B is for . . . .

bride
Barrie Levine
 
We were married on a steamy afternoon in late August 1972. My husband-to-be was a hairdresser with a beauty salon in town. We finished yard clean-up and table set-up by mid-morning for the backyard ceremony, and as a final touch, threw cut marigolds into the swimming pool. We had an hour to refresh and dress before the guests arrived. Paul opened the salon and motioned me to the hydraulic chair. He lifted handfuls of my dark hair over and under, combing, configuring, fastening. Picking up a spray of daisies from the garden, he misted them with a shot of hairspray and arranged them in a garland. Circling the chair, pleased with the symmetry, he held up a mirror for me to see a braid entwined with stems and petals. Back home in time for the noon ceremony, we clasped hands and walked out the kitchen door, the opening steps of our procession over the grass to the willow tree ringed with ribbons and celebrants. So many years ago — my white piqué wedding dress, the late summer sun, the canopy of green boughs gracing us. And now, the memory of fingers gently spreading flowers through my hair, making me his bride.


brownies
Blue Waters

In the mid 1950s my mother decided I should join the Brownies. She was worried about me liking to be alone all the time. I said okay, just to make her happy. One big thing mom failed to mention was the uniform. It was required. A dorky brown dress. And a stupid beanie that never fit right. When I found out our first troop activity involved making cupcakes for the local Cub Scout troop I didn’t know if I would be able to survive this at all. I wanted to learn how to tie different kinds of knots. And learn more about weather so I could read the dark clouds in the Kansas sky and know what to expect. I wanted to learn how to carve wood with my beautiful pocket knife, and how to make useful things to take on a camping trip. Stuff that was way more important than cupcakes. I didn’t last long in the Brownies. I’m sure you’re not surprised to hear that.


blueluminous
Carole Johnston

I still love the poems of E. E. Cummings. In high school, I was fascinated by his invented words like mudluscious and puddlewonderful. So, I’ve invented a word,” blueluminous,” because it fills me with delight. It carries me through time and space to a place where I can bathe in blue. I can spin in cerulean. I can float in infinite god-ness. “Blueluminous” happens rarely in real life, but sometimes just before dark, the sky becomes deep glowing indigo and shines in silence, impossible to describe except by making up a new word. I use this word, without shame, in poetry and prose, whenever I need a burst of joy. I write it. I imagine it, like I’m alone on a plane watching the sky flow, a river of “blueluminous” light. Is Cummings out of style now, among the elite of postmodern and haiku poets? His style of breaking lines is still popular, but the way he played with words like a child in a surreal toy store, no. I don’t see it in contemporary poetry. I stand alone, toying with words for my own amusement, out of line from my peers.


birder
Deborah Burke Henderson
 
My mother’s love for nature, especially birds, became her greatest legacy gift to me. On quiet mornings, we would watch a quail family dart through our backyard and scurry into the underbrush in the woods behind our home. Mumsy and I often traipsed through the greenish-brown shadows emanating from the rhubarb patch, white pines, and sturdy oaks. “Listen,” she’d whisper as she held my pudgy hand. Following her lead, I’d stop short and lean into the shallow breeze. “There,” she said, stretching her tanned arm and pointing skyward. “Do you see Mr. Downy? He’s gathering insects for his woodpecker family.” Then a Black-capped Chickadee hopped onto a nearby blueberry bush, its tiny black eyes peering right into me. “Hello, my friend,” I’d say. Perched up high in a bramble nest atop a dead pine, an owl fed her three young owlets. There were so many surprises to be found in our wonder-filled woodsy walks. These day-time adventures created the foundation for my nature-loving ways, introduced me to hundreds of avian species as well as deer, chipmunks, toads, and snakes, and filled my soul with love and compassion for all things wild.


babies
Edna Brown

Babies. I have baby radar. I really do. I can sense them a mile away. Is it their smell, their joy, their true essence that signals my soul they are near? My ideal retirement gig would be to hold babies, for hours at a time. Babies teach us to be present. They aren’t worrying about yesterday or anxious about tomorrow; they are here, now. I joke that my goal in life is to be a
grandmother, but it’s really not a joke. I hope one to day to hold sweet babies from my own babies, for hours at a time. I sometimes imagine a world where everyone gets to hold a baby, for 5 minutes, everyday, where everyone gets to smell that baby smell, feel that trust as a baby sinks into your arms, see that sweet smile in return to one’s own. What if every member of Congress had to hold a baby when they voted? What changes for the better would baby holding bring to our world?


butterfly
Emily Johnson

It was a beautiful June day when my family and a few close friends gathered in my parents’ backyard for my sister’s memorial service. She had died of cancer just a week before at the age of fifty. Music from a single violin floated like a soft breeze through the trees that surrounded us. At the same moment that my father stood up to say a few words about Hester’s life, his legs barely able to support him, a Monarch butterfly came to rest on my knee and stayed there, perfectly still, until my father stopped speaking. Hester had spent much of her life roaming the fields and woods around her house. She knew the name of every wildflower — every tree and bird and bush and beetle. It was her joy to take children on nature walks through the woods, to make cornhusk dolls, to make watercolor paintings of the flowers. How could I not believe that her spirit was still with us, in that butterfly on my knee, her fragile wings waving gently, until at last she flew away.


beauty
Frank Muller

Memories of beauty are scattered, like fireflies in the summer sky. I am twelve years old, fishing for trout with my dad and other hopeful anglers on a chill April morning. I decide to practice my fly fishing, whipping the long green line back and forth wildly, snagging the wool cap off a man's head behind me. I glimpse a glistening pool behind bushes at the far side of the stream and imagine it filled with trout. I spend an hour fighting my way through dense woods. I slip into a hole and sink to my thighs, my boots filling with muddy water, but continue on until I reach the hidden pool! Peering between the weeds I see a dozen rainbow trout floating silently in the crystal clear water, their sides flashing like fireworks in the morning sunlight. I put aside my fishing rod and stand transfixed, for what seems like hours. Finally, I notice my dad across the stream looking around anxiously. I retrace my steps back to his side.


balloon
Jim Mazza

We sat, crossed legged and knee-to-knee, on the wooden floor of our elementary school gymnasium. The youngest were lined up at the front; the older kids gathered behind us in uneven, gangly rows. With the lights out and wide-slatted Venetian blinds closed, a film began to flicker on the portable screen just above our heads. Le Ballon Rouge tells the story of a young boy who, walking to school among the decaying buildings of his Parisian neighborhood, is befriended by a large, floating red balloon — which becomes an immediate and constant companion. How I wished for a friend like that, someone who might follow me no matter where, creating a bit of mischief and protection along the way. Perhaps, I imagined, my red balloon would meet a blue balloon, as happens in the movie, and become my friend too. When the mean kids slay the red balloon, stomping on it with worn leather shoes, I sobbed. I cried again, moments later, when the boy is enwrapped by all the colorful balloons of Paris. As the embodiment of true friendship and adventure, they lift him, as I still dream to be carried, above the city’s rooftops and beyond.


bird
Kath Abela Wilson

seen and not heard it was a bird I think it was a sparrow said nothing no chirps to give itself away it's what happens if you leave the balcony doors open all day all night three floors up you have to expect the bird but we were not prepared surprised stunned didn't even serve lunch just tried to reason with him about occupying Rick's chair I need to sit there bird he said but bird was busy being bird on a chair took his own good time and place until becoming bird riding a palm leaf ceiling fan flutter whoosh bird heard and not seen


bathtub
Kathleen Kramer

Oh, the luxury! Oh, the extravagant bliss of a bathtub — a long, blue bathtub — where, as a 12-year-old girl, I could stretch out, feel my hair float like seaweed on a gentle, tropical tide, close my eyes and sigh one of those long sighs that nearly make you forget to breathe in again. This sumptuous interlude almost washed away the cramped memory of the square, galvanized tin tub parked on the kitchen linoleum on Saturday nights. There, knees to my chin in a modest attempt to hide my new breasts, I lathered quickly, rinsed as best I could, and dashed dripping to the bedroom I shared with my sister, Suellen. And although I was always grateful for the gallons of  warm water heated on the stove and poured carefully into the tub by my grandmother, the reality of the long, blue bathtub when it finally materialized was a miracle. There, in a portion of the attic carved out for this new wonder, the grownup blessing of privacy was assured.


baby
Katrina Morse
 
It’s July. My two younger brothers and I stand in knee-high grass dotted with big white discs of Queen Anne’s Lace on long stems. It’s hot and insects are buzzing. I look way up to the 3rd  floor of the old hospital and wave to my mother who is peeking through a narrow leaded glass window. Since I’m only seven I can’t go inside. I can only imagine my newborn baby sister, Belinda. Now we are home and my mother sits cradling the baby, my brother Rob snuggles in mom's lap, my brother Doug stands next to mom and holds onto her dress hem. I can’t reach my mother. In early November I have a stomachache so bad I double over and can’t stand up. It wasn’t too much Halloween candy like they thought. I have appendicitis. I have to go to the hospital and my mother has to leave baby Binny, Binda, beloved Belinda at home so she can visit me. Then my mother leaves me and I am alone with another girl who is having her appendix out and teaches me how to play Parcheesi. I am the oldest of four kids now. Suddenly a big girl.


boattale
Laurinda Lind
 
When I was a teenager our family was impoverished, but thanks to an insurance settlement, my father got the car he always wanted (Chrysler Imperial) and the boat he always wanted, double-hull fiberglass, which was like flying on a magic carpet after a lifetime of bouncing around our twenty-mile lake in an old aluminum fishing boat. When my older cousin came into a dock too fast and chipped off some fiberglass, I lied and said I did it, just like I falsely said I was the one who got the Imperial stuck in a muddy driveway, though I had been letting my unlicensed boyfriend drive it on our rural road. But I was behind the wheel the day I took my freshman-aged friend Reva out on the lake when I was a senior. She jauntily sat up astride the boat’s prow, and I didn’t make her move to a safer spot; in fact, clowning around, I jerked back on the throttle. She almost fell off: to this day I can’t stand to think of the alternate reality where I ran over her, maiming her for life. I turned around and eased the boat home, and have rarely run one since.


