"There once was a young girl," my professor began as she slowly took the time to make eye contact with every student sitting in the front two rows, "who was the apple of her father's eye. From the time that she was small, she and her father had a special bond. Every night he would read her stories about amazing places and they would sit in her room talking long after her mother thought the child should be sleeping. The father treated his daughter like a pampered princess. It was often quite a source of contention between her parents and certainly made her other siblings envious of the relationship. In the girl's eyes, her father could do no wrong. When it came time for the girl to go to college, she chose one close by so she could live at home. Her family was fairly wealthy, but she didn't stay at home for financial means. She stayed because she wasn't quite ready to leave the shelter of her doting father's arms. Then one day while she was out shopping, she saw a young man who was by far the most handsome person she'd ever seen. He noticed her watching him and smiled. The girl became immediately smitten but he was gone before she could speak with him and she wasn't sure she'd even know what to say. The next day she returned to the place where she'd seen him. Disappointed at not finding him there, she sat at a little outdoor cafe' nearby and had lunch. Suddenly he was there standing by her table. He shyly asked to sit down and she nodded, unable to stop smiling. They talked, mostly of inconsequential things as her food grew cold and in the weeks that followed, they spent almost every afternoon together getting to know one another."

My professor stopped at this point in the story and prompted, "What do you think will happen next? Seems pretty cliche' so far, yes?" Several of my classmates offered opinions of a "happy ending" nature. Others, like me, remained quiet, reserving judgement until we had more information. "Shall I continue?" she asked us. I wasn't sure if she would really stop the story and move on if we all said, "NO", so I did the obligatory nod adding my non-answer to that of the group.

"One sweltering summer night, with the entire house opened up in the hopes of catching a late breeze, the girl woke abruptly to the sounds of gunfire," our professor continued. "The girl crept quietly to her bedroom door and opened it only a crack. When she peered out into the hall, she saw a group of men with guns dressed in dark clothing standing at the open door to her parent's bedroom. She cried out and they turned as one. The largest man in the group came and pulled her from the room, dragging her down the hall and shoving her to her knees. She could see her parents both killed in their beds and she began to scream. The man grabbed her long hair and yanked her head back, placing the tip of his gun to her forehead. 'NO', another man shouted. 'Leave the girl,' he pleaded and knelt beside her. She knew that voice. And when he pulled the covering from his face, she recognized the face she had grown to love. It was the boy she'd been meeting in the square every day. 'Why,' she asked on a sob. 'It's not what you think, love,' he said in a rush. 'We are the Lone Wolves. Your father is responsible for hundreds of deaths. Men, women, and children died at his hands or his orders all in the name of greed. We starve and live in constant fear of when his death squads will come for us and it has to stop,' he attempted to explain. The girl looked back into the room where her parents lay, shaking her head and unable to process the nightmare of a picture he was painting over top of the world she had known since birth. Surely this was a mistake. Surely the man he described could not be the one she knew and loved, idolized even since her earliest memories. 'You lie', she said, spitting at him. His warm face in that moment turned to one of hate, the care for her erased in the very moment of her denial. She shoved him back and got to her feet, running to her parents and was shot before she reached them."

The class was quiet, our faces showing the utter shock at a love story gone horribly wrong. Our professor waited, one minute, then two, as the weight of it sunk into our hyper-processing brains. "Once you know a thing," she said, breaking the dead silence, "you cannot unknow it. You can deny it all you want, but that does not negate the truth of it, no matter what you believed 'before'. Knowledge is like that. ALL knowledge is like that, so keep that in mind as your world and ideas change throughout your college experience and on into your adult life. And as you learn new things about people, places, and the world around you, each of you must decide for yourselves what, exactly, you are going to do with this new knowledge." It was a powerful message, one that I have taken with me every single day since that story was first told. I have lost count of how many times I have had the "truth" of it confirmed over and over in my lifetime and how difficult those lessons have been. Some things we learn can be dealt with in a proactive manner. They can inspire us, be a call to action, or yes, even a call to arms. Other things, however, we must simply live with. I'm still not very good at that, even though I've had years of practice. And while I agree with the message "Knowledge is power," that I've taught all of my students, as well as my children over the years, that is not the end of the story. Knowledge can also be very painful, shattering us in a myriad of ways. Knowledge changes us, not always for the good, and also puts the responsibility of choice absolutely in our face. Live with it? Sometimes you have to leave what you learn right there. It's an ugly truth when that is the only option, but it is one I am coming to terms with.

