Aug 27

WHY I WROTE: GREEN EYES: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I have always loved the movies. Since I was a child, my favorite movie types were. In order of favorites, here’s my list: Cowboy Movies War Movies Mystery Movies I loved watching any and every kind of Cowboy Movies. Westerns, they were called back then. I still believed the good guys wore white hats and the bad guys were black hats. That’s how they were easily recognized. The bleak dusty desert backgrounds of the wild west were wonderful to see as well. How the beiges, shades browns and cactus greens contrasted with the bright orange skies at just before sundown. My next favorite type were movies about war. Where the was war never matter to me. I loved the buddy, buddy stuff where tragedies of war brought soldiers together. I admired how the soldiers formed long lasting relationships. In the movies, those deep bonds always lasted longer than the war did. The war buddies stayed dear friends until they passed on. Their families knew each and always liked each other as well. As for mystery movies, I always tried to figure out before the hero did, who-dun-it. I sat there in the movie theater matching wits with him or her. […]
Aug 20

PLAYGROUND GAMES

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
As a kid, if anybody asked me what my favorite elementary school class was, I’d always answer how much I loved recess. My mother would interrupt the conversation to correct me. She’d say recess wasn’t a class, but I remained steadfast. I’d mumble under my breath, “If recess isn’t a class, it oughta be.” The reason I loved recess in the wintertime so much was that I had the freedom to release the tomboy I felt screaming to be outside. That part of me wasn’t allowed be out any other time. I should explain. I came from a family and a time when young girls were expected to wear dresses to school, at home, at church, and even at play. Girls wore dresses everywhere. Of course, since girls dressed like miniature ladies, they were supposed to act like them as well. That meant no ball playing, including foot races, baseball, football, or basketball. In my elementary school, nobody knew what soccer was, so I didn’t play that game either. Girls could play dodgeball, red rover, jump rope, tag, hide ‘n’ seek, and jacks, but no marbles, a game in which I excelled, and other games that didn’t involve the running […]
Aug 13

Letter to my granddaughter

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
The photograph on the left was taken on the way to my sister’s Going Home Service in Maryland in December of 2017. That’s my 100-year old mother reading a menu at a seafood restaurant. She has a cellphone in the pocket of the jacket she’s wearing. She never leaves home without it and the emergency medical alert chain around her neck. She uses her cellphone to call folks like me; her two other children; six grandchildren; her AKA sorority sisters; friends and her neighbors. The photograph on the right was also taken in December of 2016. That’s my 3.5-year old granddaughter in reindeer clown makeup. We’d just returned from the main branch of the NY public library at Fifth Avenue. We had gone to NYPL’s Christmas Open House for children. There she is relaxing with her mother’s cellphone in a chair made just her. (That’s what I told her as her mother; and I put the two chairs together). As she sometimes does, my granddaughter is watching one of her favorite movies. She loves Sophia, Frozen, Pound Puppies and so many more kiddie movies I can’t remember. At nearly four, she can scroll down screens; she can enlarge or reduce […]
Aug 01

Green Eyes: Molly & Juliane, a story of war love and redemption

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
GREEN EYES: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption. Somewhere in the conflicted Middle East, a badly wounded female transportation driver named Juliane Thomasina (JT) Epps nearly loses a foot and ankle in a rebel attack. As an army corporal, she’s been driving supplies from the local airport to the US Army encampments in the desert and the mountains for two tours of duty. After the attack, she manages to drag her passengers to safety in a nearby cave-like structure and steps on a landmine. Molly Running Deer, an ER Army field nurse, saves JT’s life. JT has lost so much blood, her heart stops. Molly stops the bleeding using a temporary fix until the doctors can operate. Molly develops a connection with JT and goes with her to Germany for additional surgeries to save her calf, ankle and foot. Flash forward many years later, and the two women, their lives now immeasurably different, meet up again by chance in New York City. Will their previous connection bind them together again, or has their mutual attraction faded with the passing time? Find out in Green Eyes: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption. Green […]
Jul 23

WHY I WROTE: GREEN EYES: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I have always loved the movies. Since I was a child, my favorite movie types were. In order of favorites, here’s my list: Cowboy Movies War Movies Mystery Movies I loved watching any and every kind of Cowboy Movies. Westerns, they were called back then. I still believed the good guys wore white hats and the bad guys were black hats. That’s how they were easily recognized. The bleak dusty desert backgrounds of the wild west were wonderful to see as well. How the beiges, shades browns and cactus greens contrasted with the bright orange skies at just before sundown. My next favorite type were movies about war. Where the was war never matter to me. I loved the buddy, buddy stuff where tragedies of war brought soldiers together. I admired how the soldiers formed long lasting relationships. In the movies, those deep bonds always lasted longer than the war did. The war buddies stayed dear friends until they passed on. Their families knew each and always liked each other as well. As for mystery movies, I always tried to figure out before the hero did, who-dun-it. I sat there in the movie theater matching wits with him or her. […]
Jul 16