bestow
Lou Robinson
 
It’s a prayer, even though I don’t pray. Please, you, (anonymous, any entity, any accident) bestow protection on my horse Gabriel. Bestow on him a circle of white light, watermelon, apple or whatever you think works. Stem my flow of hatred and bitterness toward those I blame for this world mess, long enough to help him. I can’t help anyone. I try to visualize harmony blah blah blah and out comes a tornado of rage against whoever I can find to blame in the moment for the state of things. Heal his lameness, his anxiety at being locked up, alone. His hunger for friends, freedom, unlimited grass …. Until now I believed a native American saying: “Pray to Horse. Horse has a god” but I don’t know if Gabe prays. And if he does, does he pray to be free to run looking for his imaginary herd? Does he want to live? Does he want to die from overeating? If Horse has a god, can Gabe share it with me? Did you ever pray? At about age four I had an imaginary black panther that lived under my bed and protected me. He was all powerful and I swear kept me alive for many years. He was a spirit though, dead, had to be to be powerful enough. Little Gabe goes charging out the gate in his white face mask and fly-sheet flapping, like a medieval charger, into the pasture. I thought I would write about the current thing this second, this lifetime, that makes me most sad. So, here it is.


booze
Margaret Dennis

Booze. It’s an ugly word, but for years I loved it. I craved it. Starting when I was very young, I felt like an outsider, uncomfortable in my own skin. I copied “normal people” to see how they behaved. That all changed, however, when I discovered alcohol. I was seventeen and I was with my friends after a prom. We decided to go to a place that tried to pass as a nightclub in our small town. I ordered a Seven and Seven (Seagrams 7 and 7 Up). I was in heaven! I became another “me.” She was prettier, funnier and a total risk-taker. I wanted more of this wonderful feeling.
I drank heavily in college, but it seemed everyone did. When I married and had children, I was much more moderate, but, oh, how I longed for that feeling again. In my mid-forties, finding myself alone, I turned to my old friend again: booze. My drinking became out of control. But strangely, it didn’t give me the rush of good feeling that I wanted. It only gave me problems: terrible hangovers, evenings I couldn’t remember, and worst of all, a total loss of self respect. Fortunately, a dear friend directed me to a local 12-step program. There I worked on getting myself back: a new self, one that was confident in the life she was learning to lead.


bluefish
Miriam Sagan

First you burned, and then everything else went up in flames. I unhooked you from the respirator, and then you died. Do you remember that evening when we caught the bluefish in Menemsha Bay? We were ill-prepared, had neither a bucket nor a knife. We didn’t expect to catch anything, but a large vicious bluefish took the hook. We pulled it gasping to the sand, and had no way to kill it as its teeth went for our bare feet. You took a large rock and brained it. At that exact moment the moon rose full and orange over the eastern shore of the island, behind us. We put our hands in gassho and bowed to the fish. Took it home, cooked, and ate it. Only I remember, as both you and the fish are dead. You were cremated in your gray under kimono, along with your lineage papers, certifying that you were an ordained Buddhist priest.


before
Pat Davis
 
He grinds beans for a bowl of coffee with torn bread for dipping. I think he's planning his day, but it's hard to tell because he rarely speaks. When it's time, I follow him to the gardens behind our tenement. On the days I listen long enough, I can hear him hum in his world of living things.


birds
Stacey Murphy

Birds and their babies are all around this summer. Outside my window, in a planter box high above a driveway, a junco family nested and carefully tended three eggs. Two hatched. Last week, I was sad to find one of the chicks had fallen to the driveway below. That left one remaining, and it seems she made her way under the container holding the geraniums, into a space between the plants and the larger window box, judging by the parents who kept coming with bugs and disappearing into the cranny. It has been two days, though, and the adult juncos now seem focused on a nearby smoke bush. I am wondering how long I should wait before lifting the plant container to verify: did the last junco chick fledge? Or will I make another sad discovery? Unlike juncos who place nests up high, I am not very brave.


birds
Sue Norvell

More than 20 years ago, when she was about two, our granddaughter called them Baw Egos. She stood wide-eyed as we three watched two great chocolate birds with glistening white heads soar above us. Rare, and wonderful. Many years before that, my husband and I had huddled with other birders around powerful spotting ‘scopes in a cold, unwelcoming parking lot at Montezuma Wildlife Refuge. Buffeted by stinging late winter winds, we wiped our drippy noses as we peered through the ‘scopes at tiny blobs on a frumpy nest on a far away snag. We said “Oooh!” and “Ahhh!” — excited to know that we were seeing one of the first pairs of Bald Eagles nesting in the Northeast in many, many years. DDT had decimated the population. Blurry and distant though the sighting was, we were cheered and felt a glimmer of hope for the species. Forward another 20 years. Two weeks ago my husband was removing invasive water chestnut from the Six Mile Reservoir. As he sat in his kayak uprooting the weeds, he heard a splash. Close by, a Bald Eagle powered up from the water, carrying a fish. Baw Egos are back!


bali
Theresa A. Cancro
 
An enchanted island in southeast Asia, a tiny place considered a vacation paradise by many. In my young adulthood, I never imaged I'd be involved in pursuing the arts of this corner of the world. Due to several serendipitous events, the Indonesian Embassy's Assistant Cultural Attaché — a Balinese music and dance master — invited me to join the American gamelan group that practiced weekly on authentic instruments. It was a crash course, mostly by rote, but soon I was involved in performances far and wide within the US. I pursued Balinese dance in the master's basement studio for a number of years. I can't say that I ever became terribly good at the dance — it is so difficult to get just right: the curve of the body and tilt of the head, the posture of the arms, and the quivering of fingers to match the intricate music. Elaborate costumes and headpieces took time to put on, every detail was important, but I felt like I'd entered a magical world. I can still recall the shimmering sounds of interlocking rhythms and the gleam of colorful brocades.


bessie
Tom Clausen

One day, five years ago, I realized there was a deer watching me from the bushes in our back lot. Incredibly, she and I developed a relationship that has evolved to include her fawns and extended deer family. I named that deer Bessie and from that fateful day my deer family has grown to include Darling, Pasha, Leah, Lee, Doris, Phoebe, Ivan, Abe, Ring Eyes, Dezi, Dooley, Bella, and some whose appearances were just once or twice and not enough to get to know them and name them. It was just Bessie way back when, in the beginning, bless her.    


berlin
Yvette Rubio

I lived in Berlin — West Berlin, to be precise — in 1976,  the world’s symbol for Separation, a walled-in and walled-off capital, a landlocked island at the epicenter of the Cold War. I flew away, Fulbright scholarship in one hand, empty notebook in the other waiting to be filled with my brilliant Masters Thesis. I fled to this separated city, separating from my husband; I was far too young to be confined by marriage. I escaped the ancestral swamps of New Orleans for an imprisoned icy marshland. No matter the irony of my decision. Tomorrow belonged to me. After a year, I left Berlin unchanged. Its wall was still there. I left unchanged, too. I completed my thesis. I had a few exciting love affairs. My German was improved. I nevertheless remained the same walled-in and walled-off woman, separated, engaged in obsessive planning of the next escape. It would take many more years, a year in fact after the Berlin Wall came down, before I’d begin to slowly take down my own walls.


basement
Zee Zahava

There were so many rules to follow back in those days, when we lived in that huge apartment building in the Bronx. Most of them started with the word “don’t.” Don’t talk back. Don’t speak to strangers. Don’t be late for school. Don’t lie (not even a fib). Don’t lose your library books. Don’t forget to brush your teeth. Don’t fight with your sister. Don’t be fresh. Don’t eat anything in someone else’s house. Don’t get up from the table until you’ve finished all your vegetables. And more. But the most important rule of all was: Don’t go down into the basement. That’s where the washing machines and dryers were, for all the tenants in the building. Only mothers could go there. My mother went every Friday, carrying the dirty laundry down a long, dark staircase and carrying the clean laundry back home. When she was in the basement I held my breath until she returned safely. Mom never told me “don’t worry” and that was smart. Because I didn’t know how to not worry.

S is for . . . .

shrimp
Ann Carter
 
S is for shrimp. I can de-head two shrimp at one time, standing up. When I was twenty-five I worked on a small shrimp boat off the coast of North Carolina. We shrimped at night and dug clams during the day. Gliding through the salt-water creeks, the night sky stretched across my imagination and darkness wrapped itself around me. The weighted nets were dragged through the black water leaving gentle ripples behind us. When they were full, we hoisted the doors up, and emptied our catch into the boat. Then standing at the bow cap under lantern light, I de-headed pounds and pounds of shrimp, one in each hand.



s-shaped
Anne Killian-Russo

Our cabin-like home in the woods had its share of mice and spiders and ants and my husband always remarked calmly, “We live in the woods,” whenever I  would become unnerved enough about their presence and want to demand the landlords do something. It was a lovely home otherwise with just enough of what we needed and a wood-burning stove that kept me warmer than I’d ever been in the long northeastern winters. One warm August evening that turned into night while I worked, Cali, our cat, and I were upstairs creating a birthday memory project for my son, Sean, who was turning 30 in September. I worked and Cali dozed. Nobody else was in the house. Feeling quite pleased with how the 30 collages of photographs and words to represent cherished remembrances of his life were developing, I capped the glue stick, organized the materials for ease in picking up where I left off the next time, closed the light, and descended the stairs with Cali right ahead of me, as usual. At the moment my feet touched the ground floor, I noticed Cali frozen in full attention toward the living room. “What?” I asked her, as I turned toward what she was looking at, to see a black ring-necked snake slithering quickly across the floor, its body forming first a correctly formed capital S, and in one quick movement, a backwards one. We don’t live in that cabin “in the woods” anymore.



smoke
Bill Waters

I was out for a drive on a sunny November morning, and I was five cars behind a big dump truck. We were all moving down a narrow tree-lined road, and as the truck driver shifted up through the gears, clouds of exhaust came blasting out of his muffler. All that pollution! I set my ventilation system to internal as the bluish haze expanded — above the cars, above the truck, above the trees. And then I noticed the sunbeams: long, slanting shafts of light among the bare branches. Without the smoke, I couldn’t have seen those sunbeams; without the darkness, I wouldn’t have seen the light.



