My Stories

I spent a lot of time ruminating this week on this theme of talking with my ancestors. This has been a difficult one to write about, who are my ancestors? Seems my ancestors are people I know little or anything about and did not know existed until three years ago. Did they ever cross over and talk to me or give me a sign? And if they ever did, what did they talk about and what advise have they given me. When we drove cross country ten year ago, I was attracted to getting off the interstate in Eastern Pennsylvania to see the Amish Country. We saw the horses and buggies going down the highways with Amish men, looking much like Hassidim, galloping past. Was I attracted to the novelty or was there some internal messaging to see my roots? Or then again, was it because we read about a good brewery just miles off the interstate and wanted to bring special beers we were collecting along the route to our children? I have nothing in common with these people. I feel no certain affinity as a dig d...

Thursday was Liver and Onion Day in my house growing up. I can still smell that liver frying to this day. It was a disgusting smell, sort of like the smell you get passing those steers waiting for slaughter along Interstate 5 near Kettleman City. Wait, that smell is more pleasant to me than the smell of that liver cooking. I tried to stay outside or in my room with my door closed and the window open. Seems nothing worked to hide that smell. I remember my parents trying and trying to make me eat that liver, but I just couldn’t. And the smell led to me just hating the look of that slimy purplish red blob wrapped in white butcher paper. Once cooked it turned a hideous rusty brown. So that pungent smell went on to affect all my senses toward liver. Once my parents finally figured out, I absolutely would not eat that organ on the plate, my mom decided to instead serve me the over-boiled chicken which was nearly as bad but not intolerable. Okay, a bit more about the chicken. My mom would buy...

Runaway I was a round ten-years old. I decided to run away, not sure why now, but sure I must have had a good reason. Where to runaway to? Around the corner was a street at dead-ended into Swanson’s Nursery. At the back of the nursery was an old woodshed where they kept some tools, hoses, and fertilizer for the plants. We kids often went into the shed for our games of hide-n-seek and war. Either the Swanson’s did not know we were there or didn’t care that were there as this was an area behind the nursery and we never went to where the plants were growing. I think they did kick us out once or twice but for the most part we played back there all the time and it was fine. I remember it was dark and I was hanging around the shed. Going inside and then going outside to see if the search party was out looking. I had brought some extra clothes along in a duffle bag but no blanket or sleeping bag. I think the duffle bag idea came from an episode of Lassie where Timmy decides to run away from h...

 The first pet I was aware of was my parents dog Taffy, a Chihuahua. Taffy died when I was around six and my mom almost immediately went to the pound and got a dog named Jinxy, I'm not sure why the name and if we named her or if she came with that name. Jinxy was a white, with some brown, Fox Terrier mix. She was a great dog but had two problems. The first is that she always urinated when anyone pet her. And when the door bell rang and she ran to the door excited, there was always an accident including urinating on several guests shoes. Because of this, Jinxy was confined to the service porch with our washer and dryer or the backyard. This leads to the second issue - She loved breaking out of the yard and run (sort of like Almas). Not to long after we got Jinxy, my parents did get another Chihuahua, which they named Chico. Jinxy was "my dog" while Chico was my parents. The dogs got along well and I've got cute pictures of them laying together. However, Chico always ha...

 My name is Thumbelina. I’m a 30-year-old miniature horse and I live on a farm near Petaluma. I used to live in a smaller town called Occidental. Many years ago, when I lived in Occidental, I had a dear friend I use to play with all the time named Jammy. Jammy was a potbelly pig and we use to have so much fun running and playing in the fields. As we were both small and the owner was gone most of the day at work, we spent many a happy day romping in the grass and weeds. We liked to play as we were both “close to the ground” as our owner would say. While my original owner abandoned me and the Humane Society found me the home in Occidental, Jammy came from a good home and her old owners came to visit Jammy all the time. I still recall their names after all this time, Jerry, and Susan. How could I forget their name? Jammy talked about them all the time: “Susan this and Jerry that.” To be honest that is the one thing that drove me crazy about Jammy; she could not stop talking about Susa...

It was the Summer after the Summer of Love, 1968, I was eighteen, and five of us jammed into my 1961 Chevy Corvair and headed to San Francisco, the then action spot of the world as far as the five of us teens were concerned. Interstate 5 was not yet open all the way to "SF" as we in Los Angeles called it. There were almost no has stations and the freeway would stop and start taking you onto the old California Highway 33. It was along one these stretches of Highway 33, reminiscent of a John Steinbeck novel, that the car ran out of gas. I remember that Louise, my high school prom date was already not in the best of moods and running out of call in the middle of nowhere land did not help. Besides, it was after dark and about 110 degrees outside, at least so it seemed. The cars in those days had no air conditioning, or at least my old Corvair did not. After taking the rath from everyone in the car for not filling it sooner, an old man in 1950's pickup came along and offered m...

