November-December 2004

Waking Up Blue in a Red State
By Ellen Holmes Baer
"Right now things seem to be falling apart on a national level as well as an international level, and I hope I can wake up and learn something. The last time I felt so out of step with the prevailing culture was in my home state, Mississippi, in the late 1960s."

Mother's Nature
By Sheilah Zimpel
"Something is troubling my 70-year-old mother: She has begun to channel the weather. She knows when it’s raining, anywhere in the country. You can plan your weekend by her, your wardrobe. Weather is now Mom’s only topic of conversation, and, like her, it’s unavoidable, ubiquitous, 24/7."

Grave Concerns: Mark Higgins
By Karen Stark
"Mark is the 47-year-old owner and director of Hall-Wynne Funeral Home in Durham. I met Mark, not in death, but through a friend who had first laid eyes on him while she was working at Guglhupf Bakery. It was just before Christmas, and Mark was buying some exquisite Christmas stollen, more than a dozen of them, to give to grieving clients."

Ivan the Terrible
By Robert Sherrill
"Remember September, when those bully hurricanes were tearing up new ground in the mountains and down in Florida, and one was fixing to give the Gulf provinces a blast? I called this friend who lives in Tallahassee to see if he was safe, worried, or what."

The Carp
By Angelika Koblenz
"Someone taking a picture would have seen a little girl, perhaps 6 years old, in a short dress, with blond pigtails, standing on her toes on a commode, her arms leaning against the wall, stretching her tiny body towards the light outside which seemed not willing to come through the little open window."

The Rest of My Life?
By Timothy M. Cannon
"The metal door slides open on its mechanical shifting track, clanging loudly, allowing us passage to the next corridor. I maneuver through the throng of convicts milling about in the congested hallway. A desperate human energy bristles the air, a hungry, tangible essence reeking of rebellion and seeking release. Today is Tuesday, the summer of 1997, three years into my life sentence at Central Prison in Raleigh."

Caution: Men at Work
By Byron Papa
"As I stood staring up at the roof plywood, I suddenly heard a noise and a scuffle right beside me. I lazily turned my head to the left to see what was happening, but John was gone. I looked down just in time to see his upper half rapidly beginning to rise again."

Selling Water
By Jan G. Hensley
"It was 1954, and Greensboro was in the throes of the worst drought anyone could remember. It had lasted all summer, and people were losing their lawns and about to lose their shrubbery. With the drought lengthening into fall, the City of Greensboro enacted a law making it a misdemeanor to use water for anything other than bathing, flushing toilets, cooking, and drinking."

Antsy-Pantsy at 90
By Ted M. Miller
"The Honda generator hums Newfoundland ditties as it keeps the computer running and ready to record this story: a once-in-alifetime chance to explore the Barrens, a demeaning term for a wonderland most tourists blindly travel through."

A Christmas Hero
By Laure T. Jensen
"Dad and I sat beneath the newly decorated Christmas tree. Side by side, we admired our work. Every icicle hung separately as ordered by Mother. The lights, Dad’s sole responsibility, were evenly distributed. Around and around from the angel who perched on the uppermost limb, her crown almost touching the ceiling, they swirled toward the bottom of the tree."

Heat Without Light
By William Odom
"There came a time, back in my twenties, when I would sometimes ask people who was the first stupid person they ever knew. You know, you’re living your young life and one day you realize you have an acquaintance who lacks a little something in the mental department. Not the sharpest tool in the shed. Not the brightest bulb. Missing a few shingles."

Two Out of Tree
By Russell Newell
"In my town, when you wanted a Christmas tree, you just went out and cut one. They were along the ditches, the fence lines, and the edge of the woods. The farmers without bush hogs thought you were doing them a favor."