It may have been the devil himself who prompted the kids in my schoolyard back in 1947 to chant “Patsy Foley’s roly-poly from eating too much ravioli.” At first, no one could remember w...

Let’s stop the crying, Millie. It’s true our friends are dying. They’re old like you and me. Why not celebrate instead that 80 years ago you and I

Sheep are by a goat while cattle are like swine, prodded, ye… cattle go by hammer while swine are by the hind leg hung then swung about to spigot.

Spring will eventually arrive, Tom tells his youngest daughter looking out the window at the snow… Take heart, he tells her, and listen for the blue jays when

Alvin didn’t want to be anybody else. He didn’t want to be himself either. Money wasn’t a problem.

Tommy is the only man for miles around who can knot a ti… Old farmers come to town on Satur… and wave from pickups with respect when they see Tommy on the street

Woman in a window brushing long hair madly screams at a little boy down in the street licking an ice cream cone

After services on Sunday the old Marlboro man puts his Bible under his arm and talks to his pastor through a hole in his neck.

You never know who’ll be there though folks are dying to get in. Then suddenly you’re at the door, hat in hand,

It’s your anniversary so you’re thinking steak but your wife wants ramen so you go to a nice place and order the fancy ramen

In 1958 Elmer’s was the only high school in his county that had been integrated. Basketball was the big sport. People in the little town filled the gym every Tuesday and Friday. They ro...

He wants to be fair to both sides because there’s an election coming soon so he tells his side every day

It isn’t a flophouse where Fred lives now but he calls it that a month after moving in and seeing his fellow

It started with a smirk she managed to arrest. It returned seconds later in a sneer she pulled back but then it appeared again