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Tag Archives: writing
RAW Journal Kernels – 1
Since my laptop took over, I haven’t journaled in many years. But, as you can see, I used to.
Skimming through these old treasures, I had this thought: “What if I shared kernels, bits of my past from numerous journal entries?”
So, here I go, making myself vulnerable. Again.
Please note: In order to be true to myself and to my fellow followers, this and upcoming entries are raw, unedited and scanned into this blog.
Better now, without teeth
Cono visits his grandpa. (No Hill for a Stepper, except- based on a true story)
Pa and I are sharing a piece of Ma’s famous peach cobbler when I ask, “Pa, what happened to yer teeth?”
“Cono, now I’ll tell ye. My teeth started to achin’ and smellin’ so bad that I figured I needed to take ‘em out, harvest ‘em like an overripe crop.”
“All of ‘em? Ye pulled all of ‘em?”
“Shor’did. I got myself a pair’a pliers, sat there on the front porch and pulled out the ones that were botherin’ me the most. The good ones left felt funny bein’ in there without company, so I jes’t took them out too.”
“Damn!” I say. “They don’t stink no more?”
Pa laughs. “Ain’t nothing left te sniff.”
“He’s an old coot’s what he is,” yells Ma from the kitchen, overhearing the story.
“I’m surprised ye noticed, Ma,” he yells back. “Ye cain’t see two feet without yer glasses.” He turns back to me. “Don’t ye fret none about it,” he gums out. “Ever since them holes healed up? I kin eat a steak jes’t like ever’ body else. I chew a little longer s’all. But my whistlin’s gone to hell in a hand basket.”
Daily prompt: Aromatic
A Gift to Frame
A friend of mine gave a copy of my latest book, The Last Bordello, to her mother, Del. She doesn’t email, nor does she know how to write a review on Amazon. So, she sent me a “real” letter! What a special gift!
Don’t mess with the Madam
Madam Fannie Porter vs. Mayor Hicks: Excerpt from The Last Bordello
“Pull the reins back, Mayor. Sadie’s not evil. Wouldn’t hurt a fly.” He was using Sadie as an excuse, a reminder I hadn’t moved into the mandated zone a stone’s throw down the road.
“If she could pull a knife on a man who harmed a friend, what measures would she take if she thought she had been wronged? It’s no secret she hates the temperance women.”
True. “What are you getting at? Do you still think that just because she found a yellow scarf, she’s guilty of a crime? Had something to do with the missing girl?”
“It’s likely.”
“It’s preposterous. Now, is there anything else?”
“She was there at the meeting. You know it as well as I do.”
“That’s no secret.”
“Too bad for her it’s not.” He stood, approached the front door, and yanked his jacket off the hook. “Not looking good for her. Nor for you and this place.” He waved an index finger around the parlor like a gun. “I’ll be watching.”
I didn’t escort him to the door, but watched him exit at the same time thunder rattled the porch. Good. For all I cared, he could glide back to the office on his own slime.
Two sets of eyes peeked over the swinging doors and into the parlor. “Okay, nosy children,” I said and joined Meta and Reba in the kitchen. “What happened to those good old days when Bryan Callaghan was our mayor?”
“We’s been scorched by a stinkbug, that’s what.” Reba palmed her newly straightened and gelled hair.
Meta’s expression remained grave. I had the feeling she felt a kinship with the missing girl.
The Shape of Emma June Crawford
First, thanks so much for liking my “shape” in previous posts.
When I posted The Shape of our Being, I mentioned how experiences shape our humanness. Here’s another example of the “shape” of Carolyn’s Being that shows up in my novels. I’ve posted Meta’s shape from The Last Bordello and Cono’s shape from No Hill for a Stepper.
Here’s Emma June from The Moonshine Thicket.
Kids at school say Scooter’s grain elevator doesn’t reach the top of the silo. That he acts more like a six-year-old than a thirteen-year-old. They don’t know diddly-squat. Scooter might not be the brightest penny in the cash box, but I’ve known him all my life. He has more grain than most of the numbskulls in Holly Gap, Texas and Scooter’s worth more than the whole lot of them. Wherever Scoot skips, bounces or walks, goodness grows in the footsteps he leaves behind. Without Scooter, everything would grow dead.
I can’t wait for you to meet Emma June when she finally gets out and about!
Scooter’s Bridge
From The Moonshine Thicket:
Scoot will always be with me no matter how old I get. People often say, “I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.” I remind myself to never cross a broken bridge, especially if a gangster-wolf is lurking on the other side.
Scooter’s my bridge. He leads me across to a wonderful, magical way of looking at the world, one that’s never too dangerous to cross.
Daily Prompt: Mythical
The Shape of Cono’s Being.
