In honor of Mother’s Day, I am sharing the letter that I wrote to my mom not long after my daughter was born. This letter healed me. It allowed me to forgive my mother while understanding that I would never forget the memories, some good, some...
My mom’s favorite piece of advice was, “Do as I say, not as I do”. All things considered with my mom, that was pretty solid counsel. My hope is that I don’t often have to tell my daughter, Conley, to do as I say rather than as I do. And, I also...
116 Powhatan Avenue was once alive with hope. It beamed with the possibility of being filled with children’s laughter, nights of popcorn and movies and coffee and paperback mornings. 116 was a white cottage house that set in the bowl of a steep...
After successfully zooming past any wayward zombies that may have hanging out in the overgrown cemetery that guarded the entry of my great-grandmother’s street, I breathlessly bounded up the jolly, inexplicably blue AstroTurf that lined the...
It’s sandwiched between a garage and a bar where the burning embers of the regulars’ cigarettes dance through the night air as snippets of hard pounding classic rock rolls out of the constantly opening and closing door. If you follow the sidewalk...
When my now husband, Tony, and I moved to Charlotte from West Virginia in 2001, our moving truck broke down on the way. It took us two extra days to arrive to one of the hottest Mays in history. After carrying box after box up flights of stairs...
We’re in unprecedented and unchartered territories. As I told my 10 year old daughter, not only I have I never lived through something like this but neither has her great-grandmother – who survived the Great Depression and a World War. It’s...
The smoke detector screeched and the security system hollered. I jumped up and punched the code on the alarm as my husband started opening doors and windows. Conley and her friend started laughing and running around, pumped up and excited by the...
Snoring makes me an irrational, seething, rage-filled lunatic. My husband, Tony, fell asleep on the couch over the weekend when we were watching a movie. I was still awake and had every intention of finishing the movie. However, between the grating...
She slid her arm through mine and I patted her hand as we strolled home through the uneven cobblestone streets. She talked about the architecture, one of her favorite topics, of the hugging brick buildings along the way. I watched the Spanish moss...