by MarianBeaman | Jul 13, 2013 | Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Neighborhood / Environment, Uncategorized
Home for me is bracketed by the two houses we ping-pong between: our parents house and Grandma’s house on Anchor Road. Her house is at the bottom of the hill and ours at the top. Both houses are along side Anchor Road, between Elizabethtown to the west and...
by MarianBeaman | Jul 10, 2013 | Lists, Purple Passage, Tips, Uncategorized
Debut of purple passages! A collection of lines from books I have read since 1989 when I began jotting them down in my journals, my 9 books of wishes, dreams, laments, and bursts of praise. The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines a purple passage as one...
by MarianBeaman | Jul 6, 2013 | Family / Nostalgia, Lists, Memory, Recipes, Uncategorized
I grew up north of the Mason-Dixon Line, in Lancaster County, PA, to be sure, but my current friends are from the South. And they have secrets to go along with their charming accents: They . . . 1. Never, ever leave the house without makeup. 2. At pot-luck dinners,...
by MarianBeaman | Jul 3, 2013 | Coming of Age, Conflict, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite Lore, Uncategorized
“Keep your hand upon the throttle and your eye upon the rail,” my Dad sings in his top-of–the-lungs baritone, the volume of his voice amplified by the force of his hands on the keyboard. Every Saturday night Daddy sits down at our mahogany Marshall and Wendell...
by MarianBeaman | Jun 29, 2013 | Family / Nostalgia, Memory, Mennonite Lore, Uncategorized
Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November. All the rest have thirty-one, Excepting February alone, And that has twenty-eight days clear, And twenty-nine in each leap year. Memory is at the heart of memoir. It fuels unfolding stories. A memoir writer like...
by MarianBeaman | Jun 26, 2013 | Coming of Age, Conflict, Family / Nostalgia, Mennonite Lore, Uncategorized
“Get out! Get out!” For heaven’s sake, that is my mom’s voice yelling at someone at the door. Why would she scream at a neighbor? But it wasn’t a neighbor. It was Stinky Joe. On a cold winter’s day, he had opened the door to the wash-house and was starting to...
