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Showing posts from June, 2019

#27: Last Dance : Inspired by my own father.

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First Dance image by Jacqueline Osborn Last Dance I wrote this short story after my dad died in 1992. It was published in SKYLARK, Purdue University's literary journal; I was so thrilled I framed the acceptance letter. I still have that letter hanging around someplace. Not literally hanging anymore, I packed it away in storage during one of our moves. Like my memories, it's in there somewhere. I wish I could give you this stuff in order, begin at the beginning. If I could do that, I'd write a book. Instead I have to grab at what glimpses I can. It's as though all the places and people stuffed inside my head are like yards and yards of once beautiful fabrics, ripped from their bolts and shoved into one large bin. Velvets, jewel-toned satins, richly-textured tapestries, billowy silks. Cotton, denim, gingham and chintz. They're all jammed in there together, some faded now, some in tatters, a loose thread here, a trace of a connection there. A smell, a smi

And the sparklers red glare [Also on iTunes, Stitcher and SoundCloud]

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We didn't celebrate the Fourth of July when I was a kid growing up in Canada in the Sixties. But that doesn't mean we didn't have fireworks. And the Sparklers' Red Glare July 1st and in Niagara Falls we were celebrating Dominion Day just a few days before the Americans right across the river celebrated their independence. As a kid I didn't separate the two concepts. Fireworks were fireworks, explosive charges that burst into beautiful fiery lights, zapping our sleepy summer skies with noise and color and a dash of danger. The nuance that the Americans were celebrating their freedom while we were celebrating the 1867 union of the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Canada into one country, the Dominion of Canada, under the governance of British rule was lost on me. It was 1963; the maple leaf flag was yet to be, the Union Jack still waved. God Save the Queen! Like the American kids across the river, all we cared about were the burgers being g