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September 11, 2001
I can’t believe it’s been 15 years when the tragedy still feels like yesterday sometimes. September 11 has become the “Where were you?” story for a lot of people in my generation the way the assassination of JFK or the explosion of The Challenger became for other generations. I was in my junior year in college and among the last group of people to know what had happened that morning. I didn’t watch any TV or listen to the radio that morning as I got up and went to class. That wasn’t unusual for me. Classes were held like normal and a few people mentioned to the professors that classes should be…
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A Eulogy
“A Eulogy” 12-26-05 Written about my grandmother, my father’s mother, who died in March of 2004. She was my favorite person in the world and the reason my daughter’s middle name is Pearl, named for my Meema. When I started college, Meema would write letters to me several times a week. I have saved every single one of them. What can I say about her? Simple doesn’t say it— Beautiful is too generic. All I can say is that I loved her, And can’t believe she’s gone. I still think of her gentle old face, Hollowed in its frailty, smiling while writing letters to me. She told stories of the past with…
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The evolution of my novels, leading to Caroline’s Lighthouse publication
Humble beginnings: I have mentioned before that I started writing novels when I was 13. I hand-wrote them in pencil on notebook paper. (I have scanned them and saved them digitally now in addition to keeping the originals.) Between the ages of 13-15 (or 18 if you count the typing of the last novel) I wrote 7 book-length stories: Night and Day, When Does Life Begin?, Four Hearts, Jordan’s Sister, Just Taylor, One Shot, and Caroline’s Lighthouse. I also had an idea for a story about a young girl named Kincaid staying at her grandparents’ motel for the summer and the lessons she learns, but I never wrote anything more…