slinky
Blue Waters

I was five years old, in 1952. My three older siblings were all at school. Mom needed something from the Dime Store. We went together. I was too young to leave at home alone for a half hour, apparently. Not in my opinion, but definitely in Mom’s. While Mom went to find what she needed, I wandered around the store on my own. And then it happened. I saw something I absolutely had to have. A slinky! I fondled it’s wiry structure and imagined it walking down the basement stairs like I had seen on TV. I knew Mom wouldn’t think it an appropriate toy for me since it wasn’t a cutsie baby doll. So I just stuck that slinky in my pocket. We went back home. Helen, the owner of the Dime Store, was also my Sunday School teacher. When I saw her on Sunday, she winked at me. I knew she knew. I whispered my confession to her. “Just promise me, Martha, that this won’t become a habit. It’s not proper. So don’t ever do it again, okay?” “Okay. But can I keep my slinky anyway?” Helen gave me another wink. “As long as you be good.” My first big secret from my mom!



sex
Edna S. Brown

The questions my young children asked me about sex still make me giggle. How are babies made? (Sperm meets egg, they fall in love and a baby is made.) How does the sperm get to the egg? (Traditionally, penis goes in vagina.) Silence . . . . But only for a second, right? (Oh, I hope not!) Do you guys still have sex? (Much less than we used to before you were born.) Can we watch? (No! Oops, forgot to stress the privacy part.) You’re naked, aren’t you? (Yes, sexual partners may be partially clothed or naked.) Last comment, “naw, we don’t wanna watch that.”



streams
Frank Muller

All my life I have been soothed by streams in the woods. I often sit quietly on their banks and listen to their gurgling songs, becoming part of the scenery. I watch as deer, fox, and raccoon appear silently from the forest to drink. I float in kayaks or immerse myself in the cooling waters.
I sail leaves in the currents and watch the natural sailboats journey on the living, undulating, glistening pathways. Sometimes tiny water strider insects climb on board a leaf raft to rest. I watch as they spin and meander slowly downstream, then quicken in rapids until out of view, journeying towards unknown destinations; a metaphor for life.



stream
Ian M. Shapiro

By the high school there was a stream and when things got rowdy kids would get thrown in. One time the stream flooded and overflowed into the high school parking lot. The lot became a pond and this guy took a boat out in it. But what I loved was if you left the school and headed into the woods, following the stream, it all became mystery. Trees and light and shadows and water. And solitude. So I did that. I left the school and I headed down the stream.



stinky
Jim Mazza

Ours is a neighborhood of cats. Most are rescues and some have been plucked from cardboard boxes at farm stands posted with signs promoting: Zucchini, Tomatoes, Free Kittens. Others have arrived with the fall influx of students. Stinky was one of those. She accompanied a first-year veterinary student who moved in next door to us. A lovely, long-haired feline, with fluffy black and white fur, Stinky’s appearance (and sweet smell) belied her name. Often left alone, she spent most days curled up on our front porch. She was a great presence in our life, so we were saddened when Stinky and her student moved across town, although equally surprised to find her, just days later, once again on our porch, sleeping soundly in her usual chair. At first, we feared she had been abandoned but soon learned that Stinky’s daily visits to the old neighborhood were planned. As implausible as it seemed, Stinky arrived each morning — by car. In the evening, the car returned and blew its horn twice, the cue for Stinky to jump off our porch, run to the corner, and disappear into an opened passenger door. Unwittingly, although happily, we were providing Kitty Day Care.



sauce
Julie Lind

When I was growing up, my parents would pack my sisters, brother, and I into our gray minivan every Sunday and drive down the thruway to Niagara Falls. We could see my grandparents’ house from the 190: a small ranch on the corner of 70th street with yellow siding, a brick front, and two small plum trees in the backyard. As we pulled up to the side walkway, we took our seatbelts off, ready to slide open the car door and run towards the entrance. Before we set foot inside, we could smell the garlic, tomatoes, and meat that had been simmering on low all day, the flavors folding into each other. We could hear my aunts’ Italian voices talking about what happened that day at the hospital, the smoke of their Merit menthol cigarettes filling each pause. The basement was the only room large enough to hold everyone, so at dinnertime we all headed downstairs and sat at the two tables that my grandfather had made out of old doors. We passed around the Parmesan cheese and sprinkled it on platefuls of spaghetti covered in sauce. Before we ate, my grandfather led us in prayer: “Father, Son, Holy Ghost, who eats the fastest gets the most!”

 

swan
Kath Abela Wilson

I was in love with the letter S. I knew it meant more. It only counted for one, I knew that. But added to other things it was priceless. Doubled their value, even tripled, without trying. I could be like that. I knew it. And so I was always in love. I began to collect S's. I put them in artworks, and modeled my signature with swirls and curliques. Finally with natural grace, one night, one began to come to life, formed itself with clay in my fingers, into a swan, the most natural shape,  a beak on one side and fan on the other. I had met my match. That was the night we grew wings.



soaps
Kathleen Kramer

Every Monday through Friday, at precisely one o’clock in the afternoon, Mother and Grandma Hess settled themselves before the TV, sighing with contentment and anticipation. It was time for their favorite soap opera, As the World Turns. Balanced on their laps were their lunch plates, and placed carefully on the floor beside them, steaming cups of black coffee. Mother’s lunch was always a cheese and onion sandwich — sharp cheddar, topped with a thick slice of Spanish onion. Grandma’s was the same, sans onion, but slathered with mustard. The morning’s work — whether it had been scrubbing floors, changing sheets, or canning peaches — was done, and they could lose themselves in the dramatic world of Sheila and Tom, Old Judge Lowell, and Bob and Lisa Hughes, whose troubles were always worse than their own.



snap
Katrina Morse
 
Larry Mortimer was destined to sit behind me in homeroom from 7th grade to 12th, Mortimer being alphabetically closest to my last name of Morse. In 7th grade three elementary schools merged together and we started having homeroom and passing classes. Each homeroom was a chunk of students whose last names were close together in the alphabet, so Larry and I started each day for 6 years sitting in our row of desks with me in front of him and him looking at my back. Larry looking at my hair, at what I was wearing each day . . . and then one day in 7th grade homeroom he ran his finger down my spine. I could feel it through my top. “You aren’t wearing a bra,” says Larry. “There’s nothing to snap.” I don’t know what I said, if anything. I am sure I turned bright red, mortified that he had noticed that I was still a prepubescent girl with no breasts. After that I asked my mom for a “training bra” and then asked her how to shave my legs — and hated how my legs quickly became scratchy hair stubble.



skinny
Margaret Dennis

I was always skinny as a kid. My legs were so thin that I had to endure tons of insults growing up, like: “what are those strings hanging out of your shorts?” or “what are you standing on? Toothpicks?” It didn’t help that my mother  was especially proud of her legs. She wore sheer nylons with seams up the back and very high heels, all to show off her proudest attributes. When the mother of my best friend bought me my first garter belt and stockings at age twelve (my own mother would never have done this) I was thrilled and felt so sophisticated! It didn’t matter anyway, though, as the stockings just “puddled” at my ankles. I cried bitter tears. It wasn’t just my legs that were skinny, I was thin all over. In elementary school we would get little cartons of milk for a mid-morning snack. I hated mine. The milk was warm and unappetizing. The nun in charge of my class would inevitably decide that if there were any “extra” they should go to me since I looked undernourished! The thought of that time can still turn my stomach. As years went on I did get an appetite, gained weight, and looked somewhat more “normal.” My legs never changed though. They are still skinny, but at this point, I have decided to like them!



sunrise
MJ Richmond

It was still dark as I drove my rental car down into the canyon toward three rainbow-colored hot air balloons resting on their sides. At first it appeared that the canopies were being filled with fire, but they were actually capturing the heat that was urgently coaxing the balloons to repeatedly rise and fall back to the ground. The basket readied for its passengers by sitting upright as the nylon envelope expanded. The sky above the Arizona canyon walls was light peach as I climbed into the wicker basket quarters and we lifted off. First we floated gently, a few inches aloft along the ground, then moved smoothly up into the morning light. We rose quickly as the sky took on hues of deep pink and bright reds. Soon we were close to an altitude of 3000 feet, moving in a river of air being heated by the rising sun that greeted us near the top edge of the steep-walled valley.   



sudan grass
Tina Wright
 
For the hell of it, I am growing a garden plot of Sudan grass this season as a cover crop.  My first try, buckwheat, was decimated by birds, especially killdeer nesting nearby. So I replanted. A crazy thing to do anyway, sign up for a Cornell community garden space in late May after my brother Jay’s death, but I needed a project like this, a cover crop with garden tools. In his last days Jay was desperate to refurbish the Farmall M tractor in his yard to a bright new red and I was to be his helper. So, we’re doing this instead, Jay. I tell the June blue sky about calling the Ithaca Agway Farm/Garden line to ask about seeds and the woman there had never heard of Sudan grass. Only Jay would know what I mean. Jay, she never even heard of Sudan grass! I told her it’s a sorghum, dairy farmers grow it sometimes when you can’t get corn in on time. And she acted funny like I was asking about quinoa seeds or something weird, exotic. Only Jay would know what I mean. A farm store!



scurvy
Zee Zahava

Mom talks a lot about scurvy. That I will get it if I don’t eat half a grapefruit every day. She says it’s what sailors used to get and it is a bad thing. I say I’m not a sailor. Mom says that doesn’t matter. Half a grapefruit. Every day. She must have read an article about this in one of her magazines: Redbook or Family Circle. I hate grapefruit, so bitter, makes my mouth pucker. Mom doesn’t care. Every day. Half a grapefruit. Because of the sailors. And the scurvy.

