In the backyard of the house I grew up in is a swamp. My dad cleared the cattails when we first moved in, creating a pond for us. My sister and I head to the water’s edge. The smell of decaying vegetation wafts off the swamp. Dragonflies skim the water, eating the mosquitoes that swarm around us. One finds my arm and I slap it dead. We each grab a stick off the ground and squat at the water’s edge, swirling the duck weed. A tap draws our attention to the kitchen window. Mom, a yellow apron over her church [...]
Charity
Before Christmas when I was eight or nine, my mother and my aunt took my sister and I to the home of someone that needed groceries for the holidays. They had gotten her name from our church. Before we went my mother talked to us about what to expect. She told us we were going to the home of a single mother with a little girl about our age. We were going to bring some food so they could have a nice Christmas dinner and some toys for the little girl so she would have some gifts for Christmas. [...]
Grandma Pearl
It’s Friday, so time for some Red Dress Club. There were two prompts this week you can click over to read if you’d like. I thought about doing this fiction, but non-fiction was easier for me, and I decided to go easy this week. Critiques are welcome. Grandma Pearl The radio in the kitchen played on my parent’s old am/fm radio with the front that reminded me of a wicker chair. My sister and I careened from the kitchen down the dark hallway. We were in our pajamas and our slippers. My dad’s mom knit them for us regularly. [...]
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