Shakespeare and the Blues

When I was teaching high school English literature, I tried to make the pieces we were studying together relevant – especially Shakespeare.   A quick rundown of the plot of “Romeo and Juliet”: an impetuous teenage boy falls in love with a teenage girl at a masquerade ball.  It is only after they have fallen […]

If You Leave

The back-to-school honeymoon we enjoyed in those fresh-faced few weeks of summer is clearly over.   We are swimming in the deep-end now. We are in full-on homework agony. The scheduling squeezes of after-school clubs are putting a vice-grip squeeze on us now.  The once sparkly-new, back-to-school tennis shoes have turned into worn-down stinkers that fill […]

Jabberwock

Once the bridges were reopened in the early morning of September 12th, I borrowed a friend’s car and drove back to our little apartment in Alexandria. Lying in Jamie’s arms in our little bed, in our little apartment so far away from home, I whispered, “I just want to go home. Can’t we go home?” […]

Love

After Ginny and I were born, Daddy gave himself completely over to loving us, “his girls.”  Daddy is a tough disciplinarian for sure, but we were never too old to be close. Even still, we sit close on the couch, his hand on the back of our heads.  We hug each other hello and goodbye. […]

Three Envelopes

This morning at 11:30, I sauntered into our office cafeteria like a gunslinger in a Technicolor Western walks into a saloon: hot and dusty, spurs jangling, a band of sweat around my cowboy hat. I wasn’t kidding when I ordered my bourbon and Coke, but Miss Lucy thought I was and looked over her r