Category: Childhood
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Coal For Christmas
[Watercolor sketch by Paul Egan. Date unknown.] [Note to my readers: If you think you’ve read this blog before, don’t think you’re getting senile. It’s perhaps the fourth or fifth time I’ve posted it. It’s my version of a pure Christmas Story. I’ve tweaked the story several times to try to make the narrative better, clearer and more truthful. As…
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The Gift Of The Troll
[Source: google search.] I tried to be as quiet as a cat as I approached the Barnum Brook Bridge. I put my foot on the first plank and sure enough, my stealth was inadequate. Out from under the bridge, so fast I missed it because I had blinked, emerged the Troll, blocking my way. “Who…
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My 500th Blog !
[The Wanderer Over The Sea of Fog. Casper David Friedrich. One of my favorite paintings. Source : Google search.] Dear Followers, Open your oldest and best cognac and celebrate with me. This is my 500th blog post! Finding topics and putting them into (what I hope were) clever words was not an easy thing to…
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I’m Not Sleepy
[Goya’s The Sleep of Reason. Photo credit: Goodle search.] [NOTE: The following post is rated S for sad.] When I was a young boy, about a hundred years ago, my mother would sit on the edge of my little bed and stroke my brown hair. It was well after my bedtime. I should have been sleeping the…
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It’s Not Easy
[Elias has to choose. It’s very important what to consider.] [DEDICATED TO ELIAS MUIR GOLDSTEIN, MY GRANDSON] It’s not an easy life being a child. No, the easy part of life is being a grown-up. They can go to bed when they want, they can watch any TV show on the cable…like The Bachelor in…
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A Cemetery With a View
[The grave of Sa Sa Na Loft. Evergreen Cemetery, Owego, NY. Photo credit is my own.] I’m back in my home town of Owego, NY for a reason. I have no one to visit. Nothing to purchase (I did buy two books at River Row Book Store), but I was there on an early September…
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There Must be a Story Here
[From my Instagram post. A Year or two ago.] For those of my followers who track my movements or care where I am at any given time, here’s some help: I’m not wandering the forests of the North Country at this time. I’m in New York City for the usual doctors appointments, Mariam’s meetings and…
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The Holiday Card
[What follows is pure fiction. It is a short story that I hope you will enjoy. It’s not funny, but it’s what I wanted to write. Please don’t read anything into this post.] It was during a brief April thaw, when a chance breeze blew the snow and a few minutes of sunlight melted the…
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Like Living in a Holiday Greeting Card
[Photo is mine.] Let it snow. Let it snow. Let it snow. –Lyrics by Sammy Cahn I’ve never lived inside a greeting card before. You’d have to be really really thin, like Wiley C. Cayote after being flattened by a road paver. Never fear. My readers know that and that the title of this post…
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My Father’s Books
The 1950’s & 1960’s On Sunday nights, in the house at 420 Front Street in Owego, NY, there was usually an empty chair in our living room. My mother and three older brothers would gather around an oversized wooden console that housed a Black & White TV. The Ed Sullivan Show was about to come…
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