After a Book is Published: We Were Not Spoiled.
What happens after a book is published? As readers of this blog know, I recently published my mother’s memoir, We Were Not Spoiled. The book had been five years in the writing and had gone in and out of my focus. When I started to interview my mother and write the text, she had been […]
Guest Blogger: Heroic Annie Hill
She’s more than a name on the genealogy chart, although I don’t know what she looked like or the sound of her voice, the color of her hair. Her heroic character shows in census records. Her scarred and paint daubed blanket chest sits in a place of honor in my home. My great grandmother, Annie […]
My father-in-law’s 100th birthday
On February 24, 2013, I celebrated my father-in-law’s 100th birthday. Arthur Blowen has been gone now for 28 years, and the people who were his peers and friends are mostly gone. There are many family stories about him. They are told as mythic journeys, Arthur slaying the dragons that assailed him. Here’s the plot line […]
Getting My Dream Coat
From We Were Not Spoiled, the memoir of Lucille Verreault Ledoux as told to Denis Ledoux. My mother-in-law had a lovely black Persian lamb coat. It had large buttons that were very fashionable at the time. That coat was heavy and warm, and Mrs. Ledoux wore it everywhere. She looked good in it. Rhéa had a raccoon coat […]
Childhood Memories: The Price of Happiness
In 1953, we left our one-bedroom basement apartment on 7th Street in New Toronto to live in the small town of Tottenham, Ontario. We moved into a three-bedroom flat above a hardware store. There was no central heat or hot water, but I thought it was a palace… (more…)
The First Months of My Marriage
e left Lewiston and our wedding guests to travel to Albert’s base in Syracuse, New York, at 1:30. Since it was still summer… (more…)
The Story of Why My Parents Came Down
While my parents were immigrants to the US, they had not really come to be immigrants. My father’s health had been affected by the tiny, deadly filaments called asbestos dust in his hometown… (more…)
Lightning or When Young Love Strikes
It was the summer the city burned. The weather was dry and hot, but the real tinder was a mixture of frustration and anger, white and black, promises and demands. If I paused to consider these things, the pause was imperceptible. I stood at the edge of the pool contemplating… (more…)
A Grandmother Story: Nothing Broken
“Look at this,” my grandmother said. “Not a tooth broken.” We kids looked at the comb. We were not impressed. “I made this when I was 8 years old.” (more…)