I recently joined a conversation in The New York Times about driving, the hazards thereof, and the forgiveness of sins. So to speak.

This response of mine was published: Read more about Driving Them Cars

I have my own Maggie stories, but they will have to wait. For now, I have one of the my friend Bill's. Maggie was who every bartender wanted to be when she grew up. Sheelah told me she was taking bitch lessons from her.
Here's Bill:
Bat Bitch, she always wears black. Maggie Colie's the bartender, and she's saving up for motorcycle leathers. The sign on the tip jar reads "MAGGIE'S LEATHER FUND ...TODAY'S MY BIRTHDAY." Read more about Maggie

In the spring of 1970, Steven Jerrick and I moved to Camano Island, WA. It is a time that remains somewhat out of time. Even the house has burned down. It's as if we were never even there. But I wrote most of it down. And here we are: Read more about Springtime on Camano

Friday September 21, 1979

The first day of fall and we are falling fast. Steven cannot find work and he is obsessed with failure. We expected a check from Green Bay today that has not arrived. We are down to about $4.00, but we have been that low before. Traveler’s Aid is our last hope tonight to cash a check for the weekend. Read more about Almost Down and Out in Seattle

The trip out was an odyssey of remembering and experiencing. We crossed by the same route that Steve and I took on the bike six years ago. I didn’t do it out of nostalgia. It is the best route across that section of country that I know. The Badlands, the Black Hills, Yellowstone. Chris had never been through there, so it was great to top a rise and point out the next mountain range – each one getting bigger, taller, wilder, with more promise of a vast remoteness. Mountain Magic. Home of storms. Places where the wild things live. Visible but beyond reach. Read more about Westward Ho 1985

How in the world did one blond haired, blue eyed, English/Norwegian family of two parents and six children become a “We Are the World” poster?

It wasn’t the eldest, Barbara, who although serial monogamous with several variants in later life, serially married and procreated with two straight white males of European heritage.

My sister Joan, who liked things that were imported, married first a German and then our favorite brother-in-law, a Turk. We’re branching out now. One daughter’s husband is a Finn. Read more about The Fam

I pushed my little brother Paul down the stairs. He was about 10 and I must have been 16 or so. I know why I did it and knew it at the time. I don’t remember what the silly argument was about. I do remember that of a sudden he reminded me of myself – he looked like me, he sounded like me, he was the mirror image of me. And I was disgusted with me, so I pushed him down the stairs.

He wasn’t hurt, that I recall. Nothing broken. Can’t say we were the closest of sibs from then on. But I was growing up and out. He was going to be sticking around for a while. Read more about Paul

THM stands for the title of a post I hope to do soon on my old friend, Bill Heintzelman, who, when I knew him, was a Blue Moon bartender. An honored post in my culture. Today is voting day, and I don't have the time to write it. But in going through my tubs and bins, I came across a sheaf of papers he gave me once: short monographs of Blue Moon people he hoped someday to make into a book or a play, perhaps? He didn't live long enough to finish it. But I can't let them go unpublished. Here is one of them: Read more about THM: Chris

Sticks and stones may break my bones
But words will never hurt me.

I can almost hear my mother comforting me with those words when I cried because somebody called me a name. I had no way of comparing the two experiences - sticks and stones vs. words - until much later, but I'm here to tell you that there has never been an aphorism more false. Read more about Sticks and Stones

What in the hell is a “free range” kid?

I have a feeling it is what was called in my day, “a kid.” Read more about Free Range