On a completely unrelated sidebar...I wish all of the children participating in some form of Trick or Treat a very safe and happy Halloween (this extends to the large children who are merely a child at heart).

Love,
A.

"Knock, knock.---Who's there?---Howl---Howl Who?---Howl I get in if you don't open the door?" ~from funnyjokester.com

Halloween is hands down my favorite holiday and if I had to pick a favorite month, it would definitely be October. I love the way summer sheds her clothes, replacing them with the finery of Fall. I love how clean the crisp night air feels once the heat has burned away and how clear the night sky can be on a chilly autumn eve. Perhaps my favorite part, however, is Mother Nature's vivid reminder that everything ends and endings can be beautiful (...with an underlying Hope of Spring, new growth, not far ahead).

And even though I have a "witchy" spirit, am highly attuned to all things elemental, I am not the kind of girl who is into horror flicks. I don't watch them, don't own them, in fact I avoid them like the plague. I enjoy fun ghostly flicks, a good vampire story, and almost any witch tale. Frankenstein, no matter which version, always makes me sad. I want to just take him in my arms and kiss his whole face, telling him that it's perfectly okay that he's not like everyone else! I don't go to haunted houses or ride scary rides, mostly because I despise being caught off guard (by way of something jumping out at me) a lesson learned long ago from monsters of the human variety. If you are a regular to my blog, you already know that frequently my dreams are vicious nightmares that feel very real when I'm having them and can stay with me for days afterwards. I avoid anything that might add to a brain already full of frightening things.

Wherever you are, however you plan to enjoy the weekend's spook 'fest, I hope it finds you safe and happy! And don't forget the candy, which is clearly one of the best parts!

Love,
A.

As I drove home today it was impossible not to be in awe of autumn's final act. It's like the trees burst into vibrant flames before they are stripped bare and left to nothingness in the cold winter months. I thought about life and the seasons we live, if we're fortunate, wondering if my mother was afraid in her final moments. I wondered if prior to her last breath she thought, "Well this didn't go as planned at all!" I swear I could hear her in my mind chuckling. It felt as if she whispered, "It didn't hurt, baby. I came to a place where people I love were already waiting for me and knew that those I left behind would be along shortly." It has taken me many years to be able to have these kinds of thoughts without the blinding pain that used to accompany them and I can't tell  you how grateful I am for that.

Some might say the direction of my musings is maudlin and sad. I think, however, that we don't weep for the leaves strewn around on the ground, or the trees that will spend the next months naked. We know that every facet of life has seasons, cycles and that no living thing is immune to them. For the most part, they are as beautiful as those wildly colourful leaves, although I can't say I intend to grow "old" gracefully. If I get to grow old, I'm going to do it in a manner that would make autumn proud...vibrant and boisterous. I'm going to make my own curtain call something to remember well into the cold, heavy snows of winter, but hopefully not for quite awhile.

