. LOS ALAMOS We moved to Los Alamos, New Mexico when I was thirteen. For a time, we saw atomic-bomb mushrooms from our front yard every day about noon and then it would rain. In Los Alamos we had a brand new school and the best of everything because the town belonged to the University of California. Dad was a security guard who usually worked at the main gate where everyone … [Read more...]
A Writer is Born
I was born in Lovelock, Nevada, which was on a Blackfoot Indian Reservation. My dad worked as a meat-cutter for Safeway and when Mother was expecting me, she worked in a laundry. A pregnant Blackfoot Indian, Wapun, worked alongside her, and mother was astonished when Wapun went into labor, got word to her husband, went home, had the baby, and came back all in the same day. When … [Read more...]
My End Time
We’ve been talking with our grown kids about the end times—our end times. We’re not going to live forever—surprise, surprise, and we want things to be as easy for them as possible when either of us goes, especially their last parent, whichever that may be. We’ve written a simple will and had it checked out with our lawyer, even though there’s not a lot to leave. The next … [Read more...]
My West
Thanks for mountain, creek, and pine. Thanks that all of this was mine. Thanks for Shetland, sorrel, bay. Thanks for every sunny day. Thank you for the high, clear air, Thunderstorms and breezes fair. Thanks for folks, stoic and brave. Give pardners a hearty wave. Take me where the West begins Please don’t ever fence me in. … [Read more...]
