Cold and grumpy, I walked faster down Murray Street. I gritted my teeth and headed for the Indian River and sunshine. Our tree dappled house, riddled with windows, made summer without air conditioning bearable, but in the winter it morphed into a mausoleum. I dug my...
I pedaled faster, away from my stepfather’s El Patio Restaurant, darting a glance over my shoulder. My fingers clenched the money pouch with three hundred and six dollars against the handle bar. Two p.m. sun cooked my scalp and shoulders. I pumped harder, my progress...
July, 18, 2016, Ashland OH—My eyes traced the gold and maroon geometric pattern on the carpet of Ashland University’s John C. Myers Convocation Center. I’d attended the annual National Conference of the Brethren Church for over 35 years and I was focused on slipping...
I didn’t belong here in this hazy rented hall that smelled of hops and hairspray and heated bodies. The knowing started in my sternum and crawled outward. I crammed it back into the corner where I kept God at times like this. The ƩAEs and a cadre of coeds danced to...
David Lossing stood in a circle of light at Disney World Fort Wilderness Campground. He jutted his chin toward the furthest tent in our M.A.S.H.-like village stuffed with more than fifty members of New Smyrna Beach High School’s Spanish Club. “I’m headed to the party...
