run on sentences

My sister Barbara Jean has a long list of people she says a prayer for every night. She has a superstition about her list too. She never talks about praying - just "putting in a good word" for people who might need it. This term came from my dad who always asked us to "put in a good word" for him. Barb has people on her "good word list" who have long been dead....like grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and even many pets that we had as kids and that she had as an adult. She even puts folks on the list that she reads about in newspapers or who may just be "locals" that she doesn't know but figures they could use some help. I once asked her how she ever gets to sleep with all those folks to remember. She says she just thinks of them but does not pray out loud. She has considered just asking the good Lord to refer to the previous night's list, and only list out the new additions. Once you are lucky enough to be on her list, you never get...

When I ran last Sunday with Sid, I had a feeling that my dad was running with us. The air after a warm rain smelled unusually damp and woody like when I was a kid and would go to the woods to peel pulp with my dad. He died about 5 months ago and I haven’t had many dreams about him or really felt his presence much before. He has never gone running with me and unless he got his amputated leg back in the afterlife, I don’t think it would be something he would come back here to do. But he was there and I mentally told him to go away. I love him and miss him a lot, but I am worried he is coming to convince my mom to join him. She always pretty much did what he wanted. Earlier that week, my mom had a small stroke that seemed to only affect her speech. When I talk to her now, I feel as though she is being drawn in another direction. She is distant and her affect is flat. My dad never could fend for himself so I suppose he finds it difficult to live without her in the afterlife, even though th...