On Sunday, as we were cleaning out the camper and winterizing it, my cellphone slipped out of my pocket and hit our concrete driveway right on the corner shattering the screen. In all the years that I've had a cellphone, this is the first casualty I've experienced and it was brutal. The rest of the day, trying to use it with a broken screen drove me bonkers! My very sweet husband took me out the next evening to replace my poor, deceased phone (...probably so I'd hush about it. I know my irritation and complaints were driving him nuts. Hell, they were driving ME nuts!) As I perused the various phone selections, it struck me just how weird I am about my phone. I don't want one too big or too complicated. I want one that has a lot of pretty cases to pick from AND I want to be able to make the new one look almost exactly like the old one so it feels familiar. When the guy helping us asked me what kind of phone I wanted and I told him all of those things, I'm sure he thought I'd lost it, although he politely showed me what his store had to offer. After much discussion on memory issues, easy settings, price and durability, we finally came to the conclusion that an iphone would fit my needs. I've never had an iphone before. All the stuff is different. He attempted to give me a crash course in the things I'd need to know, but I forgot half of the things he told me almost immediately (probably because I wasn't really listening) as I struggled to figure out how to set my ringtones properly. I thought I had it down, really I did and bless him the sales guy DID explain to me how to purchase the ones I wanted and where to look for anything else I might need. But no matter what I tried, all my phone would do was vibrate. I made my husband call me from his phone a half dozen times. I called myself from the house phone and nada. No sounds whatsoever. With great frustration and disgust, I handed it over to my husband before bed, and he played with it awhile to no avail. "We'll figure it out tomorrow," he said on a yawn. "Time for sleep." I didn't know how I was supposed to sleep with my phone still not "right" but I gave it a go.

I dragged my sleepy butt out of bed this morning, having absolutely no time to try and puzzle out why the sounds still weren't working. Finally, after coming home from work today and clicking just about everything I knew to click, buying a new ring tone (which was my old ring tone that I dearly love), setting all the other buttons for things in a desperate attempt to make my phone make SOME noise, I admitted bitterly that it was beyond my ability and drove down to the Verizon store in defeat. When I told the little sales girl my problem, she showed me the little button on the side that flips up and down...up for sound, down for vibrate! Wait. WHAT? There's a button on the side??? I would have never figured that out on my own and after she pointed it out I felt completely stupid (or at least barely half as intelligent as my SMARTphone). How has my life become so wrapped around the axel when it comes to my phone or my laptop? It's ridiculous and yet it has been a giant source of my worry and angst for two days now! Do my contacts have pictures? Are the pictures centered and light enough to see the face of whomever they belong with? (And in case you're wondering, I did pressure the sales guy who told me to call him if I needed any help to allow me to take his picture so I'd have one with HIS face!) Do the contacts I want to have personal ring tones have them and are they set properly? And how do I shut everything off to quiet when I'm out in public (use the dumb/smart little button on the side, goofball)? Is it weird that I think it's wicked cool my phone opens up to the home screen because it recognizes my FINGERPRINT??? Yes, I sat in utter wonder like a complete dork as my phone scanned my fingerprint and filled in all the little lines on screen for MY finger. It's going to take me months to figure out all the bells and whistles for this entirely new set-up (and that's being generous saying I will actually learn them all *snorts*). By the time I have them all figured out well enough to do the few things I really want to do with my phone, it will be time to get something new (I absolutely H-A-T-E that part). Sigh. Yes, technology has made me her bitch. I'm not proud to admit that, but I'm still very excited to learn something new. And come on...admit it...that fingerprint thing is COOL!

The split screen in my mind was dark, both figures shadowed except for the places where moonlight poured through windows around them. On the left, a long, lean young man wearing lounge pants, and a t-shirt with graphic art on it, his sleeves pushed up to just below his elbows. He was stretched out on a sofa, legs crossed and moonlight made his white-socked feet a beacon of contrast to the dark in the room. As I studied him, I noticed one hand resting casual and low on his stomach, while the other cradled the phone, a flash of white from his teeth, as the girl he was speaking to said something to make him smile.

On the right the girl he was speaking to sat Indian-style at the foot of her bed. The moonlight caught her nightgown and the tip of one exposed knee as she quietly spoke to the man on the phone. I watched them talk to each other in low, intimate tones and got the sense that their "relationship" was new. The man grew more uncomfortable, fidgeting on the sofa as the woman's voice aroused and enticed him. The woman, sensing his mood change, cut the conversation and told him she was going to bed. When they hung up, his part of the screen vanished and I watched the girl smile to herself, get up and perform her nightly rituals.