Types of Silence: a collective list compiled between May 1 and May 3, 2020

The silence of a bad internet connection
The silence of waiting for a phone call
The silence of a finished book
The silence of a sleeping cat
The silence of a break in the rain
The silence of new buds blooming
The silence of an antique plate, lying smashed and scattered on the floor
The silence of elves when people pass by
The silence of waiting for bad news
The silence of the world holding its breath


The silence of ignored pain
The silence of a brilliant idea, lost
The silence of confusion
The silence of not saying anything because it would be rude to comment
The silence of predawn
The silence of a text, forgotten and left unread
The silence of two people on a video call, longing for each other
The silence of 174 miles, the distance between you and me
The silence of the coward
The silence of the ache nobody sees


The silence of emptied park
The silence of the house he won’t come back to
The silence of insensate stones
The silence of savoring that first cup of morning coffee
The silence of the just-filled bird feeder waiting for visitors
The silence of waving to others from 6 feet away
The silence of a baseball stadium waiting for the pitch
The silence of contemplating the empty canvas
The silence of writing the dreaded letter
The silence of a sulking child


The silence when a concert ends, just before the applause begins
The silence when your car hits a patch of black ice
The silence of shock — felt in the pit of your stomach
The silence of fear
The silence when you realize you’ve made a terrible mistake
The silence of the naughty child
The silence of disappointment
The silence after meditation
The silence when the phone stops ringing
The silence of snow falling on the ocean


The silence after tears
The silence during joyful memories
The silence of a back alley viewed from a hotel window
The silence of the room around my thoughts at night
The silence of a flat roof
The silence of a crawlspace
The silence of an attic
The silence of a prison cell after the door is closed
The silence on top of Mount Washington that I didn’t know existed
The silence that became my mother’s eyes toward the end


The silence that abides in all trees
The silence that arrives when deep friendship settles into itself
The silence of tears falling inside your heart
The silence of daffodils waving in the breeze
The silence in your car when you're all alone going nowhere in particular
The silence / rest between musical notes without which there would be no melody or rhythm
The silence before telling the truth
The silence of an earring that has lost its mate
The silence of of a loose ring, slipping off my finger
The silence of a tube of lipstick, unused for decades


The silence of a rainbow, fading
The silence after a raucous mental storm
The silence at the completion of my exhale
The silence of a still lake at dawn
The silence of my dull depression
The silence of my own sweet soul
The silence when the Jimi Hendrix song ends
The silence in your smile
The silence of touch
The silence of my deaf dad’s world


The silence of gum inside my pocket after washing my pants
The silence of his final breath
The silence of the platform after a fast moving train has left the station
The silence of morning when the garbage trucks depart
The silence of a searching eye
The silence of summer as I dip my head below the surface of the water
The silence of a deleted email
The silence of defeated desire
The silence of a jet stream drifting above my head
The silence of my 1968 Royal electric typewriter gathering dust in the attic


The silence of a restaurant cocktail shaker awaiting ice and a customer
The silence of the snowblower on a mid-July day
The silence of a raccoon in the tree above my car
The silence of an albino skunk as it scurries between my feet
The silence of the King Fisher just before spotting dinner in the creek below
The silence of a line of industrious leaf-eating ants
The silence of her inaudible voice beneath the protective cloth mask
The silence of a grasshopper cupped in my granddaughter’s hands
The silence of freshly-cut grass
The silence of a heron moving through the rushes

The silence of an echo on the moon
The silence of the last word in an argument
The silence of the printer when it stops
The silence of a sleeping baby
The silence of  a fog horn when the blast ends
The silence of your breath behind a mask
The silence of the clothes hanging in my closet
The silence of the orange glow of a Himalayan salt lamp
The silence of an unplayed piano
The silence of a full moon hiding behind a cloud


The silence of the sun resting on a turtle's back
The silence of the tulip before it opens
The silence of goldfish gleaming in a sunlit pond
The silence once the barking dog is let inside
The silence of pages in a new blank journal
The silence of my childhood doll
The silence of the orchid in a season of non-blooming
The silence of the dove spreading warmth over her babies
The silence of the Muse in a dry season
The silence of dandelions invading the garden


The  silence of a worm as the robin pulls it from wet earth
The silence of deep mud below the river's rushing
The silence after the death of your beloved
The silence before someone leaves
The silence after someone leaves
The silence right before the first glimmer of dawn
The silence of the stars on the coldest night of the year
The silence that tells you something you’ve cooked is delicious
The silence when snow stops falling, a reminder that falling snow makes a sound
The silence when the day is over and the house dark, but for two small reading lights


The silence that gives you goosebumps
The silence that soothes a headache
The silence that opens space for ideas
The silence of seeds as they breach the dark crust of potting soil
The silence of the yellow trout lilies, lightly waving in a low-flying breeze
The silence of the soft, white quilt after I’ve made my bed
The silence of the empty bird feeder
The silence of soggy Rice Krispies
The silence of moss on the roof of the old shed
The silence of the painting when I’ve straightened it on the wall


The silence of my bedroom ceiling at 3 a.m.
The silence when I email my teenage granddaughters
The silence between breathing out, breathing in
The silence of the last straw
The silence of moonlight through a white curtain
The silence of weeds around my mother’s gravestone
The silence of cornstalks on a windless afternoon
The silence of an ice cube melting
The silence of a rocking chair after the children are grown
The silence of thankfulness when there is too much to give thanks for


The silence of the teardrop as it rolls off of her cheek
The silence of the room during deep meditation
The silence of despair after surrender
The silence of the child after an intrusion
The silence of the heart after its last beat
The silence of the earth following a soaking rain
The silence of the fawn under the pine bough
The silence of the woman when all is lost
The silence of the sleeping village at 3 a.m.
The silence from unspoken words that could have made a difference


The silence of the ventilator just after it is turned off
The silence in the synagogue as the last candle is blown out
The silence of a book I’ve been meaning to read for a long time
The silence of a canoe gliding across still water
The silence of a broken pencil
The silence of my inner clown
The silence of an unsent letter
The silence after a terrible thought
The silence of “I can't believe I said that . . .”
The silence of not knowing what to say


The silence in the middle of an argument
The silence of kids playing — a sudden silence that means trouble
The silence of a memory that shuts out the present
The silence in those seconds as you pass from awake to asleep
The silence of midnight in the suburbs
The silence of an unopened pinecone
The silence of one pebble in my pocket
The silence of a spinach seed in the earth, not yet sprouted
The silence of birds as the spring storm descends
The silence of boys, when all goes quiet because they broke something


The silence of all the things we cannot say
The silence after I say too much
The silence of a prayer held deep inside my chest
The silence of houseplants, no judgment from them
The silence of my dog as the sun sets and sleep arrives
The silence inside of me, just before I begin something difficult
The silence of this car packed to the gills, the engine not yet started
The silence of a fawn beside the trail, hidden by its mama
The silence of a poem after it has been read aloud
The silence of a lazy cloud


The silence of trees standing, waiting
The silence of light introducing the dawn
The silence of a mourning heart
The silence of the road ahead
The silence of a woman saying goodbye to her dad
The silence of the past
The silence of a soft kiss
The silence of humility and forgiveness
The silence of true wisdom
The silence of aging


The silence of feeling alone
The silence of an internal prayer
The silence of a lullaby sung by a summer’s sun
The silence of regret
The silence of a lost friendship
The silence of drifting off to sleep while sitting in a cozy chair
The silence of a secret love
The silence of eternity
The silence of the unknown
The silence of seeing oneself in another

The silence at the center of a pause
The silence at the bottom of the swimming pool, near the drain
The silence after we leave
The silence before and the silence after and the silence during
The silence of the frozen sea
The silence between drips after the rain stops
The silence of doing something just a little bit sneaky and not wanting to be found out
The silence of the unreturned wave
The silence of a Sunday morning, very early
The silence after saying the words “I love you”


The silence of fog, filling the crevices between the spruce trees
The silence of no cat
The silence of Quaker meeting
The silence of the setting sun as it slips into the lake without a single splash
The silence of disapproval
The silence of my neighbor’s little boy — two panes of glass between us
The silence of unfurling ferns and purple violets opening
The silence of a hibernating rodent
The silence after the last leaf falls
The silence of the cabin in the dead of winter 


The silence of a cup of tea
The silence of outer space
The silence at the bottom of the ocean
The silence at the end of a song
The silence of fog settling on the hill at midnight
The silence of the dog circling on her bed
The silence of dough rising in my grandmother’s bowl
The silence of the star blazing across the dark horizon just before dawn
The silence of my heartbeat unheard by anyone but me
The silence of lit candles, hoar frost forming on windows, and leaves heavy with dew


The silence of the house as sleep becomes elusive
The silence of lying in bed before I start thinking
The silence before remembering we are in a pandemic
The silence of being alone in my house
The silence just before the coffee kettle whistles
The silence of the bird's nest cradled on my porch
The silence before I turn on the radio or the television
The silence of passing people 6 feet apart, wearing masks
The silence of smiling behind my mask
The silence all day long, just waiting, waiting


The silence before telling the truth
The silence of a strand of origami cranes
The silence before the start of a family Zoom session
The silence of a Little Free Library, empty of books
The silence of turning pages in a book I am reading with the Kindle app
The silence of Tibetan prayer flags on my neighbor’s porch
The silence of my rage, rarely expressed
The silence after the woodpecker flies away
The silence of a locked door
The silence before that last whispered “good-bye”

===

A great big NOISY “Thank You” to all these wonderful contributors:

Anne Killlian-Russo
Beth Evans
Betty L. Spero
Caroline Gates-Lupton
Ellen Shapiro Wiernicki
Fran Helmstadter
Gary Russo
Ian M. Shapiro
Jai Hari Meyerhoff
Jayne Demakos
Jim Mazza
Judith Sornberger
Kate Halliday
Kathy Kramer
Leslie Howe               
Margaret Dennis
Marty Blue Waters
Maryam Wilson
Peaches Gillette
Saskya van Nouhuys
Sheila Ann Dean
Sue Norvell
Susan Annah Currie
Victoria Jordan
Virginia Fenton
Yvonne Fisher
Zee Zahava

A Numbers Journal (a collective list)

2 children on scooters block my path across the pedestrian bridge; they giggle and say “password please”

15 minutes to walk to my office each morning and only 4 minutes to return home at night

40 years of friendship with my beloved and we still laugh together every day

12 spiders make their home on our entry porch

9 people pass our house and, happily to my ears, four different languages are spoken

5 egg-soaked slices of bread, topped with cinnamon-sugar, makes a lovely meal of French toast

8 men’s vests in my closet; she calls me “Vest Man”

7 pens  in my backpack but only 1 has ink

1 monarch butterfly has made a home in our garden

22 long-forgotten cherry tomatoes found in the back of the fridge; four are still edible

1500 calories ingested daily and I still can not lose weight

430 bridges make the many little islands of Venice into a single city

9 chopsticks in the drawer but only two matching pairs

3 locust trees slightly yellowing and glowing in the autumn sun

4 bright white moths fluttering among the lavender

5 bright beaded bracelets on my tired typing wrist

1 joyful granddaughter discovering her feet

1 castle ruin and countless Scottish hills etched calmly in my mind forever

2 hours I will never get back . . . damn stupid movie

1cat lying in the sun, she knows winter is coming

3 chrysanthemums on the porch this year, 2 last year, 1 the year before … maybe 4 next year?

