The postal carrier dropped a postcard through my mail slot that had been sitting in a dead letter box since 1988. It carried eight words written in my father’s familiar, …
The 1988 Postcard From My Late Father That Cost Me Thirty Years And Found My Sister Read More
The bell over the diner door was missing its little clapper so it just made a dull thud against the wood frame every time you pushed it open. I hated …
The Two Packets Of White Sugar That Cost Me Five Years Of Blindness In The Diner Read More
The cold linoleum under my boots had that faint, sour smell of damp pine needles we tracked in every autumn from the woodpile by the back porch. I was standing …
The Waterlogged Phone At The Bottom Of The Merwin Reservoir That Cost Me My Brother Read More
The cedar chips in the flower beds always smelled the strongest right after a heavy rain, when the red clay settled down and the yard stopped looking like it was …
The Five Million Dollar Parking Lot And The Little House On The Hill That Would Not Budge Read More
The cedar fence posts along the county road were gray as driftwood and twice as stubborn after three years of drought. I sat on the tailgate of my old Dodge …
The Rusted Hohner Accordion And The Fifty-Year Secret That Cost Me My Quiet Porch Read More
The smell of damp mortar and cut lime always brings me right back to the summer Cal decided our backyard needed a monument. It started with a pallet of red …
The Backyard Brick Wall And The Painted Mural That Cost Me My Whole Marriage Read More
I know you are going to hate me when you hear this, and honestly, I do not blame you one bit. I was the one who left the side door …
The Backyard Cat And The Lonely Woman Who Cost Me Fourteen Months Of Searching Read More
I was wrong about what that old trunk in the back of the garage was meant to hold, and I admit it right here because keeping that secret for thirty …
The Patched Wool Quilt From My Grandmother’s Trunk That Cost Me Thirty Years Of Pride Read More
Three seasons of dead squash vines and brown tomato stalks will teach you a lot about how stubborn dirt can be when you do not know how to talk to …
The Forty-Three Dead Tomato Stakes And The Hidden Letters That Cost Me Three Years With Arthur Read More
The box fan in the second-floor hallway was clicking every third rotation like a dry joint in a knee. I had just finished scrubbing the linoleum in room 214 when …
The Ice Cream Truck Song That Cost Me Fifty Years And Led Me Straight To My Grandson Read More
My coffee cup was still lukewarm and half-full on the side table when I grabbed my car keys off the brass hook by the back door. I had lived in …
The Platform Two Green Bench And The Thirty Years I Spent Waiting With Dale For A Train That Never Pulled In Read More
I know you are going to hate me when you hear this, and honestly I do not blame you at all because I was the main one wasting six years …
The Old Brass Key In My Late Father’s Drawer That Cost Me Six Years And Told Me The Truth Read More