She came to lock the front door, which was open, but a screen door was closed over the doorway and she saw the man from the phone, his tall form familiar, approaching her door. His face was covered with a balloon bouquet he carried as he walked across her front porch to the door, and she laughed. She kept the screen, also locked, between them as he stood just outside it and moved the balloons, his face a happy grin in the black night. "Are you going to let me in?" he asked boyishly, a little shy now that he was here and she was so close. "Nope," she said smiling. "It's the middle of the night, you goof. I'm going to bed." The hot look that crossed his face made the now quiet between them hang heavy in the air. They both stood, watching each other and waiting. Finally, he took a deep breath, scrubbed his face with a hand he didn't know what to do with and leaned a little closer to the screen, "Come for a ride with me?" he challenged, appealing to her wild side. "Now?" she asked, breathless that he was close enough to feel his warm breath against her cheek through the screen. "Yeah," he nodded, locking his eyes with hers. She looked to see his motorcycle parked at the end of her short gravel drive and found it impossible to resist. "Okay, I'll be right out," she said in a burst of courage, the words blending into one smooshed sentence that made him chuckle.

She turned and dashed back to her bedroom to slip into jeans and a long-sleeve t-shirt. "Hey," he shouted from the door. "Aren't you going to let me in?" "Not a chance," she called back, laughing and pulling on her boots as the excitement built. She grabbed her keys, stuffed them into her jeans pocket, darted out passed him as she locked the door, and raced to stand next to his bike. He followed her, then scooped her into his arms and kissed her deeply before she could squirm away. She gave a soft moan that nearly did him in and he let himself indulge in her lips another moment before forcing himself to pull away. "Get on, woman. Let's go for a ride," he said, mounting the bike like a modern day cowboy. She climbed on behind him and they roared away.

They took an old dirt road that curved around woods and fields near her little house. It was clear that there had been a lot of rain, great clumps of mud and water pooled in places throughout the large field. The night air was cool, so she squeezed close to his warmth and held on tight. He stopped by the edge of a forest, turning to kiss her hard and deep. He cut the engine so that he could pull her even closer but as they kissed there in the night, a roar overhead broke them apart. Together they looked up and could just make out several large, dark planes flying overhead. He tensed, got off the bike to stand and get a better look. It was then that I realized that he was somehow connected to the military and recognized the significance of what they were seeing, even if the girl from the dream had no idea except to be afraid. An explosion rocked the woods in front of them and she took off across the field, running in the direction of her house. The mud was slippery and several times she lost her footing, but she could hear him running behind her. About a hundred yards from her house she fell. She heard helicopters overhead and looked up. They were circling her location like angry buzzards. Suddenly, one of the helicopters swooped to its side where she could just make out the emblem of a blade-like white cross, then it dropped a long cylinder-like object that landed about 30 feet from where she lay. About the time she realized it was a bomb, another fell, this one landing only about five feet from her. She knew she would never get away in time to avoid the blast and she could hear the man screaming her name in the night, his voice laced with panic. He didn't know where she was and she didn't want to call out to him because she knew he'd die with her if she did. There was no way he wouldn't come to her and that just wouldn't work. She curled up into a tight ball there in the dark and oozing mud and waited. It wasn't long before the explosion shook her and woke me.

Last night before bed, my husband and I were watching the news as they spoke of the Vice President, Joe Biden, passing on a run for president in the upcoming election. "I swear if it comes down to Trump and Clinton, I'm writing you in on my ballot," I quipped. "No kidding," my husband said disgustedly. "I'll write myself in and that will be two votes for me," he said, smiling. It seemed like a ridiculous idea at the time, a joke we both laughed about before heading off to dreamland. It has, however, gained some steam over the course of my day.

The Today Show was on this morning while I was getting ready for work. They were discussing Hillary verses the Donald. Trumps media bite had him saying he thought Biden was doing what was best for him family and he was glad because he really wanted to run against Hillary. I thought, "These people can not be serious! Who in their right mind would consider either of them as a viable leader for our great Nation?" Suddenly the exchange with my husband from the night before didn't seem so outrageous. In fact, in the face of this mess, it seemed positively sane in a world gone mad. My husband is a good man, an honorable man who devoted twenty-four years of his life in the service of his country. He certainly can relate to the average American's plight much better than a billionaire or an affluent, lying, career politician! His qualities, to my mind, make him a much stranger candidate than Trump and Clinton put together.

