the true beauty of SPAM-ku (what some consider the SPAM limerick’s more cultured cousin), a form [...]

Spring

Spring has sprung upon North Idaho at last.
The evidence was all around me today while Caleb and I celebrated the sweet turn of the weather with a nice, long walk. I did the actual walking. Caleb rode along in the purple jogger stroller; this is the last year he’ll be able to [...]

Between the Pages

I have a very vivid childhood memory of sitting next to my mother on our orange plaid couch, leaning contentedly against her shoulder with my eyes closed while she wove the words of a book around my head. It was My Side of the Mountain, by Jean Craighead George, and as she read it aloud, [...]

Music Minute

My sister, Amber, introduced me to the rock group Red last month, blasting this song through me with her car speakers while we were out driving around town. (I believe we had actual errands to accomplish, lest you imagine we were cruising up and down Sherman like a couple of teenagers, two grown women hanging [...]

Home Again!

No one in my immediate family got knocked down by the thirty pound salmon hurtling through the air at Pike Place Fish, so in that sense, at least, our trip to Seattle was uneventful.
On the other hand, we gawked at aquatic mammals in the aquarium, sat in the cockpit of an F/A-18 Hornet at the [...]