Category: writing

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Valentine’s Day is When?

Writer’s Workshop Prompt 5.) Valentine’s Day is coming…share a favorite Valentine’s tradition.

My husband’s Valentine’s Day tradition is simple. On Valentine’s Day, Ed always comes home from work late.

On Valentine’s Day, we rarely go out. Very often, it’s a week night. Neither one of us remembers to make reservations in advance, and then we’d also have to find a babysitter. So I usually try to make pot roast, a dinner Ed loves.

One February, I bought a beautiful beef roast for Valentine’s Day, and then I received a phone call. It was one of those phone calls you dread. My grandpa had fallen, and my cousin thought we should travel to Iowa to see him. I threw that gorgeous piece of meat into the freezer, packed my bags, and spent the week, including Valentine’s Day, with my family.

I was grateful I went, because I was able to be with my grandpa on the day he died. He had loved a long and wonderful 96 years.

Ed joined me in Iowa for the funeral. When we returned home, there was a puddle of meat juice on the kitchen floor. Our refrigerator had kicked the bucket and that was the end of the pot roast.

For our first Valentine’s Day together as a married couple, I handmade a sentimental card for Ed by printing some special emails we sent to each other. I included the emails we sent when I first asked him out, and the emails we sent to each other the day after we were engaged. I made a cute little booklet with hearts and a photo of the two of us, and presented it to Ed on Valentine’s Day.

After eight years of marriage and two kids, I rarely remember to buy Ed a card. So I traipse up to my card box, look at the cards I’ve saved from previous years, and re-give Ed one of those cards. He never notices. The key is to never write the year on the card.

One of my choices this year.

I rarely receive a Valentine’s Day card from Ed. Instead, he’ll stop off at the Jewel after work to buy me some flowers. That’s why he’s always late on Valentine’s Day, because he stops at the grocery store to buy me some flowers.

That’s good enough for me.

Mama's Losin' It

What do you love about Valentine’s Day?
Visit Mama Kat’s for more about Valentine’s Day and other writing prompts!

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Fries and Family for Writer’s Workshop

I’m writing two separate pieces in one post today for Mama Kat’s Writer’s Workshop. First, a poem inspired by the following prompt: Write a love poem to a favorite food. The second piece is about this prompt: Social media is an amazing way to reunite with old friends. Describe a good or not-so-good experience you’ve had with it.

Ode to French Fries

Oh, french fries, you’re glorious,
even though you’re calorious,
You simply are my favorite food.

Share you, I’ll never
Even though it will ever
Be said that I’m rude.

No ketchup, please,
I’d rather have cheese,
Or just sprinkle you with plenty of salt.

Although I just love your taste,
You really add to my waist,
Our love affair certainly must halt!

Skins on or nak-ed,
Fried, but not bak-ed,
Thick or thin, still I adore you.

After much consideration,
I’ll try moderation.
My love for you remains true!

If you wrote a poem to your favorite food, what food would you choose?

Mama's Losin' It

Facebooking My Way to Family

Basically, they thought I stole their uncle away from them. They were six and nine, and had had a doting uncle up to this point. Then suddenly, their uncle wasn’t as accessible any more. He became busy on the weekends, and visited less spontaneously. And when he did see them, he brought me along. They no longer had their fun-loving, rough-housing uncle to themselves. Instead, he was always holding hands and confiding in someone else: me.

I was a teacher, and I always got along with kids. I thought I would win them over instantly. However, it didn’t turn out that way. We got along, but our relationship was never “easy.” I disciplined them too much, unable to drop my teacher ways over the weekend. They resented me sometimes for just being there.

Their uncle and I married, and suddenly, I was their aunt. I don’t think they have ever called me “aunt”. I was just as bad; in the beginning, I referred to them as “my husband’s niece and nephew,” not “my niece and nephew.”

Along the way, they became teens. For some unrelated reason, I joined facebook. They friended me. We started chatting online. They commented on my statuses and I wrote on their walls. The relationships we had online seemed to be smoother and more natural than the relationships we had in person.

In my mind and in my heart, they became my niece and nephew. Just as I hope that in their hearts, they think of me as Aunt Ginny, and know that I’ll be there whenever they need me.