Tag: family history
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A Special Memory for Throwback Thursday
One afternoon back in my mid-teen years, I was home alone in the apartment when I heard a car honking outside. When I rushed to the window and looked out, I saw a Chevy like this one pulled up to the curb. Right away my mom and dad got out. I didn’t realize it then,…
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First Love
A Reminiscence It’s Sunday just past eight as we leave Mom behind at home. Dad wears the same dark gray suit he wears to work. His shirt is fresh and his tie knotted close to his Adam’s apple. My brother Dale, seven years older, wears a heavy, white sweater over his shirt, woolen knee pants,…
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Hollyhocks and Tomatoes
Like Hector Jones, a character in “The Barn Door,” my father always had tomatoes and hollyhocks in his gardens, no matter how large or small. He must have done this sketch from memory because it’s dated 11-16-39 in his neat civil engineer’s hand. “The Barn Door,” a prequel story to my calendar mystery series set…
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The Gardener
Recently, while working on a prequel story for my calendar mystery series called “The Barn Door” that takes place on the 4th of July weekend in 1898, I decided to give one of the characters a vegetable garden. And that led me to think about my dad and his gardens. Here’s my piece on that…
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A Family Story
A Family Story Part of the backstory for my calendar mysteries explains how Minty Wilcox, her mother, and the two youngest members of the family came to live in Kansas City. This story focuses on Minty’s youngest brother, Eddie, born with a clubfoot. When Eddie was around six or so and going to a country…