SUCCESS MEANS LEARNING TO FAIL

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
The picture above is a view of the Riverside Drive’s Park between West 144th Street and West 142nd Street. The strip park run along Riverside Drive and follows the Hudson River. Parts of the drive mingle with the West Side Highway and so the park overlooks the highway or 12th Avenue. Other parts of the park disappear and reappear further uptown and end somewhere in Inwood. The park still has uniquely antique elements. Note the water fountain, the cobblestone made of bricks, and the old-fashioned street lamps that work. What’s most interesting to me is the way one main road separates into two paths. It reminds me of Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken. For the past six months, my niece and I have grown particularly close. One reason is that my sister, who was also her mother, died six months ago. I’ve always considered my niece like a daughter and so this was a natural progression of things. Another reason we’ve grown close, I’ve been giving her some advice about jobs. Lately, my suggestions have been geared towards her new promotion. A little more than a year ago, she took a job as an entry level employee with a […]
Jul 09

WHAT DOES PLEDGING ALLEGIANCE MEAN?

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
When I was a kid living in Ohio, I could count on two or three things always happening to me. If it was summertime and school was out, my mother would send my siblings and me outside. We played outside all day after we finished our daily chores which included weeding my mother’s flower garden planted by our house and the large patch of vegetable garden, growing yards away from our lawn. If it was the fall and school was in session, I knew two things. The school’s cafeteria would serve the slimy, nasty-tasting olive-green canned peas I hated. I’d ended up missing lunch recess because the lunchroom teacher believed in the motto “eat everything on your plate” and I didn’t. The second thing that was a guarantee was that I’d start my day just as the other children in my class did, by pledging allegiance. I never thought about the words. I just memorized them. I stood up and faced the American flag hanging in the corner of the classroom every morning. Then I placed my right hand over my heart and repeated the memorized words about the flag and the republic. I knew what a flag was because […]
Jul 06

Green Eyes: Molly & Juliane, a story of war love and redemption

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
GREEN EYES: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption. Somewhere in the conflicted Middle East, a badly wounded female transportation driver named Juliane Thomasina (JT) Epps nearly loses a foot and ankle in a rebel attack. As an army corporal, she’s been driving supplies from the local airport to the US Army encampments in the desert and the mountains for two tours of duty. After the attack, she manages to drag her passengers to safety in a nearby cave-like structure and steps on a landmine. Molly Running Deer, an ER Army field nurse, saves JT’s life. JT has lost so much blood, her heart stops. Molly stops the bleeding using a temporary fix until the doctors can operate. Molly develops a connection with JT and goes with her to Germany for additional surgeries to save her calf, ankle and foot. Flash forward many years later, and the two women, their lives now immeasurably different, meet up again by chance in New York City. Will their previous connection bind them together again, or has their mutual attraction faded with the passing time? Find out in Green Eyes: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption. Green […]
Jun 25

WHY I WROTE: GREEN EYES: Molly & Juliane, a story of war, love and redemption

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
I have always loved the movies. Since I was a child, my favorite movie types were. In order of favorites, here’s my list: Cowboy Movies War Movies Mystery Movies I loved watching any and every kind of Cowboy Movies. Westerns, they were called back then. I still believed the good guys wore white hats and the bad guys were black hats. That’s how they were easily recognized. The bleak dusty desert backgrounds of the wild west were wonderful to see as well. How the beiges, shades browns and cactus greens contrasted with the bright orange skies at just before sundown. My next favorite type were movies about war. Where the was war never matter to me. I loved the buddy, buddy stuff where tragedies of war brought soldiers together. I admired how the soldiers formed long lasting relationships. In the movies, those deep bonds always lasted longer than the war did. The war buddies stayed dear friends until they passed on. Their families knew each and always liked each other as well. As for mystery movies, I always tried to figure out before the hero did, who-dun-it. I sat there in the movie theater matching wits with him or her. […]
Jun 18

RIB BONES & MY FATHER

by B.L. in Other 0 comments
That’s a photo of my father in 1953 when we lived on Douglas Street which no longer exist as I knew it back then. My mother likes to tell two stories about me. One shows or purports to show how creative with the truth I was at a young age. As for the second of my mother’s tales, I’ll save that one for another time. I think I was five at the time. Apparently, we—meaning my parents, my sister who was seven, my brother who was three and I were enjoying one of my favorite dinner meals. We were seated around the dinner table in the dining room of our old house on Douglas Street. I should say right now, I don’t remember experiencing this tale myself, but I’ve heard the story so often, I could tell it in my sleep. Knowing my mother, the home economics teacher, believed in balanced meals, I’m sure we had string beans, a green salad, a starch—baked potatoes or something like it, meat or fish, milk for us kids and coffee for her and my father. My parents believed social graces at the dinner table. That usually meant my father would ask my mother […]
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