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Chapter Endings
Also: One day at a time… At the time, I thought the years (actually only six weeks) that I had spent in basic military training at lovely Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio were the worst. But the next day after graduation (and after having been awarded honor graduate for my “skills” as guidon during honor flight competition) I stepped onto a chartered Greyhound bus headed north for Wichita Falls, TX (which conveniently was a mere 9,990 miles away) I contemplated the past six weeks. The past six weeks? They really weren’t that bad, I thought. I got into great physical shape after having gained a great deal of…
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Learning To See Clearly
Photo by freestocks on Unsplash We’re at a little church that we’ve visited several times lately. It’s just a big country church with good, friendly people. Nothing fake here. There is one problem, however. And I hate to bring it up. But … There are pieces of artwork on either side of the front wall, on both sides of the preacher. It’s metal ironwork with curves and circles. The iron forms a fleur de lis, a flower lily. It’s the symbol that the New Orleans Saints NFL football team uses. It’s also the symbol numerous churches have used for thousands of years. Sometimes people use the fleur de lis to refer to…
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Coinage from Heaven
I’m six years old. And like normal six-year-olds, I am fidgety, shifting my little body back and forth in a wooden church pew in a community called Plateau, which, by the way, most people mispronounce. I’m clutching coins in my hands. They’re mostly pennies, a few nickels, and some dimes. But, no quarters. I would have kept those. A minute earlier, my mom had handed me the now tightly clutched coins in preparation for, “The Collection.” This was not a particularly joyful occasion. Judging by the looks on peoples’ faces, I’d say it was more like a romantic breakup. “Goodbye. I’ll miss you, little dollar. Write me!” Then, the obligatory…
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A Love Story in Winter
I twirled her around a few times while the soft moonlight filtered and fractured its way through the frozen branches of a row of nearby birch trees. It was this magical moment that one simply cannot replicate in the warm and mostly snow-less climate of central Arkansas. But I was in Russia and for me, everything — everything about that place was educational, motivational, and intoxicating. This was one of those intoxicating moments. I had met this smart, talented, and beautiful northern woman weeks earlier. A few minutes earlier, we had taken some toys to an orphanage and were now walking through the snow and ice back to her home. Now before…
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Happy Paternal Unit Day, Papa
As a new paternal unit, I pondered what I wanted to be called by our children. For some reason, I wanted them to call me Papa. I’m not sure why. Maybe because that’s what their mother had always called her paternal unit in Russia where she was born and raised. Papa. I liked the sound of it. Like millions of families, our girls heard a mixture of two languages in their first few years. The one I liked to hear was, “Papa.” “Where’s Papa?” “Papas’ home.” “Papa’s going to class.” “Go tell Papa we’re ready to eat.” “Papa’s going to read you a story.” I very much loved being called…
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The Power of a Wrong Word
I’m on a bus in northern Russia. Our small group consisted of my future mother-in-law, a friend named George, and me. We were headed somewhere in town. My Russian skills then, like now, were nonexistent, but I want to tell my mother-in-law something. I needed to tell her the one thing that all women worldwide appreciate hearing from a man. I want to tell her to calm down because well, she did need to. Or so I thought. I turn to George. “George, what’s the Russian word for “relax?” Because what could go wrong? Am I right? We were both single, so neither had any real substantive thought process going…
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Invasive Plants and Future
I ran across this little popcorn tree a few days ago. As strange as this may sound, I miss them. (Yes, I do know that they are an invasive species, but go with me here.) This one is growing in a field next to our apartment complex. For it to be here, there must have been another such tree nearby. Reasonably close, anyway. Maybe the wind blew a seed here. Maybe a bird thought that this field needed a new Chinese Tallow tree. Maybe the rain, I don’t know. I miss them because, on our little half-acre lot in southwest Alabama, we had three such trees. All of them, to…