As I shared my thoughts about this on Facebook with some friends and family, it was suggested that no one seems to care how damaged our country has become, nor how completely ridiculous it is that either of these people is being considered for the highest office in the land. Mostly I believe people feel helpless to stop the utter trainwreck our government displays on an almost daily basis. We are only helpless, though, when we are just one lone voice here and there. Together, if we stand as ONE voice, we truly can create the changes we wish to see. I teach this to my students and believe it to my core! Do I have these grandiose aspirations for the man I'm married to? Not a chance unless that's what HE wants. The only agenda either of us has, especially in this regard, is the well-being of a country we both love very much. So, we must decide...what do we stand for and whom do we stand with? For me, those answers are easy!

"The past is a ghost. The future is a dream and all we ever have is now." ~author Unknown

Here lately my footsteps have been shadowed by the ghosts of people I've left behind, which has a way of layering a coat of melancholy over my entire mood. There is no trigger, no rhyme nor reason for their appearance and the "shade" of them" pulls away, vanishing in an equally unassuming fanfare. While they linger, my ghosts whisper almost forgotten names in my ear or flash a long-ago memory through my mind. Mostly, though, they haunt my damn dreams. Awake I can usually distract myself from them, or even drown them out almost completely. Dreams however are different. There's no escape, nowhere to go while they hold me captive and say whatever it is they've come to say. The worst part about this is how upon waking, they doggedly hound my every step with this "new" memory. It can be almost as powerful as an actual memory and include smells, sounds, colours so vivid I have to bite my lip HaRD to remind myself I'm awake and it's not real.

I have learned that some things, some people invariably "stick", whether you want them to or not. Some memories do not allow for escape. This used to drive me completely mad, nearly desperate for an out, the Exit, anything to make them be still, or better...GO away. Now that I know that's not going to happen, I have stopped fighting it and just let them run their course. It's usually brief, and when the last of their bluster has burned itself down to ash, I can step over it and continue moving forward...until next time.

I sat at a picnic table across from my husband in the crisp October evening, while we listened to the rules of our first ever Chili Cook-Off! We were surrounded by people we didn't know, but you certainly wouldn't have guessed that due to the warm, friendly nature of the conversation. There were no strangers at these tables, merely friends who were meeting one another for the first time. My husband, who to my knowledge has never eaten chili in his life said, "I'm going to try some of them. Show me what you'd think I would like?" I could not contain my smile, as the steam of a new path we're taking really got going. The path we've agreed to embark on together involves doing things we've never done, traveling to places we've always wanted to go and discovering ones we didn't even know we wanted to visit until we got there. This is one of the reasons we purchased our camper over the summer, so that we would have a mobile hotel room to wherever we decided to let the wind take us. On this beautiful little mountain, at the third ever RV Park where we were camping, both of us spoke in quiet tones to each other about the deep and loving sense of community shared here. People made us feel welcome. We talked about our dogs, laughed at the playful challenge for the winner of the cook-off, and prayed for an eight-year-old none of us knew who was lost on the mountain.









One thing both of us have really loved about our RVing experience is the opportunity to meet and visit with people from all over. I am delighted to discover this underlying current of camaraderie that seems to be absent in suburban America. Honestly, I thought it was mostly lost forever. Turns out it's just gone on the road to "everywhere"! Who knew?! Our last trip for the season to McDowell County, North Carolina was just "right"! We chose that destination because the fall colours are still in wild array, and if you haven't seen the North Carolina mountains in full fall glory, you truly must! We certainly enjoyed Mother Nature's enchanting autumn beauty, but even more fantastic was the warm welcome we received from Ron and Becky Johnston, the owners of Mountain Stream RV Park and the great group of campers whom we had the good fortune of meeting. Dinner Saturday night was delicious. The chili perfectly hit the spot and helped beat back the cold of the night to come, while my husband's homemade brownies added the "frosting" to our experience!

