Randomness

The Grandma’s

My father’s mother was Italian. She was really old the day I was born and realy old twenty years later on the day she died. My Italian Grandma wore a dark dress every day of her life, a dark knitted shall, and support hose that came up to her knees. Her shoes were sensible black blocks, manish looking to me. She had a funny hair net she kept her silvery-gray bun in, she stuffed tissue up her sleeves, and was always clutching a rosary. We didn’t exactly have a “relationship”.  I don’t remember actually having a conversation with her, ever.  My dad would fetch Grandma from her house on Sundays and bring her to our house for dinner. We kids were always told to remember to talk to Grandma. This was kind of tough to do as she spoke Italish; a combination of Italian and English. Understanding her was a challenge. I always asked Grandma how she was doing. “Ohhh…she would groan, “Denise! Denise!” I had no idea who Denise was and why that was her answer. I would ask my dad time and again who the heck was Denise? He had no idea what I was talking about until…

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Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

As Odd Balls Go… Pt.1

I was about twelve years old the day I witnessed her tall thin frame flit past me on her way down from the cabin dressed in a bad bathing suit, beach towel flung over her narrow pail shoulders. She hit the beach running and then came to an abrupt halt, dropped her towel and looked around, a puzzled expression on her face, brow slightly scrunched. There was really nowhere to run except straight into the water. The beach was small, the water level of the lake still quite high so early in the season. When I watched her run by, I’d noticed a kind of expectation in her whole body; the way she held her head high, shoulders back, an eager excited look in her eyes as she rushed forward. I wondered what was going on, what the excitement was all about. It took no more than a few seconds to see, by the crest fallen look on her face, that thing didn’t exactly pan out the way she’d expected. For a moment she stood alone on our little stretch of beach looking ready to cry, her eyes searching for something or someone who wasn’t there. I wondered what in…

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Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Road Trip Pt. 2

A ghost was looking down on us, tortured mouth silently crying out, empty hollow eyes. We gasped and took a good hard look at each other than looked back to the window. “Did you see what I just saw?” “Oh, yeah. What do you think it was?” “It was the ghost, of course.” Crossing the street, we entered town hall through huge wooden double door and approached what we figured was the front desk. But no one was there so after a while we started calling out a cheerful “hello” yet, to no avail. A radio could be heard playing somewhere in the building and there was a static electric hum in the air, as though frequencies were bouncing off one another and shooting around the atmosphere. “Hello,” we called out again, but still no one answered. “Hey, there’s a restroom,” I said looking down the hall. “I need to use it. Come with me.” I grabbed for Kathy’s arm. There was no way I was going anywhere in that building alone. The restroom door creaked loudly as we pushed it open and tentatively stepped inside. It was as old and original as everything else about the courthouse building, and…

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Randomness

Road Trip

My friend Kathy has a brother-in-law who shot an alligator once and took it to a taxidermist. The taxidermist preserved the alligator in a posture that made it look as though it were getting ready to jump up and bite someone. It appeared to be lunging forward, slightly elevated on its front legs with the head thrust forward and upward. The huge jaws were wide open exposing a mouthful of menacing teeth. If a person were to stand in front of the alligator, turned around and bend over, it would appear as if the alligator was about to take a large chunk from said behind and quite possibly leave the person with one less cheek. Kathy and I thought this was the best photo opportunity, ever. We took turns posing, bent over with our rear ends in the gators face. One of us would feign expressions of terror and shock as the other one captured the Kodak moment, over and over again. We let our imaginations run wild and made continuous attempts to out-do each other in creative poses and expressions. The pictures are ridiculous and hilarious. It really looks as though we are getting ready to lose our derrieres.…

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