My Portfolio

Automatic washing machines as upposed to wringer washers.  Clothes dryers instead of clotheslines,  (although I loved the way the clothes smelled when I took them off the lines) ,  Pampers, which I never had the pleasure of using,  Garbage disposals (now that's a big one),   Medicine for anything that ails you, it...

Our accommodations at the whale camp were serviceable but Spartan. We were provided with cots and sleeping bags in small tents on the beach. Because it was a desert—and February—the temperature dropped sharply when the sun went down and how the wind howled! Each night I waited for our tent to...

The most enduring Christmas tradition in my family is our annual race—a race against time. It is the same every year, the result of a combination of procrastination and high expectations. Every year I swear it will be different but it never is. I start making my list early and even...

All science classes in the small-town high school from which I graduated were taught by a poor soul whom, for out of respect for his memory, I will not name.  Consider him “Mr. X.”  Mr. X became infamous for the total anarchy that reigned in his classroom.  This unfortunate man had...

A Web of Destruction Down inside the soul of every man and woman is good and evil.  One characteristic overshadows the other, and usually by a large margin.  For some, evil is the primary inhabitant.  Good is only occasionally allowed to rear its head.  The souls of these are dominated by...

Forgiveness is such a powerful action.  I call it an action, because it takes conscious effort to go through the process of forgiveness.  It doesn't just happen by itself, and it is actually an attribute to which we should all aspire.  The result of an unforgiving spirit is bitterness.  And bitterness...

In the 1930’s, Central Oklahoma would have made any film director looking for an “On Location” site for a movie depicting the seven plagues of Ancient Egypt drool with desire.   Most of Oklahoma, after enduring the destruction of the Dust Bowl, foreclosures on family farms and double-digit unemployment had one...

I was indeed fortunate to know both my maternal grandparents and my paternal grandmother. My paternal grandfather, Stephen Harry "Dick" Mason, died many years before my birth, so I only know what I have been told and what information I located doing genealogical research in the Prairie County, Arkansas, Courthouse in...

Really - only ONE ancestor?? Come on - you have to know me better than THAT!!  Me who is working on a book about time travel and going back to watch my ancestors and maybe interact with them.... (still working on plot and story line).  So I cannot limit it to...

Forgive?   I have much more to be forgiven for than to forgive.   The years between 1950 and 1979 are filled with things I did to hurt other people.   It wasn’t deliberate or malicious but that doesn’t excuse the fact that I did hurt people, sometimes severely.   I either didn’t know or...

To FORGIVE.... that is tough... Different from forgetting... I have had to learn that to forgive someone of something doesn't mean you have to forget they did it.  And that is a HUGE difference as well as a HUGE gap to cross... A tough lesson to learn and actually follow.  I...

Life is made up of achievement, failure, frustration, fulfillment, ecstasy and agony: and in my 79 years I have both sampled and sometimes dwelled too long in every one of them.  That is as it should be. I would find it impossible to say which among the thousands of joyful moments,...

The Spirit of Christmas is the Spirit of Christ. As my son, Golden, was reading a story from Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Second Counselor in the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, it triggered a memory in my mind that had been long forgotten. On Christmas...

In my growing up and college years, I had a bad temper.  However, over the years I have learned to control it, as well as come to the knowledge that if I was offended, I was the only one to blame.  No one could make me angry nor offend me without...

There are some things we did in our lives that we may wish we had done differently, but there is a good probability that if we got a second chance we would not do them differently.  Why? Because the motivation to do what we did the first time is firmly grounded...

Oh Boy ; Oh Boy ; Oh Boy Week 2 of the December Legacy Story Prompt is a doozey : Describe an egregious act that is still too difficult to forgive or that you have since forgiven. As a Christian I know that I am supposed to forgive those that trespass...

Topic "Wisdom and Opinions" Our world is changing faster than civilization is able to keep up. These changes are sometimes for good and others not so. Sharing each others' insights can open our eyes to things we may not be aware of. On the flip side we can have that same...

Did you ever return from a job and say to yourself, I ought to write a book, but it's just too overwhelming, and who's got the time? Here's a free place to chronicle those unusual days and odd occurrences in snippets before you forget about them. I've already written a couple,...

In reply to the question to write about one's greatest achievement in my life, I wrote the following: Since only one in ten students graduate from stenotype school, I would have to say that this has been my greatest achievement. The fall after graduating from Frank W. Cox High School in 1970, I...

Prompt:  If you could go back and relive any part of your life what would you do differently and why? Over the many years since I was a child, I have had many experiences that have been a result of some of the mistakes I made as a youth.  Would I...