If you're ever in the neighborhood, consider stopping in at the Mountain Stream. They're not kidding with their claim of being, "The prettiest little park this side of Heaven"! You can find them at www.mountainstreamrvpark.com.

It was a dark and stormy night....no, wait. Wrong story! This story is about an exciting, full of life young lady who continually inspires and delights me. Yesterday my youngest daughter and I spent the afternoon and evening creating a murder mansion for her Halloween Party that she's hosting on Saturday. She's having a murder mystery dinner party and the work she's put into it is creatively delicious! I've had a lot of fun listening to her make potential killer profiles, clues for the various scenarios that might have happened, and helping her bring her vision to life! Everyone has chosen a different character and will come in costume according to their role and hopefully all are anxious to discover "Who Done It"! The images below set the stage, but the absolute best part will be the development of the story as the people slip back in time to the 1940's, landing smack dab in the middle of a murder (...or perhaps they are the ONE responsible for said murder)! I can't wait to see how it turns out!

Here's wishing you a weekend full of adventure!

Always,
A.

As you enter Murder Mansion, the house is deceptively warm. Candles sparkle and the atmosphere invites you to put your feet up and make yourself at home...and yet, there is an undercurrent of unease felt just at the moment when you relax...

Someone in this group is hiding a terrible secret. Can you guess who it is before it's too late? Can you identify the killer without becoming his or her next victim? Or, if YOU are the killer, are you intelligent enough to elude discovery and get away with murder?

...to be continued!

On average, I take about five "selfies" a week. Most of them get deleted (...because let's face it, nobody needs that many photos of themselves). Many of them get sent to my husband (...because he digs it and it makes him happy). And some of them find their way into my blogs (...like today)! Why this gets such intense negative reactions from some people (and it totally does) is beyond me. Of all the things I could do or say that one might find offensive, this is it? The thing that pushes you over the proverbial edge is that I have a photo posted of myself? The shame! The horror! I just don't get it.

First, let me say that from a marketing standpoint, one thing that has been suggested over and over in my research is that readers want to know their authors. Building a reader base, a reader/author relationship is in part learning how to sell yourself and showing my visage publicly is one strategy I use to help grow my writing career. Since I'm building it without any help from anyone (for the most part) except my small fan base, it's a simple strategy I am equipped to manage. That makes it a win-win for me.

Second, I can't tell you how many truly wretched photos people have taken of me over the years  (my grandmother was famous for doing this). Every time I see one it just makes me groan. Honestly, I'm relieved when a decent picture of me "show's up" and it's not because I am particularly obsessed with seeing my face (which I have in fact been accused of). I see my face daily without the existence of any selfies and when I do I am reminded that I have my mother's skin and cheekbones, the Brown signature chin, and eyes with bits of both my mother's blue and my father's green. I see a woman who has survived a whole lot of crap without turning into a bitter, jaded "ugly" person. I see a woman with flaws I can live with, who still needs to work on other things (...internal things). I am neither ashamed nor overly proud of the fact that due to some decent DNA, I am not unfortunate to look at.

It's funny (...and by that I mean ODD not hilarious), that you see so many things encouraging people to be confident about who they are, and yet the very moment someone exerts said confidence even a little bit, someone is behind their back, or in their face ready to label them things like vain, cocky, or my personal favorite "putting on airs" (*insert serious eyeroll here). I find that utterly ridiculous and I know I'm not the only one who feels this way.

Finally, whether you take, post, or have one selfie or a hundred, I personally enjoy seeing them. I especially adore the unique and beautiful faces of those I love, most of whom are scattered around our globe. It makes me feel as if those people are somehow a little bit closer. If you, however, find yourself annoyed by other people's selfies...don't look! If you hate them for whatever reason, don't take them! And if you are offended to the point where you feel justified in bashing me or others about them, then I suggest you NOT talk to me. In fact, stay away from me completely because I promise you eventually I will call you out on it. Selfies hurt no one. Attempting to change that simple fact by trying to shame others about taking them is very uncool!