In a previous post titled, The Shape of our Being, I mentioned how experiences shape our humanness. Here’s another example of the “shape” of Carolyn’s Being that shows up in my novels.
Disclaimer: I’m betting on my ‘underdog-ness’ again–that part of me who feels uncomfortable with self-promotion. But try, we must. Right?
NOTE: No Hill for a Stepper, is about Cono, my father (and a huge piece of my heart) who died in 2009 before its publication. Don’t worry, he read and loved the first draft.
In 1942, victimized his entire life by his own father, fourteen-year-old Cono must stand up against him an protect his mother and little sister.
Excerpt:
I hear Mother scream. I snap back into the present, out of my daydream. Maybe she’s woken up, has seen blood on her sheets reflected in moonlight, seen the blood on Dad’s face. I start to get up, but the quiet has taken over; but only for a moment.
I hear a voice I know is Dad’s but different somehow, guttural like a wolf’s growl. I hear Mother say, “Stop it Wayne!”
My feet touch the floor before the rest of me knows what it’s doing. I open my door. Mother is backing towards me, but away from the bloodied-face man holding a butcher knife, glistening from moonlight, shiny like a raccoon’s mirror. He’s stumbling towards her. My mind freezes. It’s a scene from a scary picture show. No, Cono, I tell myself, this is real. Real life, real time.
Dad’s stopped walking. He’s swaying back and forth like an old porch swing. No, more like the swing of a hanged man’s noose. His eyes are glazed like a film of anger is laying on top that he can’t wipe away. He glances once over to the couch where Pooch is sleeping.
“Mother, keep backing up towards me,” I tell her.
She stares at my father but listens to my words. Dad stops at the kitchen table, he puts his empty palm on the table for balance, the butcher knife in the other hand swaying by his side.
“C’mon, Mother, keep coming to me,” I say softly, feeling a surge of calm and determination at the same time.
Mother has backed all the way up me. I pull her behind my door into the bedroom where Delma is still sleeping. Mother is shaking. My hands are doing the same now. I see our .22 sitting on the open shelf just a few feet away. It’s so close I can almost feel it. It’s like the .22 Hoover found, the one I felt in my hands, the cold steel of it. Now, I want to feel the warm safety of it.
A fear invades my body like a sickness. I’m drowning, but not in water. I’m drowning in the fear of what to do next, what I need to do to protect my family from a madman.
Here’s Cono, my dad. My sister had the novel photoshopped into his hands and gave me this awesome framed photo.
Emma June’s Brain Percolates
From The Moonshine Thicket (1928)
“Frank never did anything to make Mama and Daddy fight. And, he had nothing to do with Mama leaving. Being mad at him would be like Choppers being mad at me for only having two legs.
“I’m sure.”
“And I never told Miss Helen you helped me with that delivery. Just so you know. So, we’re still friends?”
“Still friends,” I tell him.
I spit on my palm and stick it out for him to shake. He smiles and spits. I look him in the eye and shake his wet hand. Friendship, settled.
My brain percolates like Miss Helen’s never-dry coffee pot. I don’t worry about my questions. I worry about what Miss Helen will say when she answers.”
The Shape Of Meta’s Being
“I’m going to bet on MY ‘underdog-ness’ and give this a shot. Some might sigh a bit when they see a fellow blogger try to promote their work. But try we must.” CD-W
In a previous post titled, The Shape of our Being, I mentioned how our experiences shape our humanness, including the Carolyn Being (a work in progress). My “shape” shows up in my novels. In this excerpt from The Last Bordello, Sadie, a prostitute in a 1901 bordello, escorts the virtuous Meta (who accepted Madam Fannie’s offer to be the bordello’s pianist) on a tour of the city.
And truly, thanks for hanging with me!
“Meta, I know this is your first time to a big city. I want to be fair. There is something I want you to understand.” She paused, gathering my attention. “People in town know I’m a painted lady, a prostitute. Or, as some like to say, a lowly whore.”
“But—”
Sadie held up a hand. “Being seen with me is almost as bad as being a prostitute yourself. People will judge you. Your reputation could be tainted by merely being seen in my presence. I truly don’t want any harm or ill will to come to you. I don’t want you embarrassed by my company.”
Perhaps this was Aunt Amelia’s concern, what she wanted to tell me. If the public thought less of me for playing the piano at a bordello, I didn’t care. Weren’t even prostitutes and their customers entitled to the magic of music?
Unlashing Sadie’s grasp, I stepped a foot to the side. “Sadie, I appreciate your honesty. Now,” I said, my grin widening, “shall we walk back arm in arm like schoolgirls?”
Sadie’s white teeth glistened in the February sun. “Yes,” she said, interlocking an elbow with mine. “Onward to the next stop.”
Excerpt from an Amazon review:
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, women’s right activist
Carolyn Dennis-Willingham 