Levity & Brevity

I was tricked. I never would've agreed to participate in Cincinnati's Flying Pig Half Marathon if I'd known how things would turn out. "C'mon, it'll be fun," coaxed my friend Marquita, who'd done it several times. "It's only ten kilometers. That's 6.2 miles. You've walked that far hundreds of times with your walking club." "Sure,…

In our little hometown, there was a small, family-owned, single screen theater within walking distance of our house. The movies were current and the prices low. The owner's children operated the popcorn and candy concession stand and their parents worked the ticket window. Every Saturday in December the local merchants sponsored a 10-cent matinee, which…

Laundry day used to be labor intensive, but environmentally friendly. Every Saturday Mom stood over a bubbling cauldron of hot soapy water and dirty clothes, stirring her brew with a sawed-off broomstick, then carefully pushing each item between the spinning rollers of her wringer washer to squeeze out the excess water. If she wasn’t careful,…

I've attended over a dozen high school proms. My parents didn't care what time I got home, if my gown showed too much cleavage, or if I had a few drinks there. That's because I was a senior citizen at all of them. I didn't go to my own high school's prom back in the…

I was jealous when I read the one line that nearly destroyed my self-confidence as a writer. Olivia Goldsmith, author of the 1996 novel turned into a wildly successful film, "The First Wives Club," once wrote the line, "Frederick is fond of the gnocchi." What a great line! The reader can almost taste the mint…

“Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer; those days of soda and pretzels and beer." So sang Nat King Cole back in 1963. I'm a geek, so I'm more likely to indulge in low-fat milk, granola bars, and protein drinks than soda and pretzels and beer. I openly admit, though, to spending many…

I once received an unsolicited email from a stranger who suggested (among other more vulgar suggestions) that I should "die slow." Is it weird that my first instinct upon receiving it was to respond, "I believe you meant to write, 'die slowly, not die slow.'" Yes, I am one of those annoying members of the…

My dad worked 60 hours a week. His Sundays were spent doing household or automotive repairs and yard work. He liked the challenge of fixing things, but hated mowing the grass. His goal was to get it over with as soon as possible. In his speed, he was apt to run over everything in his…

In urgent situations, women have been known to post a guard and commandeer a men's room

The graphic art in the plastic surgery center's ad was what caught my eye. It was a large photo of Michaelangelo's David, one of the most exquisite and realistic depictions of the nude male ever created. In the ad, amateurish airbrushing over his groin area had rendered him anatomically neutered, as smooth and genderless as…

When I was a little girl, baby dolls didn't "do" anything. We dressed them in frilly clothing, carried them around (often by an arm or a leg), and pushed them around the neighborhood in a stroller. When we got bored with them, we tossed them into the toybox. In later years, manufacturers added features making…

I should have suspected Mom had an ulterior motive when she suggested a ladies-only trip with my two sisters and me. "I'll drive," chirped my sister Susie. "Won't this be fun? It'll be just like all those family trips when we were growing up. Two adults and five children in the car for nine hours.…

I have no filter. A friend once gifted me with a pin to wear that said, "Caution...socially inappropriate." In baseball terminology, I have no on-deck circle. If a pitch comes at me, I take a swing at it. Sometimes it's a line drive and a home run, but sometimes it's a swing and a miss.…