December 21, 2017

Just my type

I pulled out my grandmother’s typewriter today, which I have been more or less using as a decoration on the bookshelves in the great room because I love typewriters. I love how they look, how they sound, and that incredible works have been created on them. I learned how to type on an IBM Selectric nearly 30 years ago. My school had a computer lab filled with boxy DOS machines and giant monitors with tiny displays, but the typing class still had Selectrics. To this day I don’t know why I signed up for a typing class, except that maybe my subconscious knew that I’d go on to bail out of engineering school after three terms and move to journalism. My subconscious, then, is way smarter than the rest of my brain. This is not surprising.

∼ Continue Reading ∼

• • •

November 7, 2017

Owl Surgery

Zoe called me in to tuck her into bed last night, and when I walked in I found her frozen and staring down at the sheets. Normally this means she’s discovered a spider or some other bug, or she’s just barfed, or something equally disgusting has just taken place. I steeled myself and asked, “What’s going on?”

∼ Continue Reading ∼

• • •

September 22, 2016

The Crash of a Hero

One of my favorite childhood toys was an Evel Knievel action doll. Evel’s diminutive doppelganger was a slim man in a white pantsuit with a deep, dark blue V chest applique that was studded with white stars. He had a matching white helmet and a cape. His white gloved hands were perfectly molded to clamp onto the handlebars of his shiny motorcycle. That motorcycle locked into a plastic hand crank that allowed me to wind him up and set him flying, just like the real Evel Knievel.

∼ Continue Reading ∼

• • •

February 1, 2016

The Motorman

One hundred and two years ago today, my great-grandfather received his union card. John Foley drove a street car, and he was a proud member of the Employes Mutual Benefit Association of the United Railways Company of St. Louis. He was a motorman in the 6th Division. The back of the card says he was 5 feet 10.5 inches tall, and had black hair and blue eyes. The same blue eyes as my grandmother, my father, and my daughter. (I didn’t get so lucky.) (Thanks, Mom.)

∼ Continue Reading ∼

• • •