7 newly planted daylilies already waiting for spring

3 wheels are best for 1 waterfront trail 

24 mandarin oranges to a 3 pound bag

7880 unread emails

8 emails read and answered

2 pieces of toast with mascarpone and jalapeño raspberry jam, plus one more

2 cups of coffee lingered over while reading about snails

4 books returned to the library; 6 books brought home

3 times my path crossed that of a possible friend, unexpectedly, in the same week

1 perfect hug

5 bowls, 3 spoons, 2 mugs, 1 plate, and 1 knife waiting to be washed

2 minutes less sunlight than yesterday, forgiven in light of the full moon

71 steps over 10,000 just before midnight

19 hours and 40 minutes past deadline

6 negotiations before the wedding invitations can be sent out

17 houses I’ve lived in so far in my lifetime

11:11, 1:11, 10:10 — numbers that come up all too frequently on my iPhone when I look to see the time, making me wonder what lies beyond the reality we live in — it must be something beyond a coincidence but I don't know exactly what it might mean

1 sister, sometimes not enough, sometimes way too many

 2 aunts I never knew as well as I wish I had

3 cousins who have always lived too far away

4 grandparents, all of whom I knew for so many years — I was so lucky

3 sisters-in-law; sadly 2 have died

56 sand dollars lined up on a rail along the dune

327 and its cousin 237 are numbers that frequently show up for me, and have done since childhood

12 pairs of shoes and sandal in my closet

1 new pair of striped Smart Wool socks that I love

2 jars of “peach pour-over” made by my neighbor, waiting to be used as a topping for vanilla ice cream

30 years I’ve been going to the beach in Maine

10 times last week I said to waiters and waitresses “no straw, please”

25 years I’ve been coming to the Thursday morning writing group in Zee’s studio

10 toes that press too tightly in my shoes

38 students to teach

57 pages that need editing

2 eyes that itch

1 nose that needs blowing

33 years a mother

51 years since my mother died

50 nights in 50 states — performances by George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers

320 one-night stands in a single year by the band Three Dog Night

3 keyboardists in The Grateful Dead who died too soon — it was like a curse

5 rings — 3 worn on my left hand, 2 on my right

2 watches —1 was my late father’s and 1 is mine — plus 5 bracelets, all worn on my left wrist

8 bracelets (and 1 scrunchie, if it’s not in my hair) worn on my right wrist

19th of January, my birthday, and I share it with Edgar Allan Poe who was my favorite poet when I was a child, long before I knew when he was born

9 children in a family, four were born in January, four were left-handed

2 sets of parents and children with the same birthdays within the same family

1 brother born with eleven fingers (1 was surgically removed)

1 rocket to be built by the 2 hands of 1 young child

1 Basset Hound, 1 corn snake, 3 salamanders, 1 guinea pig, and 30 gerbils; I had them all at the same time

20 years between me and my son, 20 years between him and his daughter

2 boys and 4 girls as grandchildren

13 windows in my last apartment in Brooklyn

3:47 a.m. is when I have woken up for the last 15 days

48 teaspoons in a measured cup

1 eagle circles two baby ospreys as they sit in their nest

2 pairs of used winter boots lying on the curb next to a “Free” sign

2 baby guppies named Tick and Tock

1 accidental click of the “send” button can change everything

28 raisins in my granola (I didn’t actually count but I’m an amazing guesser)

7 pieces of mail, 5 of them go right into the trash unopened

1 person ahead of me in line at Wegmans but the third person in line in the next aisle beats me

2 people waiting impatiently for the simmering chili and 1 person not really hungry

8 servers at Applebees who always want a hug when I come in

3 people who usually join our Sunday morning coffee chat at Ithaca Bakery

3 inconveniently timed stop lights entering town from Route 89

1 lonely jalapeño pepper hanging onto the stem after a stormy night of  September gusts

3 birds identified by a beginning birder roaming through the woods — a phoebe, a red-tailed hawk, and a vulture

4 digitized photographs (40+ years old) taken by my best friend in Taiwan — a group of friends from college days — so good to be reminded of the young men and women we once were

5 boy toys that used to belong to my son, sold in the garage sale: the Tonka truck, the toy dump truck, the super soaker, the hockey stick, and the soccer ball

6 purple and green lawn chairs, strewn forlornly in my neighbor's manicured yard, waiting for the grandchildren to stop by

7 ingredients are all I need to create a simple, satisfying Chinese stir-fry dish: 1 protein, 1 seasonal veggie, brown sauce (soy sauce, wine, vinegar, sugar, and chili)

5 North Carolina pines, beacons of light in the morning fog, their noble trunks silvery grey

256 silky strands, some sticky, some not — a gossamer web

1 word, a name, separating you from him

4:17 twice each day — once while I’m sleeping and once in the afternoon and if I see the time I whisper “Happy Birthday” to myself

2 refrigerators, 1 just for beer

4 days of solitude

5 folks in my family

55 trips up and down the stairs, carrying stuff into my new apartment 

65 packing cartons used in this move from one home to another

18 buds on my new African violet plant

1 full moon + 1 day at the Jersey shore = effective antidepressant

7 days to practice until Porchfest

6 screws stuck in an odd pocket at the yard sale, miraculously remembered when needed

5 milkweed pods piled on the porch railing — now where are they?

4 friends to visit and I only have to walk 1 mile

3 Bad Things happening in a row, just like my mother would say

2 books placed in the Little Free Library; 1 book taken from the Little Free Library

0 frogs singing at my pond this year

1 person successfully avoided on the street, only to have her turn up again 5 minutes later (and we bump right into one another)

7 grade school children clambering in the creek-bed, on the hunt for crawdads

6 layers of sheets, blankets, and mother-made quilts as autumn approaches

5 trips to the mechanic so far this month

4 times we sing the sacred medicine song

2 dogs dozing in primordial yin-yang formation on their yoga mat

2 beloved beings we are mourning whose birthdays are this month

4 fingers that haven’t touched the frets of a stringed musical instrument in many moons

5 windows and 1 door closed against the cold of night

6 dishes that haven’t been washed

7 directions beyond the visible to call upon for support and guidance on our healing paths

22 people ahead of me in the ticket line for the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra

5 times I went to my closet to get something, forgetting what it was each time

14 pennies, 2 nickels, 5 dimes, and 7 quarters rambling around in my pocket

2 really big worries keeping me awake at 5 a.m.

2 toothbrushes in a glass jar next to the bathroom sink

1 new word I learned this morning and forgot by evening

2 really good ideas before breakfast

3 pairs of eyeglasses on my desk

50 or more (maybe 100?) pens, over my lifetime, that have run out of ink when I didn’t have another pen handy

2 friends I wish I saw more often

15 cherry tomatoes in the blue bowl but only 5 are orange (my favorite)

11 books waiting to be read

1 week since I felt truly at ease

$259.98 — the cost of a new Royal 79120q Classical Manual Typewriter (red)

6 tiny turtle sculptures remaining from the time when I collected turtle sculptures

30 pairs of socks in a canvas basket on the floor of my bedroom; 12 pairs of socks in the sock drawer

54 colored pencils patiently waiting for me to use them; 36 marking pens, also patient; 64 crayons, not that patient

$6 and the Sunday New York Times is mine

0 regrets — I wish!

27 minutes to prepare my lunch; much less time to eat it

16 endless minutes of intermission

37 items of black clothing in my closet (shirts, pants, sweaters, jackets, coats, shoes)

16 times I greeted a stranger with “Good Morning” during my 30 minute walk; 6 responded; the rest didn’t seem to be aware that a person had passed them on the street

69 at my next birthday in a little over 6 months — I find it hard to believe this is true

1 woman I mistake for another woman, resulting in an inappropriate wave

5 equally excellent choices of what to eat for lunch — an embarrassment of culinary riches

1 peaceful day filled with countless moments of contentment and ease

==

Thank you to all these contributors:


Annie Wexler
Barbara Anger
Barbara Cartwright
Barbara Kane Lewis
Barbara Van Dyk
Denise Horvath
Fran Helmstadter
Gabrielle Vehar
Jenny Marshall
Jim Mazza
Jonathan Plotkin
Judith Andrew
Lyn Staack
Manuela Amzallag
Marty Blue Waters
Mary Louise Church
McCaddens of Honey Sweet Harmony
Peaches Gillette
Reba Dolch
Rob Sullivan
Saskya van Nouhuys
Stacey Murphy
Sue Norvell
Susie C Y Li
Timothy Weber
Yvonne Fisher
Zee Zahava

