Footprints
"On A Rare Day" is a 2020 revision of my 2014 book--"Footprints" plus poetry written since and stories published in my book "A Blaze a Glory". It begins with forty nine poems, a few dating back to the 1960s and '70s when I lived in Michigan, San Francisco and New York City--most of more recent vintage. Fourteen songs follow, then short stories, followed by humor. The beginning few pages of my two other books (teasers) complete this work. Here are some samples :
WATER Water wants to run, gaining speed times speed on crazy cobblestone mountain twistways, laugh, tickled by the tingle of coldness and playful fingers of breeze, feel the frightening freedom of falling, shatter into fine jewelry mist, break sunlight to play in the colors, lick the smooth taste of shiny rock, stop to rest in deep, sleepy pools HER VOICE
When I first heard her voice blew through me like wind through a whistle, she hit me rolling eighteen wheeler fast and I was road pizza. (to my wife, Susanna) Novelists... spew gallons of ink over oceans of paper the way ruptured tankers spill crude. Poets are ecological. DON'T LET ME DOWN
Last week my telephone rang while I was in the shower. Got so mad I pulled it off the wall. But if this new one doesn't ring in the next half hour, It'll be the second phone to fall. So I'd appreciate it kindly If you don't let me down this whole damned bottle An' you don't let me down that old highway all alone Cause that's where I'm goin' if you let me down. I called you yesterday an' I know you got the message I'm sorry for the stupid things I've done. But if you don't call an' tell me all's forgiven It's time for this old boy to cut an' run. So I'd appreciate it kindly...(repeat chorus) Yeah that's where I'm goin' if you let me down, So I'd appreciate it kindly. |
Most of the materials in"A Blaze A Glory" were added to my Footprints book when it was revised and renamed "On A Rare Day" in 2020, so A Blaze a Glory" is out of print. Here ia info about the short stories that were in "A Blaze a Glory" which are now in "On A Rare Day".
"Great Speckled Banana's Great Quest" is the story in a drawing book I've published for "children from 3 to 103". The story is for all children, but some of the humor goes over younger heads and hits us older "children". Likewise "Timmy And The Hotdog Song" and "What A Way Ta Go" are likely to be enjoyed by kids of all ages, though the latter may not be appropriate for the very youngest children. "Timmy And The Hotdog Song" is available on Amazon as a drawing book similar to "Great Speckled Banana's Great Quest". "Leaving Flowerville" is the first chapter of a book which is as yet unnamed. I have several thousand more words of it on paper, but it's currently a shelved project. It rests on a fairly convenient shelf in my computer, though. I expect to pull it out, blow off the dust, and resume work on it someday. The first few pages of "Shrugg, 1 Mile" and "Last Voyage a the Vangeferth" give you a pretty clear picture of the two fiction books I've written. "Last Voyage a the Vengeferth" is an adventure book on the level of "Robinson Caruso"--good (and appropriate) for adventure lovers of all ages. It's quite historically accurate in its pirate lore, but its main conflicts are man against nature. I Put excerpts from a rave review it received from a book blogger on the back cover. You can read some of that review on "The Last Voyage a the Vengeferth's" page on this web site. "Shrugg, One Mile" is a science fiction novella. I rate it PG17. The only complaint I've ever received about it is that it's too short. I may write a sequel someday.
What
A Way Ta Go
Boredom was the enemy for us kids of course. Especially in the summer. News, good or bad, was a good thing. News had the word new in it. News had the four directions in it, North, East, West and South. Every day at six o'clock you could be reminded of that by Walter Cronkite--small, in black and white. News meant something was happening, something loud to kick the cobwebs out of your head and push back the morning fog, some excitement. Like the glorious time old Will Hardy drove into the fire. Now that was excitement. Of course it didn't seem so glorious to old Will, but it made him the biggest hero of all time around those parts and who wouldn't want to go out a hero? It happened long before my time, but I'd heard the story dozens of times from Gramps before I was knee high to a cricket. Gramps said nobody for miles around needed that tin plaque on the rickety wood stand out front of the Hardy Theater to remind them how it got its name Gramps would start in after dinner on the porch swing between puffs on his corn cob pipe. "According to my Dad, Will was a pretty average Joe. I was a few years younger than you are now when I saw it happen, but back then I never knew anything about Will. Can't remember ever seeing his face before I caught that last glimpse of it, eyes bigger 'n saucers. "But Dad said he was pretty average in most ways. Not too smart nor too dumb, too tall nor particularly short. But he was honest. Dad swore to that. Honest as the day was long. A course that wasn't particularly unusual. Most folks round those parts were. But the one thing Will did have was the braggin' rights to bein' the best watermelon seed spitter in the county. When that man spat a seed it stayed spat a long time, my Daddy used to say." Gramps would shake his head. "Come to think of it I might of seen him spit seeds at the county fair the year before he burned up, but I was caught up in the fair and too young to take notice of him like I would of, if I knew how famous he'd get ta be." Gramps always put most of the blame on Hardy's Hill, which didn't have that name 'til it was named after Will. "There were plenty a hills west of town and lots of 'em were pretty steep. The land was good, but in them days it was easy ta wear out a team of mules or horses farmin' them hills. Later on, tractors were known ta roll down 'em sideways once in awhile. Good luck ta the driver. Ya gotta jump quick an' in the right direction. Hardest thing in the world though I suspect, ta not go jumpin' west when she's a goin' west. Roll bars are a true blessing. An' seat belts, too. "Anyway, Hardy's Hill is as big and steep as any of 'em and the closest ta town. It's so danged close. When you walk out the Hardy theater and look straight up Lawrence Boulevard, that hill looks like old Will coulda hit it with a well spat seed. "So, that's the way the town was set up. An' still is, far as I know. Boulevard shoots right down the hill, into town and stops at Main--the smack dab center a town. But strictly speakin', Lawrence ain't no boulevard with grass down the middle--just named that--and Will didn't.....Stop that is. (Gramps always said it that way, taking a solemn puff on his pipe in the pause.) "I sure don't know what dumb fella thought ta plop the town down right next ta a hill that big. Dumber 'n a bag a hammers," Gramps would guffaw. "An' whoever decided ta put a road straight down that hill into town must of been his brother--even dumber. Two bags a hammers. Course the road was likely there first. Oh well. "Anyway that Saturday, 'bout noon, old Will come out from workin' in his barn ta get hisself some lunch and spied a big old cloud a smoke just a billerin' up from behind the hill. His bein' the first farm over the hill on the.... |
I hear a major airline
is planning a new promotion. They're going to introduce flights with gourmet
cooks aboard. Passengers will be served all the gourmet food they want while
flying from New York to L. A. and from L. A. to New York.
Can you guess what they've named this amazing promotion? It's to be appropriately called "When Pigs Fly", which, coincidentally, is precisely when it's is scheduled to begin. Why did the bully refuse to cross the road? He was afraid they'd think he was a chicken Speaking of chickens, did you hear about the hen that laid a five-pound egg? She was quite surprised and so was everyone else. But she sat on it for a while and sure enough, it hatched. Well, that chick was about the size of a bowling ball and nearly as heavy. And right away it started growing. In just a few months it grew to nearly fifty pounds with legs about three feet long. But it had a very sad life, you see. It really was a chicken and it always tried to fit in, but it was ostrich sized all its life. Little is known about the great Count of Monti Crisco except that he was quite rotund and his sword was as dull as a butter knife.
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"On a Rare Day" 28,211 words, 110 pages, pub-lished 5/22/2020, cover design G.A.Schindler, available at amazon $11.99. Also available on kindle.
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