 I'm the Wizard, do what I say to get back to Kansas. Did you hear me Dorothy, do exactly as I say to get back to Kansas and you can return to your normal life. Wash everything down. Do not use your own little basket when you pick flowers, berries or your ugly dog. Make his walk. Use strong sanitizer and bleach on everything. Keep your food outside for a day before you bring them here to the Oz Palace or anywhere else you sleep. Make sure you sanitize each and everything you touch. Wash all your fruit and veggies several times, and preferably outside before you bring them in. Take off your clothes and wash them immediately after you come in contact with anything from the outside. Stay away from your dog and spray him often. Don’t walk near that Lion or the Strawman nor your dog Toto. Its probably OK to be close to that Tin Man, just spray some bleach on his every few minutes. Do not worry, he should not rust with that bleach. You all need to wear masks. That should also help you ma...

 This from a recuring dream. The van is sitting still. All at once it starts rolling backwards. I tap the brake and it doesn't work. I try the emergency brake it doesn't work. I'm looking backward but just through my rearview mirror. I’m talking to someone sitting next to me in the passenger’s seat. We are gaining speed as we go through an intersection in reverse. The hill is getting steeper. I look both ways. I'm in a panic the car keeps going. I even try changing gears and strip the transmission. I tap on the brake and I try the emergency brake. The car is on the side of a cliff it continues going backward but I don't crash. It goes, and it goes, and it goes. Then, all at once, the brake works the van comes to a stop and all is well.

 What a last three weeks it has been. Its like when we go from winter to spring. Everything blooms at once. It was just three weeks ago that Susan was fully vaccinated. Almost instantly we came out of winter’s hibernation. A short overnight trip to see our daughter, son-in-law and our two grandsons. It had been thirteen months since we last had seen them at their old home in San Francisco. In those thirteen months they relocated to Sacramento and purchased a house that we had never seen except in photographs. We also instantly vacated one year of Tipsy Tuesdays via Zoom and reverted to gathering at our homes. We noticed that instead of it ending by 8:30, we were all still talking till nearly midnight. We have forgone the weekly Zoom for every two weeks get togethers. We had our sons-in-law’s family here for a week. They stayed at the local KOA but came here for breakfast every morning and dinner every night. We have been to our neighbor’s Paula & Jerry’s house two evenings now ...

I am at an exceptionally large house in the Bellaire neighborhood of Los Angeles. In fact, the largest house I had ever been in before or since (a first). No kidding, beer is flowing out of a fountain in the dining room (another first and probably last). It is 1971 and I am at a birthday party for someone I hardly know. And the party has only four of us, or is it six? As I recall the birthday boy had a hired date (also a first and last experience for me). Lots of stories of what happened while in the house, but I am limited in words here so will forego any further embellishment today. I will save it for another writing prompt. After a couple hours in the house, it is time to go to dinner so into a limousine we go. Another first, my first time in a limo. And the driver is named James, no, that cannot be his real name, but it was. We drive to Marina Del Ray for the birthday dinner. A special table in a special room. A nice large room made to seem larger by the fact that there were so few...

We must love all beings What a strange water layer. How do we break it open? That being trapped inside this liquid bubble. You go in from the bottom and I will go in from the top. They have no face, no mouth, and yet I can hear them. I have no idea what they are saying but the sound is one of anguish. What is that liquid they have surrounding them. Is it toxic? What will happen if it breaks, to us and to that being? They seem to be laying on that board left from the craft when it exploded. The board itself is translucent. Their body seems to protrude outward on both sides of it as a mirror image. How much time do you suppose we have to break it open and get to them? Whatever being it is and from wherever it came, we must burst the bubble and let it come forth. We must love all beings from wherever they come and however they look

That evil house I am hiding. I am hiding from those people. I spent so much time in that house, that dark old place. If I stay low nobody will see me. The other people there, they scared me. But they were not near as bad as the staff. If I stay low on the ground nobody will see me. Once it turns dark, I should be able to leave. I am on the lookout. I do not see anybody. Hopefully, I am safe from those evil people. Those people tortured me every day I was there. I stole this dress from a closet. I do not know to who it belonged. I had to get out of those smocks they had me dressed in. Do you see that little house behind the big house? That is where they would take me. It had such an awful smell and was so dark, without a window and without light. Sometimes I would have to sleep in there, once for several days. That only made me worse. I would have those nightmares of water filling the room and choking as the water-filled my lungs. This field is wet, and this dress is getting drenched. I...

 KGUA Writer’s, Episode #46 – Is there a debt you would like to repay? As many from the Mendonoma Coast know by now, I found out a couple years back that I was adopted at birth. My adopted parents never told me, and I never suspected it, and never had a reason to doubt they were my biological parents. It was quite a revelation to say the least. I was an only child, and quite a spoiled one at that. Looking back over old family slides that I am just now converting into digital images; I see I was showered with gifts from an early age. I was in YMCA, Cub Scouts, and Little League. I had piano lessons, golf lessons, swim lessons, dance lessons, to just name a few. I went fishing with my dad, golf with my mom and dad, and camping trips to National Parks all over the US and Canada. We went to professional baseball, football, basketball, and hockey games. I was at the LA Coliseum for the Dodger - Yankee first exhibition game in Los Angeles here they honored Roy Campanella and over 100,000...