Summer Memories (the early years): Short-Shorts on a Theme

Mountain laurels thick as a jungle, we push through glossy green branches, searching for the sulphur springs. It’s an old-time resort turned church camp in the mountains of western Virginia, the air heavy and wet. We can drink straight from the stream, fresh water cold and living, but there’s this other water somewhere, piped from underground, famous enough that fancy people once came here to get healed. We’ve been newting, checking in the leaves for bright orange spotted bodies, little tame creatures we can hold in our hands and when it rains, columns of shin-deep water shoot along the gullies, warm and fast. We play as much in the rain as we do in the misty hot not-rain and everything we play is Explore. We adventure to a pond and I’m falling behind the rest when I come upon a coiled copperhead. I go running, lit by terror, faster than I’ve ever moved. I keep peeking behind me, convinced that it’s following me, slithering on my heels, ready to kill me dead and when it hasn’t, when I can’t breathe anymore and I’m safe, a wave of shame takes over. Maybe I made it all up. I can see the snake, burned in my mind, coiled and still. And I can still touch the panic, the strength of my legs, the doubt that comes after. In the woods, pushing back the branches, we doubted too. Why would once-famous springs be hidden like this? No path, not even the hint of one, all swallowed in the trees. But then we found it, a built rock fountain streaked with orange, swathed in moss. We're not not just Explorers now but Discoverers, touching the water that healed people a hundred years ago and then was forgotten by everybody but us.
    - Alison Coluccio

One summer evening — I was alone, as was the case so often. I thought stars were falling, and watched in amazement; then, growing bewilderment. As daylight dimmed and the sky darkened I woke up. Hundreds of fireflies outside my window pointed me toward doubt and the redemption of a formless reality. Last night, seeing only two fireflies outside another window I remembered; this morning, I begin to understand the message.
    - C. Robin Janning

We lived in a house with a pool for five years of my childhood. It was above ground, 4 feet deep and oval shaped with a shoddy wooden deck the previous owners had constructed on their own. After several harsh winters, the boards had warped creating painful tripping hazards. The deck was slippery when wet and splinters were common. Nails protruded. Bees nested below. We always warned guests to be careful on the janky deck. Injuries abounded, despite a strict “no running” rule. One could never fully let their guard down on our death trap of a pool deck. But I didn’t mind. I spent a lot of time in that pool entertaining myself. Goggles on, I’d take a deep breath and dive down to the bottom to examine the pebbly-looking liner in shades of blue and grey. I’d get as close as possible, staring intently, drifting by. It was quiet down there. Every now and then someone would lose an earring or a ring to the pool which would then blend in to the pattern of the liner making it difficult to find. This was always exciting to me. It would become my mission to dive down and comb the depths for the missing jewelry. I’d start close to the suspected drop site, then expand my search radius. I would look for a long time and then it seemed like someone else would inevitably swoop in and find the missing item immediately with fresh eyes while I was off in my own world: mesmerized by silence, pretty patterns, and dreams of glory. This usually ended a day of swimming. Exhausted from the hunt and saturated with chlorine, I’d leave the pool of hard knocks behind and return to solid ground and the familiar boredom of a summer afternoon.
    - J Kuonen

Ovaltine while Gramma pours her coffee. I watch her put her face into the steam and I do the same. We are best friends. I want to be just like her when I grow up. Today we will have sweet rolls. They are almost done baking in the wood stove. The kitchen smells of cinnamon and growing things from Grandpa’s garden. The sun turns everything yellow and happy. We keep talking and I listen to Gramma laugh. She likes to laugh. On other mornings, Gramma puts me in charge of the toaster. It is the old-fashioned kind with doors. She teaches me how to turn the bread without burning myself. It’s very tricky but Gramma says that I’m old enough. Next year I’ll be in kindergarten. (I’m pretty sure I’m her favorite.)
    - Jo Balistreri

After church on Sundays, we teenage girls were flushed with money from our part-time jobs. We would meet in front of the candy store wearing our Saturday clothes. We stood grasping towels and bags of sandwiches with wads of money in our pockets. Maybe two dollars each! This was grungiest Brooklyn as we headed to Coney Island. A long subway ride and in-depth discussion of last night’s party passed quickly. Finally we were greeted by salty ocean air as an old blanket was put down to avoid lying on the hot sand. As soon as we arrived, I stripped down to my bathing suit to rush into the water. I loved going past the second set of waves out to the wonderful calm ocean. My two friends fussed over the blanket claiming three gorgeous guys had stopped by. One of them was very tall. I dried off, ate a sandwich and left to soak up the waves again. When I got back, they were bored and admitted gorgeous guys were just mirages. Time to check out the boardwalk and all the amusement rides we could afford. The bumper cars were our favorites as we crashed into each other. The cyclone was a must. With no money left, we paraded up and down the boardwalk, peering into dusty, cool arcades. It was getting late, time for a sleepy ride back on the subway again. Have to go home, take a shower, get all set for the week ahead. Soon I would dream of riding waves with gorgeous guys.
    - Joan McNerney

All the stories of my childhood begin with my father. How could it be otherwise. He was a poet, my hero, and life with him was always a treasure hunt and a laughing fest. There are many little stories contained in the one big story. Little unforgettable stories, like how he looked in the fridge and said it looked like an elephant opened the bread. That was me. That was my style, and his way of responding. So charming. And how he shook the glass under the cold water faucet and made the water taste better than anyone else ever could. All these things made the Big Summer Story better . . . or worse! Independence Day turned into a mystery. It was the summer before college. I was eighteen. The neighborhood party was about to start. I could smell the food cooking on the outdoor grills, and hear firecrackers. I saw the open door and his suitcase in the hall. He left suddenly . . . leaving my loving mom, and the five of us children. He was just gone. After my first year in college I married the one high school boyfriend of mine that my father had liked, and I had my first child when I just turned twenty.
    - Kath Abela Wilson

The Susquehanna River is where we are expected to learn to swim. No contained pool with turquoise-painted walls. No smoothly-paved pool deck. Instead, a rocky bank, a riot of weeds, and a wide expanse of mysterious, moving water. We stand at the edge, barefoot and goose-pimpled, and stare at our goal, the bank on the other side. The river glares back at us, daring us to step into its secret eddies, to feel with little toes for its unseen bottom. We don’t even glance at each other. This is a solitary quest, a rite of passage. We each have to go it alone. Or so we think. Then we see our father, stroking strongly against the current. He glides into the shallows and smiles. “All aboard,” he calls. As the eldest, I know it is up to me to go first, so I step gingerly into the water and climb onto his back, wrapping my arms around his neck. “Not too tight,” he cautions, and I relax my arms a little. He launches us forward then and strikes off for the other side, over the deep part. I rest my chin on his head, dark and wet like a seal’s. The rhythm of his strokes, the sun glinting off the river’s surface, the splash of drops as he reaches forward again and again—all together, a waking dream. And I might have dozed if not for the excitement, the uncertainty, of the other side, coming closer and closer now. But he doesn’t leave me there. Instead, he turns smoothly, and swims back, over the deep part again, while my little brothers and sister dance on the bank, waving.
    - Kathleen Kramer

It was the magical summer of my fifteenth year. I had finally gotten rid of my “coke-bottle” glasses and was wearing contact lenses. I flew to my grandparents’ cottage on a lake outside of Detroit, where a group of their “progressive” (read socialist) friends had built summer cottages way back when, and I knew most of the people who would be summering there. This included a gaggle of teens, who I had reunited with summer after summer. I had a sleek new bathing suit that looked like tiger-skin, nicely displaying my curves, and I was in the prime of young womanhood. A young man came out to the lake to visit a friend, and he only had eyes for me. I had my very first passionate kiss under a full moon, with a white swan placidly gliding on the lake, as I sat embracing Steve under the willow trees. He kissed me again and again, while the frogs were making their music. The whole summer went on that way. Steve came to the lake as often as he could, and when he wasn’t there, I flirted with the others who were willing to be second-best. There were no cell phones back then, and I don’t have a single picture of that mythic summer, but it is emblazoned in my memory, Steve’s dark eyes gazing deeply into mine, no longer hidden behind panes of glass. The lake cottages are mostly year-round houses now, and I haven’t been there in years, but my cousin tells me there are still swans on the lake. Steve went on to become a tennis star, before we lost touch.
    - Katya Sabaroff Taylor

The best thing about summertime was playing softball. I lived for it and took it very seriously. I hated school and couldn’t wait for it to end so I could get down to some interesting activities once our city field opened up for us. There was only one girls team, our town was so small, but we were good. We practiced twice a week and also played two weekly games against nearby towns. We traveled around southwestern Kansas to tournaments and sometimes brought home trophies. I was a runty kid, I was told. I didn’t agree and focussed in to make a better name for myself somehow. I was only seven when I started with the team and was stuck in right field for the first few seasons. I didn’t care that I seldom got a ball hit to me. I still paid attention to every play and taught myself to think about who I should throw the ball back to, if it ever did come my way. I graduated to centerfield when I was nine years old. And that’s where I stayed through my senior year in high school in 1965. Metal bats didn’t exist back then. We only used wooden bats and I learned how to listen closely to the sound of the ball connecting with the bat. It gave me a slight head start in the right direction — especially when it was a hard crack. I would start running toward the sound and often that made a difference in the catch. My favorite thing in the universe was to grab that ball out of the air and feel it lock into the pocket of my glove. And if a runner had assumed the ball wouldn’t be caught and got halfway to the next base, a good throw from me would give my team a second out to add to my catch. What sheer victory for this most excellent runt of a girl.
    - Marty Blue Waters

Childhood summers always started on Memorial Day, when we invited the neighborhood kids over to help clean out the pool behind our garage where we would all subsequently spend our barefoot days. A hand-dug, concrete-walled construction a yard above the ground, as long as the
garage, maybe ten feet wide, and four-to-eight feet deep, this pool had neither drain nor filter. We'd siphon the water out every year at summer's end, but over the winter it would get enough rain to raise families of frogs and algae, and collect wind-blown plant parts which all had to be cleared away before we could fill it again. Sorensons, Morans, Taylors, Bairds, Fitzgeralds, and Follansbees would arrive after breakfast, ready to scoop out the water with sardine tins flattened on one side and take it away in bucket brigades, hand-to-hand. The green algae scent arose as we scrubbed the smooth concrete with stiff brooms and brushes, then hosed it all down to the deep end, thumbs tucked over the nozzle for spraying. Water fights were ubiquitous but we all wore bathing suits, and hosed ourselves off when we were finished. Happily exhausted, our efforts rewarded with barbecued hot dogs, colas, and ice cream, we lounged in the backyard butterfly chairs while my father started running water into the pool from the nearest spigot. All night you could hear the water snaking past the garage, slithering into the pool. Seeping into my dreams. The next day, summer officially began — with a splash!
    - Mimi Foyle

