run on sentences

Last Saturday night, we went to the VFW club to have a drink after dinner. The crowd consisted of me, Bruce, the bartender, and the manager. It was too early for the younger crowd, and many of the older crowd who used to populate the place are now dead. A young guy accompanied by an older one came in - both looking like maybe they had stopped a few places before showing up there. The bartender checked the ID of the young man and seemed to know the older one - I think his name was John. "What are you drinking she said?" "How about a Hot Damn?" John asked. The young man said his name was Gabe "Gabriel Andrew after my grandfather". He was quiet and the bartender gave him a coke while he made up his mind on what else he might want to drink. I think she could sense that he had already had enough and another drink was not what he needed. "He just got back from Iraq" the older guy, John, explained. "He was in the Marines". "Shut up Bro, I...

Today I am no longer "almost 54" - I am there, but not yet at another race category. It is this day of my birth which made me think of the other birthdays I remember. My first memory was when I turned 9 years old and it was my "Golden Birthday" - meaning that I was 9 on November 9Th. My mom got me a birthstone ring which I cherished and wore through three years of college until it was swiped by a roommate or accidentally washed down the kitchen drain with my Aunt Margie's class ring that my uncle gave me when she died. Aunt Margie (really my mom's aunt) died at 53 of an abdominal aneurysm. On my ninth birthday my mom made ham salad sandwiches, which to this day, I love. It was a beautiful day - unusual for November in the UP and we sat outside at the picnic table and ate lunch. My friend Darlene came over and we were using an old lawnmower to ride down a hill. Darlene fell and broke her leg. We didn't know it at the time. I did what any future nurse woul...

On many weekday mornings, I set the clock alarm for 5 am so I can run before work. When NPR starts giving me the usual morning bad news (I sure do miss Bob Edwards), I reset the alarm for about ten more minutes. It is hard to leave the warmth of the spouse next to me, who is still hopefully involved in some good dream. If my friend Becky is coming to run with me, I usually get up after the radio starts a second time. I go into the bathroom to dress and Jack the dog anxiously waits to see what it will be....if he hears the water in the shower, he knows there will be no run that day, and he will go back to bed. I shiver in the cold bathroom because the heat isn't set to go on until 6 am. When I am done pulling my tights on and wrestling with the running bra and long sleeve shirt, I open the bathroom door and Jack is laying there with his front paws crossed and pointed to a crack in the door as if he is doing some sort of trephination. I get a tail thump when he sees me dressed to go....

Twenty Six years ago I was feeling the twinges of labor pains for the second time. My mother was visiting and it was a beautiful fall day. We had gone out for pie and coffee and I was "heavy with child". Billy was due on October 16th and was way past his time. My mom suggested Castor oil - a remedy that worked for many women in her day. So we went home and I choked down a tablespoon or two of this vile stuff that had the consistency of snot, just to satisfy her. Sure enough, later that night I felt twinges of labor pain interspersed with the inevitable diarrhea. I waited them out because Bruce said he had some homework to finish - I don't believe he believed that I was in labor but as it turned out, we had plenty of time. Finally we went into the hospital early in the AM of November 2nd and my mom got up and sat and knitted all night while she waited word of William Raymond. We were going to name him Nicholas Michael but she somehow got it into her head that he should be ...