Category: Family History
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Tales from a Constant Reader, or: Books, Memories, and Changed Circumstances
Well, it’s late morning here on this Wednesday, September 9, 2020, and in my corner of Florida, it looks like it’s going to be another hot and stormy late summer day. Right now, it’s 83˚F (28˚C) under partly sunny skies, although the feels-like temperature is 94˚F (34˚C). It’s a quiet – if perhaps a bit…
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Musings & Thoughts for Sunday, August 2, 2020: Storms and Other Pieces of My Mind
Hello, there! Well, here we are on Sunday, August 2, 2020; it’s late morning in my little corner of Florida as I start this post – I’m not the world’s best or fastest typist, so it will be past noon when I finally post this – and, as usual for the Sunshine State in summer,…
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Odds & Ends for July 24, 2020
Odds and Ends: July 24, 2020 Hi, there, Constant Reader. I hope you are safe, healthy, and practicing safe social distancing on this penultimate Friday of July 2020. As I sit down to write this in my little corner of Florida, it’s almost 2 PM Eastern (not that it matters, since I can’t publish this…
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Musings & Thoughts for July 21, 2020: A Quick Update
Hi, Constant Reader. I’m a bit pressed for time right now, but I just wanted to share an update about my toxic sibling Vicky. Yesterday, while I was checking my email accounts – yes, I have several – I found a response to an email I wrote in March to Vicky’s cousin Juan Manuel. In…
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Weekend Musings for Sunday, July 19, 2020, or: Memoriae nunquam pereunt
Well, it’s already early afternoon on Sunday, July 19, 2020. It’s a hot, steamy day here in my corner of Florida; the temperature outside is 90˚F (32˚C) under partly sunny skies. With humidity at a sticky 65% and an easterly breeze blowing at 8 mph (13 kph), the heat index is 104˚F (40˚C). Later this…
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Weekend Musings for Saturday, July 18, 2020
Hello, there. Well, here we are on Saturday, July 18, 2020; it’s early afternoon in my corner of Florida, and it’s a hot, cloudy one at that. My weather app informs me that that the temperature outside is 86˚F (30˚C), but with humidity at 77% and an easterly breeze of 12 mph, the feels-like temperature…
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Dealing with Stormy Family Relationships Isn’t Easy
As the fifth anniversary of my mom’s death draws ever near – it falls on Sunday, July 19 – I find myself in an emotional tug-o’-war, just as I have done over the previous four anniversaries. I’m trying hard not to let myself fall into a depressed fugue, but at the same time I can’t…
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Why July is NOT My Favorite Month: Part Two
I hate July. First of all, if you are a Florida resident – or a resident of any of the Deep South states that were once part of the Confederate States of America, for that matter – you know that July is when the summer heat starts rising to almost intolerable levels. It’s not, of…
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Why July is NOT My Favorite Month: Part One
July is my least favorite month. Last Tuesday – July 7th – marked the fourth anniversary of a hearing I attended in a Miami-Dade County civil court’s probate division judge’s chambers to settle a dispute between my half-sister Victoria and me over our late mother’s estate. Vicky had filed a “Lost or Destroyed Will” petition…
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Movie-Watcher Memories: The Late Show and ‘The Longest Day’
I was 12 years old when I saw Darryl F. Zanuck’s The Longest Day for the first time. It was sometime during the summer of 1975 – I don’t recall the exact date, but it was around the tail end of my summer vacation from elementary school. Back then, my widowed mother, Beatriz Diaz-Granados, and…