Wet skin on sun-baked pavement. Steam rising from each cheek, pressed in turn against the scratchy hot surface. Seared and scorched, running between the house and the church to cool, shaded, pool-blue water. Sitting on the curb. Shoes and socks off. Sticking toes in hot tar bubbles. Hiding in the neighbor’s tall grass, distracted by clouds and cooling summer breeze, the shouts of “olly olly oxen free” don’t lure me back to the game. Thick, humid West Virginia summers. Tin Can Ally, Kickball and Hide and Seek move me through the suffocating air. Bologna and mustard sandwiches on the back porch with too-tart lemonade and fresh peaches. Red, blistered skin scraping against tangled sheets. Drying sweat on my neck and hair provide small comfort. Jumping from the swing at the highest point. Arms raised in flight, coasting on my bike down the steep Vermont Street hill. Racing the fastest boy on the block for a little power. Propelling myself out and away from the porch onto the hard pavement for a moment of freedom. Summer evenings on trampoline beds, the sweet pause of weightlessness in mid-air. Spitting watermelon seeds from the back porch of my grandmother’s house. Dreaming of the watermelon patch that would grow. Six of us, each taking turns cranking the barrel of the ice cream maker to earn a precious, sweet spoonful. Lazy afternoons, reading on the cool living room floor, lost in The Boxcar Children, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, and The Wind in the Willows.
    - MJ Richmond

Our family never had summer vacations at the beach when my siblings and I were young. But for some reason my mother always bought a beach ball for us at the start of the summer. It came in a small package, folded up. Flattened out before inflating you could see the brightly-colored segments, like the segments of a peeled orange: white, red, yellow, green, blue, orange. Unrolling it always released that oh so familiar smell: beach ball plastic. We always tried blowing it up ourselves, but we didn't have the breath for it. So it was my father's task to inflate it. Even after it had turned into an almost lighter-than-air ball you could still smell that plastic smell. By late summer we were bored with the ball and tired of having to ask for it to be reinflated. By the time we returned to school it was forgotten in some corner of the porch, flat and spattered with dirt from the yard, quietly exhaling the last scent of summer.
    - Nancy Osborn

I still feel the smooth, cream-colored carpet, the sage-green satin drapes and transparent curtains that hid the street and kept out Atlanta's summer heat. Smell the faint scent of mildew and damp at the back of the house where we slept on cots and polyester sheets. Hear the katydids arguing endlessly all night, and the calm hermit thrush and towhees in the cool, misty morning. I hear my grandmother’s burbling, nonsensical chatter and soft, southern drawl, calling us “Sugar” and asking us to go with her to Sunday School. She was a tiny bird, pencil-thin, with translucent white skin and pale red curled hair. She wore thick, beige hose under floral print crepe dresses and soaked her arthritic hands in hot paraffin. There was a whisper of undergarments as she moved. She talked almost incessantly in a high, soft, and happy voice that drove my father crazy. If Grandmother was a bird, Grandfather was a tree. I knew that he loved me from the glint of his gold-capped teeth and the way he lifted me above his head, just that once when I was very small. They both wore thick glasses that hid their expressions but I felt my grandmother’s longing for us three girls, despite our Yankee lack of southern charm or manners. She showed us a wooden box of toys in the attic, a hot, dusty space under the peaked roof. The best toy in it was a little girl doll with a glazed ceramic head attached to a wooden body clothed in a faded and stained petticoat. Her lips were red, paled by age and handling. Even her hair was ceramic, a curled bob chipped by handling and play. I so wanted to keep the doll, but the answer was no.
    - Patti Witten

Remember the summer we were 17 and we were working at Peacock’s packing sardines? Eugene Greenlaw was our supervisor. We would often take the afternoon off to go to Gardner’s Lake. The summer I started going out with Dana. Eugene would be disappointed in us if we didn’t come back after lunch. It was hard to work when the weather was good. I had mom’s Dodge Dart that summer. Dana had to cut a pair of jeans into shorts to go swimming. I remember waiting outside his house for a long time wondering what was taking so long until he came out with the cutoffs. We were so young. And, I had Amy there that summer, too, and she was only three, so I had to be careful not to get into trouble with Mary and Alvin for skipping out of work to go off with friends. We worked on our tans at the lake and the water felt so good; I always felt clean after we went swimming. The future seemed like it was waiting especially for us. That was also the summer Eddie Rier and you took mom’s car to get more beer for the party and the cops stopped you because you were driving too slowly, without a license. You never did get your license.
    - Peggy Stevens

When I smell gardenias I think of my first kiss, the summer before ninth grade. I met Dwight Harris at band camp and when I got home he called me up to see if he could ride his bike over to see me. We hung out in our back yard. I remember that the gardenias were ripe with scent and that Dwight suddenly leaned forward awkwardly and kissed me on the lips. His lips were cold and slimy. It was disgusting and I was sure I would never want to kiss anyone on the lips ever again. And I didn't, until I shared a seat with Ozzie Smithwick on the band bus to the first out-of town football game later that August. It was dark and quiet on the bus on the way home. We leaned in to each other and kissed — my second kiss — warm and smooth and dreamy. I changed my mind about kissing.
    - Reba Dolch

It was summer camp in the Catskills, and we were having our “color war,” which was a competition organized by the counselors, lasting several days among several groups of boys. There were many activities on the agenda, but the one I remember was the swim meet, because I came from behind and won by one stroke for our team, The Warriors. I was awarded the team banner, a large painted sheet, and I proudly hung it on my basement wall at home, flanking our ping pong table. I was often reminded of what I had done for our team, interestingly spelled on the banner: “The Worriers.”
    - Richie Holtz

My sixth summer is filled with visitors, human and otherwise. Cousins Tim and Nancy have come to visit with their parents. On the Fourth of July, we settle down in the front yard to watch fireworks. During the grand finale, something dashes by, flies under a car. Tim, intrigued, finds a tiny kitten huddled behind one of the wheels, shivering and scared. We name her "Mouse" for her diminutive size and soft gray fur and keep her in the playhouse out back, offering her saucers of milk and table scraps. For two weeks, she survives but never gets much bigger. Her striking blue eyes stare through us. They almost match Nancy's. The day after my relatives drive off, headed back to Texas, Mouse is nowhere to be found. I miss the wisp of a kitten and her cerulean eyes.
    - Theresa A. Cancro

It was a long time ago that the radio warned of possible tornados. On our upstate New York dairy farm that hot summer day I had to take a long walk down the road and then up into the hill pasture to bring the cows in a big semi-circle back to the barn for milking, through the sticky mud hole near the frog pond and down the rocky lane. I was 7. Mom was afraid of the weather — was Dad away? So she made me wear a yellow rain slicker complete with stiff pants and with kind of a pointy hood, way too hot, stifling, but it was the best she could do to calm her fears. When the little herd of cows saw me in that get-up, they panicked, raising their tails and running like crazy, stampeding all the way to the barn. I laughed an awful lot for someone alone in a field but then I dutifully trudged on, wearing the rain suit all the way home.
    - Tina Wright

We drove to the Catskills every summer. My father was an angry driver and yelled 'bastard' out the window to the other drivers. We stayed at the Palace Hotel where all the mothers cooked for their families in the huge communal kitchen. I ran around with the other kids and played in the grass. I felt wild and free. My mother played Canasta, a card game, on the porch with her friends all day. All the fathers drove back to the City to work and came up on weekends.
The other kids and I walked into town to buy penny candy every afternoon. So many different candies. My favorite was the fireball. It got so hot in my mouth that I had to take it out and hold it in my hand until my mouth wasn't so hot anymore. It was like an adventure. There was a young boy selling the candy in the small grocery store. He was different than we were. We were all Jewish from European families and we lived in NYC. This boy lived in Fleischmanns all year round and had dark skin. When I bought my candy I would look at him and he would look at me. I felt something I never felt before. It made me nervous and curious. Nothing ever happened but I never forgot those first feelings, that first look. Somehow, it made me feel like life was filled with excitement and possibility beyond what I could even imagine. That simple exchange was a kind of awakening in those lazy summer days in the Catskills before I knew anything about life and the world.
    - Yvonne Fisher

I’m fifteen, spending two months in the mountains in something called a Work Camp, where I learn how to build cabins. These are meant to be useful skills — using a saw, hammering, painting — but of course after that summer I never do any of those things again. The entire group of us work-campers, about a dozen, drive to the Newport Folk Festival in a VW van. We become instant Richie Havens groupies. I buy a button from a hippie with the car-rental slogan We Try Harder printed in red on a white background. I consider it every bit as profound as that Zen koan about one hand clapping. I wear it all over Newport and every day after, for the rest of the summer, on the collar of my denim work-shirt. When I go home at the end of August my mother throws them both out — the work-shirt and the button. It takes me a couple of days before I realize they’re gone but when I do I throw a very loud and self-righteous fit: “How could you do that to my property, it was my private property, don’t you have any respect for private property?” To which my mother replies, “It was garbage.” “But it was my garbage,” I say. “I didn’t realize you were so bourgeois,” she says. That shuts me up.
    - Zee Zahava

Lots and Lots of Questions: a collective list

Is this a question? How did I get to this age without knowing the name of that early morning bird who performs for me so beautifully? What is your idea of a perfect day? Who do you want to be when you grow up? Why do live performances always make me cry? What is your favorite book? What book are you reading now? What is the last thing you said to the last person you saw today? Are you happy about the last thing you said to the last person you spoke with? What is holding you back? What is moving you forward? What if everything is exactly as it is supposed to be right this very moment? What if you told someone exactly how you feel? Is there something you need to do right now?

