We were heading into a tornado. Of course, we didn’t know that. Our daughter Susannah was returning for her last year at college in Grand Rapids. But a late summer thunderstorm hit us en route. Soon, it developed into a blinding deluge. White-knuckled, I pulled into the dorm parking lot. As we headed for the dorm’s entrance, sirens went off…. Read More

  My mother was never happier than right after she’d had her hair done. Done as in testing the center of a baked layer cake. Done as in having her hair washed, rolled, heated, styled, then secured with a shellacking of AquaNet. She told me once that her most innovative ideas came to her while sitting  under the celadon dome… Read More

Last night it was eight degrees below. How do the chickadees keep warm? I know how the blue jays do. A friend told me he places peanuts in their shells on his deck for the squirrels. But an uninvited blue jay soon landed, lifting and shaking at least twelve shells before selecting the heaviest one with peanuts loaded in both… Read More