He's young and good looking.  College age. With long, slightly sloppy hair that says he's not making the rounds of job interviews yet. A typical student. Except that he carries cash in addition to his debit card and he has never once answered or made a phone call while in the… Read full post »

The painted cigar box sits on a table next to my bed. A golden hand print on the front."Happy Father's Day," written inside by that same hand 53 years ago. The top loose, no longer attached.

It is filled with things my father kept. Mainly Father's Day cards… Read full post »

I grew up in a small, rural, southern Illinois town that was lily white. Except for one man. A barber who lived alone on the south side of town. A negro, we would have called him then.

Although I knew he was there, I don't really remember him,… Read full post »

Reader's Digest Condensed Books show up at the store like a never ending line of lemmings--marching to extinction with the help of my hands. They're the only books that I can put out on the free shelf and know that they'll stay there until someone needs books for the set of… Read full post »

I'm always intrigued to read the stories about people who get together with their high school boyfriends or girlfriends years after the breakup. Those happy tales of people in their 50's or 60's or 70's who re… Read full post »

I have a new customer at the store.

The non-paying kind. Usually around the age of nine or ten, sometimes older. Arriving on a bike, or a skateboard, or on foot from one of the many apartments near the store.

Most have a key in their pocket and live… Read full post »

When someone asks whose books are the most popular in my store, I don't even have to think. The answer is easy, James Patterson and Nora Roberts.

They're not my favorites, and I suppose it might say something about my store, but I tend to think it's just… Read full post »

She's standing in a grocery store check out lane, fit, slight of frame, with orange-red hair, obviously dyed. A short cut, just shy of spiky. No product in it today to hold the spikes, but it's early. A Sunday morning, quick trip to the grocery. The product will… Read full post »

We were a small family. Seventeen of us if we had all been around. But a grandfather gone before cousins three through nine were born. An uncle gone when the youngest cousin was eight. One of the older cousins gone off to the service when I was nine, or maybe ten.… Read full post »

The transfer is always hard--the part of a visit where both grandmas drive to a midpoint in Indianapolis and transfer the grandson.

This time I was on the giving side, saying goodbye in the parking lot of Starbucks and leaving quickly with little more than a grande coffee and a few… Read full post »

The parking lot is full. Not a single car is parked within the yellow lines that mark the parking spaces. Most are sedans, parked at angles, crossing the yellow line on their left by at least a foot.

A few are close. They're the ones driven by caretakers or younger relatives… Read full post »

A few years ago, my daughter was doing some part-time online teaching at Gotham Writers' Workshop and found out that she got a free class for every class she taught. She asked if she could give it to her mom and they agreed.

I had quit practicing law at the time… Read full post »

I don't have a land line at home and am thankful to be missing the irritation of all the robotic phone calls that ring at inopportune times during election cycles. My sister has complained about them to me, but I really can't empathize. I haven't gotten a single one.

Until yesterday.… Read full post »

Dear Mr. Romney, 

I'm disgusted by your continued use of the tragedy in Libya as a political issue and your  attempts to give it even more traction.

If you really think that every request for additional security reaches the desk of the President, or even the Secretary of State, then… Read full post »

This year I took them home to sort. Fifty-plus banker boxes of books, mine for the taking. The leftovers from a book sale that a local church has every October. All of them already passed over by many hands, even at the bargain price of one dollar.

But all of… Read full post »

When my oldest daughter was little, she always held her mouth in a strange way whenever she told a lie. She'd purse her lips together and kind of grit her teeth, and be terribly impressed when I was able to tell her that I knew she wasn't telling me the truth.… Read full post »

President Obama wants to add 100,000 science and math teachers over the next ten years. I tend to agree it's a good idea. The store clerks who can't seem to make change when there's a power outage make a good case for the math. 

And I find that I make a… Read full post »

They walk in together, every month or so, traveling from out of town, a thirty minute drive, always on a Saturday.

Date night, perhaps. Except that it's not night. And this isn't a couple that's getting to know each other. They don't ask about favorite movies or childhood nicknames, searching for… Read full post »

"Tell me the truth, Mom. You really like me best, don't you?"

I've heard a version of that question more times than I could count. Even with two daughters raised to the adult ages of 27 and 30, it still spills out occasionally, albeit in slightly different and somewhat disguised form.… Read full post »

What to do when your favorite jeans have a hole in them?

That's the question I'm debating these days. Not Obama and Romney's positions on Medicare or whether we should get out of Afghanistan, but, "I've got this pair of jeans that I really love except there's this hole in the… Read full post »

My mom wanted to be a journalist. She skipped 4th grade, was a straight A student throughout school, a diligent worker, and undoubtedly would have excelled at college.

But she didn't go. Her dad… Read full post »

I left my phone at home yesterday. Again. Not on purpose. I just forgot to put it in my purse. Which I do fairly often. It never really bothers me. 

I'll be on a plane or at a play and they'll make an announcement to turn off all… Read full post »

 I ran across a picture of the Last Supper in a Da Vinci art book the other day, right before lunch, on a da… Read full post »