Social Media should pull people together and not apart. This is particularly true in a small area like ours. The more positive the picture or story the better I feel. The more politically charged, the angrier I get. We live in such a beautiful place, nature abounds around us. Let those magnificent redwood trees, Gualala River breaking through sand, soaring eagles, fox, ocean waves crashing over rocks, rainbows over water, seaside daises, scrumptious foods, smiling faces, poetic words, happy cows, galloping horses, winding roads, endless sands, bowling ball seascapes, passing gray whales, brightly colored red beaked oystercatcher, fog beams through the forest, passing container ships, lighthouse glows, the Milky way, quaint town views, Dungeness crabs , and yes, sunset after sunset, after sunset flood us on social media.

 I have had my share of rememberable experiences in my life. Some are personal ones like my marriage, my children and grandchildren being born, finding out I was adopted, and my parents’ deaths. And there are impersonal ones; the assassinations of the 60’s and 70’s, Nixon leaving office and the World Trade Center bombing, just to name a few. And then have been natural disasters I experienced; two or three earthquakes and Hurricane Sandy, I am still sorting where the COVID year fits into these; what lasting impression it will leave. I do know this last year has made me feel that I am so lucky in life. All at once something happens that you do not expect, and you are strong and you make it through. That is a wonder. The pandemic got me thinking about how nobody in our immediate family has a debilitating illness like cancer. No one has been in a lot of pain. I have never really been sick. Susan had a brush with a serious heart issue during the pandemic, but the outcome was positive an...

 Plecostomus Hi, my name is Plecostomus but my family just calls be Pleco. My job is to suck, not blow. I really do love to suck. And I can suck all hours of the day and night. I love to suck in those tight little cracks. I love the sense of those little food morsels, those tiny crumbs that are in dark corners, sliding up my nozzle and into my hose. Once in a while I can even find some of those little black mouse droppings hidden inside the cabinet under the sink. When they are dry and there is a pile of them, they make the slightest of sounds as they bounce off my apparatus going up my chute. It’s such a titillating sensation. While my favorite position is with my long apparatus on, I do also have to do what I do best. Slide across nylon with my spinning brushes. The brushes can be set high to just tickle the top of the surface or can be set to dig deep into the pile. I love when it is set deep. I can really feel those little curled ends pushing against my brush. Its like a battle...

This is the story of my first-time using Facebook. While most people may not remember their first time using it, I remember it clearly. Before I retired, I had an employee who was in the military reserves and was called up for his annual two weeks of training. The two weeks ended, and I get a call that the duty has been extended for another month. While it seemed out of the ordinary my employer, the State of California, was one that allowed all military leave requests. I told him to stay safe and that I would see him when he returned. A few days later, one of his coworkers in passing talks about this person having a wonderful honeymoon. I did not pick up on what person they were talking about, just that this somebody was off on this wonderful boat excursion on the Mississippi River. Several days pass and I hear another story about this same honeymooner. Until I hear it a third time do I figure out that the person on this fantastic honeymoon is no other than the employee who is supposed...

Line from Sue Miller "I wonder about my future and how the next years will play out also. Aging gracefully is my wish. Will it happen that way is anyone’s guess. If I was to divide my years" Family History Form You know, you go into a doctor’s office for the first time and you always must complete that form on your family medical history. Each time, you sit there thinking about the health of your parents and sometimes even of your grandparents. Each time you sit there you must dig back and think and conjure up any health condition they may have had. Sometimes you not sure as perhaps they never disclosed certain health issues, so you are left surmising. And of course, each time you do a rerun of your life, rather quickly, to come up with hints and clues to the genetic being. Sometimes, you do it rather quickly and sometimes, you are left to wander into your childhood images while sitting in that waiting room. For me, I work back from when my dad died when he was 89 years old. ...

This is my draft letter to my siblings that I never sent. It was drafted May, 2018. Sort of gives you the history we talked about earlier today on Zoom. I was scared to send it and never did. Turned out my half-sister JoAnne did her "23 and Me" several months after I had drafted this. I figured I showed up on Joanne's as her borther and also, that she wanted to know her relatives or she would not have done the test so I called her up on the phone. From there I ended up calling Mary, my full sister, and she then did her DNA shortly thereafter. She visited here right after our call and her DNA came back in January 2019. The next month we traveled to LA where I met Joanne. And we stopped near Pismo Beach and met my half brother Bob. We have been to Bob's a couple times since then and also to Joanne's. We've met Mary twice then then in Oregon. I have not met my borther Ray who lives in Palm Beach nor my brother Jim, though we've now talked in the phone. ******...