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Audie Cockings
Ken Burns Presents Hemingway as Bull
PBS offered a three part series last week that my husband recorded so that we could sit in bed each night hoping to learn more about Hemingway’s freshwater fishing exploits in Michigan, now that we are living only minutes away from those very same Holy Waters.
After we put the four kiddos to bed, he poured us a glass of Oban Little Bay Scotch (less peat and therefore more to my liking). We got comfy in a mess of bedding and pillows with our two German hunting dogs piled on top like a sundae. We simply don’t have much time to watch TV together and are almost never interested in the same programs. But, “Hemingway,” a new PBS documentary by Ken Burns, was something we had both been anticipating for months.
Glamping Hudson Style
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A Cute Doggo Looks Out Across the Misty Mountains
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2 Chickens in the Snow
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3 Photos of Zion in Autumn
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This Is the Virgin River
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New Nature Nonfiction & Photography: Golden Comet Hospice
Mama swaddled the week-old infant and strapped the fragile runt neatly into her own slight chest. It had been seven years since she’d tethered herself to a baby. But Mama was getting desperate. The topical spray pharmaceuticals, vitamin drops, manual extractions, and even a warm sitz bath couldn’t fix the distended lower abdomen of her young one.
The sheer frail skin covering Tiny’s lower G.I. was increasingly warm and pink. Impacted bowels were finding no more road to roam and the last exit was blocked with a pebbly yellow wall that kept reinforcing itself. Mama spoke with experts on line, all in agreement that an internal abnormality was primary reason for Tiny’s failure to thrive. The bowel trouble, a symptom of a mortal medical defect.
Mama searched online for home remedies as she gently stroked Tiny’s tender disproportioned lower trunk. Tiny had declined enormously after having a brief rally on day four just to tank the following two. It was now day seven and there was nothing more Mama could do.
New Fiction, Chapter 4: Stealing Cars and Co-Ed Bars
Serial installments of the novel ‘A Girl, A Dog, a Boat’ continue
The guys I dated before Todd weren’t anything to write home about – seemingly pleasant company, but not engaging in a lifetime sort of way. And I had zero man-luck in med school. There were too many willing undergrad girls looking to land a doctor so the single males in med school were severely oversexed…
I thought I was modern. A go-with-the-flow kinda girl who wasn’t in a full-on sprint to coupledom. But after being propositioned by far too many drunk partygoers, I concluded that I’m nicer than I put on. Perhaps all of those years of Sunday school stuck because a roll in the hay was of no interest to me.
That, coupled with the fact that I never really had a serious long-term boyfriend kept me in good standing with Flossie and her friends at church who regularly asked God to send me a husband before I gave up and sinned. She said that if she waited then so could I. She also said that the best husbands are friends first.
Editor’s note: Click here for chapter 1, here for chapter 2, and here for chapter 3 in this weekly fiction serial.
New Fiction, Chapter 3: Splinters and The Pressure Cooker
Serial installments of the novel ‘A Girl, A Dog, a Boat’ continue
Mom had planned on staying another few days, but after the physicality of my loss was over I kindly asked her to go. I was so confused. I didn’t know why I was mourning someone I never knew. I couldn’t talk about it. As much as I loved Mom’s company, I felt a big cry coming on and wanted to be alone.
The weeks following only further solidified my sorrow. Everywhere I went there were pregnant women and new babies. It was as if the cervically-gifted were breeding with each other. Multiplying
themselves just to mock me. My only solace was food and I was beginning to resemble a tub of salted caramel.
Editor’s note: Click here for chapter 1 and here for chapter 2 in this weekly fiction serial.
New Fiction, Chapter 2: Johnny Hustle
Serial installments of the novel ‘A Girl, A Dog, a Boat’ continue
Mom wanted to stay. She knew exactly what I was feeling: unspeakable loss. She’d had much of that in her life. Much more than mine. She lost both her parents very young, in a car accident. And of course, she lost her best friend, my dear father.
Dad was the most hard-working man of his time and entirely self-made. He ran off and joined the army at seventeen so he could have enough money to marry his high school sweetheart. After being a radio guy for three years and getting some experience in supply-chain management, Johnny left the Army to be a tin-knocker like his old man. He turned their petite carport into a sheet metal fabrication shop that slowly but steadily became a very profitable business venture. After retiring, Dad consulted for his old competitors who knew him by the nickname of “Johnny Hustle.” Nobody worked harder than dad. He could make or fix anything with a pencil, a ruler, a heavy pair of snips, and a Phillips head.
Editor’s note: Click here for chapter 1 in this weekly fiction serial
