The mason jar on the Hollis porch funded our block’s Fourth of July fireworks for twenty-six years. Quarters. Allowance dollars. One mysterious fifty every June. This year, three days before …
The Nine Jars on Hollis’s Porch Read More
Every Memorial Day for twenty-one years, the airshow flew the Missing Man Formation over one farmhouse. The farmhouse belonged to the widow of Major Hollis, the pilot the formation honored. …
The Hollis Flyover Read More
For forty-one years, Miss Odell brought her S&H Green Stamp books to Harker’s Grocery to paste at the counter. Every Saturday. 1,120 books. They filled toward something she never told …
The Green Stamp Books That Bought a Van Read More
In 1945, PFC Joseph Alvarez wrote a V-mail letter from Okinawa that never arrived. The War Department returned it ADDRESSEE UNKNOWN because the family had moved during the war. Last …
The V-Mail That Found Dee Read More
The same woman has directed our town’s Christmas pageant for fifty years. Miss June is eighty-six. Every December, she casts her great-grandchildren as sheep like clockwork. This year, at the …
Miss June’s Christmas Star Read More
Every Wednesday at noon for twenty-two years, the bell at First Church has rung one extra time. A single strike. Not the usual pattern. The town assumed it was a …
The Single Bell Strike at First Church Read More
Fay stopped traffic at the Elm Street crossing for thirty-eight years. Same flag. Same whistle. Two waves and a point. Not one driver ever argued. Tuesday was her last shift. …
Fay’s Last Whistle Read More
Our grocery store plays no music on Tuesday mornings from 8 to 9. The register beepers are muted. The produce misters are off. Shopping carts get taped felt pads. The …
The Grocery Store’s Quiet Hour Read More
Every day of my grandmother’s life, at four o’clock, one dozen cookies came out of her oven. One dozen. We thought they were for Grandpa. He died in January. The …
The Four O’Clock Batch Read More
My brothers staged an intervention about Dad’s house. They told our sister she had “let it go.” They said Dad was “living in neglect” while she “did nothing.” They planned …
The Chore Wheel on the Refrigerator Read More