An Italian-American Writer & Poet with a Yankee Outsider Perspective
Michele Bachman is providing mini lessons on the Southern branch of American Christianity. Granted, as she keeps telling us, she’s from Iowa. Her current constituents in Minnesota may also be surprised to find that they’re supporting a branch of Christianity … Continued
When my sister and I received our allowances as kids, each week’s outlay probably amounted to a quarter. In that distant era, when a loaf of sliced bread cost a nickle, and a bottle of milk not much more, a … Continued
Bonnie Jo Campbell’s short story collection titled American Salvage recently caught my attention because a friend of many years and few actual visits recently drove me through rural Michigan where many of the stories take place. My friend Irene (not … Continued
An adult student of mine who grew up poor in Wisconsin (growing up poor in Minnesota is also quite possible. She just happens to be from Wisconsin), recently described her finances during four years of private, liberal-arts college in the … Continued
There he stands in the University of Minnesota’s hockey arena, not a large, nor a small man in a drape of maroon cloth, his neck and arms bare, and a plastic visor circling his balding head like a slightly errant … Continued
Florence’s Protestant (or English) Cemetery used to sit outside the city walls–unsanctified ground. I like to think it was created out of an ancient kitchen midden, which might explain its peculiar shape–low at the entrance and rising at one end … Continued
OK, the truth is out. If I didn’t have a long history and lots of blank checks, I’d quit. Banking used to be serene and non-threatening. No snarly-eyed tellers inquiring if I was ready to “hand over the dough!” No … Continued
George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London (1933), describes his seasons washing dishes as a plongeur in an immense Parisian hotel, where the kitchen and scullery are sunk into the depths like Satan’s den, and the floors above … Continued