Will the sapsucker return to the hole it started making in the aspen tree right outside the kitchen window? Is the wren sitting on eggs yet? Do you see the hole in that old post leaning on the side of barn? Did the chickadee go in there? How many eggs are in the dove’s nest? Will we get a barn swallow in our new barn? Do you remember the robin’s nest in the tractor wheel? How does that robin make such a turquoise blue egg? Was it last year we kept hearing the cheeping of baby birds in your greenhouse and could not find where they were? Will the oriole find a mate? What makes you visible to yourself? Will I ever live at the ocean again? Will my new jade plant recover from sunburn? Will I continue to count my steps in the future? What happened to curiosity?When will people stop rushing? When will people stop adoring their material objects? Will clouds become ice cream in heaven?

Why do I cry every time I see an elephant in the movies, on TV, in a zoo, in photographs, in dreams, and even when I think about them? Do all animals dream? What animal will become extinct next? Why do I hate the sound of lawn mowers and leaf blowers so much, when I don't mind the sound of tractors? Do other people love laughing so hard that it is hard to breathe, the way I do? How long will planet Earth exist? Why do we say “as the crow flies” and not “as the bluebird flies”? Why do I lose brain cells and not fat cells as I age? Why do we waste technology on building weapons when I need a housecleaning robot? Why does a peanut butter and jelly sandwich taste so good after four hours on a hiking trail? “Why,” my mother asks, “do I keep losing friends when I am only telling people the truth about their bad traits”? Why didn’t I keep my poodle skirt from the 1950s? Why do my matzo balls turn out like lead when my grandmother’s were so light and fluffy? Why are some people funnier than others?  Why am I only funny when I don’t put much effort into it?

Do you remember the day we met? Was it raining? What was I thinking? Did I talk too much? What was the name of that Mexican restaurant, remember, the one with the funny names for all the dishes? Wasn’t it hot for May? Were you wearing those sandals with the faded black straps? Did we touch? How did you know? Was it my eyes or my hair? Can you still hear the sound of the water burbling in the creek and the wind swishing the pines? Did I make you laugh? What did we find to talk about in the car? Do you think we could see the future, like a reflection in a blurry photograph?

Where will I be when I die? How many stars can you see in the nighttime sky? Whatever happened to my college friend, Maggie, who used to make me strong, sweet espresso and black beans and rice? Is there a chance I might climb Mt. Everest? Does my birthmother ever think of me? Why do I never consider my birthfather?  Can you ever have enough hugs? Can making art calm my restless mind? Will the scent of lilacs stay in my nose until fall? How can I do more to fight racism, homophobia, and all forms of hate? Can a positive outlook truly heal the body? Is it possible to memorize all the words of every Cole Porter song ever written? Is red wine truly good for the heart? Have I missed this season’s harvesting of ramps? In what ways will I be a better person in the year ahead? Will anybody notice? Will the Great Blue Heron return to our creek soon?  Is there a chance for a late-in-life growth spurt? How many shades of blue can I see? Is there life after death — and if I get to choose, can heaven have a dance party? My mother puts her exceedingly-cold hand in mine, and asks, “Have I died but forgotten to lie down?”

What is the sound of a falling star? Do spiders think while they’re spinning? Do ants need a map after they run through the grass? Why is a mosquito? How does a cabbage feel when it is being boiled? Why did the smoke alarm go off at 4:16 a.m.? What do I learn by simply breathing? When will my hair turn white? Will evolution ever end? May I live in a castle in Scotland, please? Would you mind telling me how that tree got to be so tall? Will I finish what I started? Am I who I think I am? Are the roots of the trees under the park more beautiful than the park above ground? Why does time seem to go so fast? Will I ever catch up with myself? Do trees still grow in Brooklyn? Which crow in the murder is designated as the lookout? Can robots be programmed to iron shirts? How can I reach the “catbird seat”?

How did my mother play the piano so effortlessly? What compels my dog to eat bees? How do I forgive myself? Why can't I sleep? Why do I eat things I don't like? Why do I worry about almost everything, like my mother did? What  makes ants come into the house when it's so nice outside? Why did it take so long to become friends with myself? Why did it take me so long to move away from the people who weren't kind to me? Why does connectivity consume so much time? Why are public bathrooms so much more expensive in Colombia than in Ecuador? Why do brown pelicans always fly north along the Pacific coast? Why do I continue to hope when despair is so easy? Why do intense experiences come in threes? When I read through my old journals, why am I always so surprised and embarrassed by the me that was? Why don’t I ever recognize my own recorded voice? Do we really shed our skins, like snakes, every 7 years? Why is it easier to talk with strangers than with friends about deeply personal  experiences?

Where are the rabbits this spring? What other garden have they chosen for their young? Why did the thyme winter over so poorly? How did the parsley persevere? Why have only four branches of sage come through? When did the wild rose lose hope? Why is there no nest in the corner eave of the porch? When did the old lilacs fall? What will I sow and nurture? Where will I put my work? Who sees what I see, and who doesn’t? What would it feel like, in my body, to be a man instead of a woman? Where does that white fluffy stuff, like polyester pillow stuffing, that is always scattered around the yard, come from? Is the plum tree that flowered bountifully just weeks ago, and now only has a few sickly leaves, dying? What will it feel like to be my mother’s age? What did she feel like at my age? What did I feel like at my daughter’s age? How will she feel at my age? What did my grandfather think about while, as an old man, he did his yoga shoulder stands next to the lake wearing a saggy navy-blue speedo? Why does my cat so often sit mesmerized by the neighbor’s compost bin?

Why does the end of the month arrive before I’ve come to grips with the beginning of the month? At what point in one’s life is it okay just to be yourself and not worry about your reputation, your worldly accomplishments, or your social status? How many times have I reached for my glasses or my keys or the remote control or my slippers or my favorite pen, only to realize that I have not left that object in its “usual” place? Is there anything as glorious as the cottonwood tree gearing up to make it snow cotton puffs in early June? Isn’t it important to say no to someone who is convinced that they, not you, know exactly what is proper for you to do with your life?

Can I count the number of times I've walked up my front steps? Can I remember how my mother's hands looked when she sat holding a book and read after dinner? Will I ever want to give up paper maps for a GPS system? Will I ever have enough time? What was my first question? Who answered that first question? Was my first question to a person or to the universe? What is dawn for? Do I feel differently as the moon moves through its phases? If I lived near the ocean, would I sense when the tide is high? If I lost my sight, would my fingers be able to tell me when my poppies are ready to open? Can I identify my friends by their breathing? When I meditate, do the thoughts which pass through my mind lay around me like cast-off clothes? Why are poetry books always so slim? Do my books know how much I love them?

Why do some people always print while others write in lovely cursive script? Who imagined the idea of ink so writers would have a way to capture their thoughts? Do I have space in my life for more friends? Will it matter to the earth that I tended my few square feet of garden with love and care? What did people see before the color blue? What lies beyond this life? What does fear have to gain? Where is the love? How does one open the cells to healing? Where does inspiration flow from? Can someone please translate the baby dialects? Is active listening more attuned and compassionate? Is the ability to wait a prerequisite for wisdom? Can we all agree to disagree, in kindness? Is a lie made of caustic acid for both the teller and the told? How many heroes are left in the world? Does bravery mean facing one's fears?

Does anyone have an extra ordinary that they might be willing to share? How many good years are still left for me? Why not celebrate this very moment? When will enough be enough? What will anything matter, a century from now? Are we doomed to repeat our mistakes? What are the birds trying to tell us? Are the angels just waiting to be employed? Does a great hug bring harmonic resonance between huggers? If it's all been said before, isn't imitation the sincerest form of flattery? Does the study and understanding of a little known author make them one of the grateful dead? Are perspiration and perseverance prerequisites to publishing? Where are all the cool kids now? Does everyone's opinion have inherent worth? Is winning the lottery really a viable retirement plan?

Is that concrete? Why is there a pipe there? Did you turn the water on? Do we need so many different types of flower and plant spray? Why do Lily of the Valley flowers make me think of the theme music to The Exorcist? Do you think the dog senses storm ions in the air? Do you think moth balls will keep the groundhog from coming into our yard? Do you want more coffee? Did you water the lettuce? Where is the watering can? Is it a watering can if it is made of plastic? Do you think it will rain enough so that we don't have to water? What if it doesn't  rain? Was there a goddess of rain? Who  is the goddess of gardening? Did you see the Wonder Woman and Batman watering cans at Lowe's? Why did the Batman watering can have arms and a head but the Wonder Woman can only has her initials? Does rain make a sound if there is no one there to hear it? What does it feel like when you skim your hand across the top of water? What does the rain sound like when you are in the car and it's pouring?

Is it possible to forgive in reality, not just in theory? Is anyone else haunted by the song “row row row your boat” — wondering if life really IS but a dream? How certain are you that the “true” stories you tell about your life are really true? What does it take to be a really good friend? Who knows where the time goes? Have you ever been looking for something and you can’t find it and then you walk away for a minute and when you come back and look in exactly the same place there it is, the very object that seemed to be lost? Do you feel unbalanced all day if you wear mis-matched socks, or mis-matched earrings? Do you find it challenging to live in the present moment? Do you have tricks you do that help you fall asleep at night? Do you believe in magic? What were you taught in elementary school that you still remember today? Do trees like to be hugged or do they find it intrusive and presumptuous? How do I know if I’m in denial? Was I born bossy? Whose face will be the last face I see on this earth? Am I too enthusiastic? Which is more important to me: the questions or the answers?



Thank you to all these contributors:

Anne Killian-Russo
Annie Campbell
Annie Wexler
Barbara Cartwright
Beth Browne
Chris McNamara
Elizabeth W. McMahon
Ian M. Shapiro
Jim Mazza
Jo Balistreri
Joan McNerney
Joanna M. Weston
Judith Andrew
Kath Abela Wilson
Louise Vignaux
Marian Rogers
Marty Blue Waters
Mary Jane Richmond
Mimi Foyle
Nancy Osborn
Rob Sullivan
Saskya van Nouhuys
Susan Annah Currie
Zee Zahava