Toddler Toted Toys to Top Treasure Trove –1938
Caretaker Albert Nelson’s Journals–1927-53–Tell Stories
220th in a Series from Tales from Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery
By SUE HUNTER WEIR
Albert Nelson
Some of Albert Nelson’s workdays were more interesting than others. Nelson, the Cemetery’s Caretaker from 1927 until his death in 1953, sent a monthly report to his supervisor detailing his work and the number of hours that each task took. He often included a brief account, usually no more than a sentence or two, of unusual happenings in the Cemetery. In his report for April 1938, he wrote “Wed., April 20th, played nurse to a lost baby boy at the Cemetery for two hours until the mother and police called for him at the same time.” That baby boy was two-year-old James Horace Spillane.
James Horace Spillane
James was the youngest of Edward and Helen Spillane’s four children. The family lived just a few blocks from the Cemetery at 1839 East 28th Street. James, who had just turned two on February 10th, somehow managed to cross Cedar Avenue by himself and wander into the Cemetery. Apparently, he planned to stay a while since he brought a toy truck and a toy car with him. If James’ mother was frantic when she noticed that her son was missing, James clearly was not.… Read the rest “Toddler Toted Toys to Top Treasure Trove –1938”
Embracing Failure
from the series Peace House Community- A Place to Belong
By MARTI MALTBY
“Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly at first. It’s worth doing poorly many times until you get good at it.”
-Paul Tracy (or maybe it was Zig Ziglar, I can’t remember which)
“Go on failing. Go on. Only next time, try to fail better.”
-Samuel Beckett
As someone who grew up receiving a fair amount of criticism when I failed (one of the byproducts of being compared to two exceptionally gifted brothers). I often try to protect myself from failure. Maybe it would be more precise to say that, when I fail, I make sure I have my excuses ready. I’ve learned that no one can completely avoid failure. Life will sometimes require us to do things we aren’t that skilled at doing, and we won’t be able to do it well enough. That may not technically be a failure, but as I grew up, it felt like it was.
It took a long time for me to realize that avoiding my failures didn’t do any good for anyone. Others learned that I wouldn’t take responsibility when I made mistakes. I couldn’t learn from my mistakes because, I argued, it was always someone or something else’s fault.… Read the rest “Embracing Failure”
Marcie Rendon’s Sweet Revenge
from the series Something I Said
By DWIGHT HOBBES
What’s An Indian Woman To Do When White Women Act More Indian Than Indian Women Do, part of a prose-poetry reading at Jungle Theater, was my first exposure to the bone dry wit of singularly gifted writer, Marcie Rendon. Catching her irreverent theatrical tour de force, Free FryBread at Bryant-Lake Bowl. a take-no-prisoners satire cum indictment of the prison system, I sat back in my seat, thinking, ‘Scared of her: this lady ain’t nothin’ nice.’ Her play, Sweet Revenge, receives a March 20th stage reading at the Jungle and I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Between books Murder on the Red River, Girl Gone Missing and upcoming releases, Anishinaabe Songs for the New Millennium and Where They Last Saw Her, she pretty much has two speeds, asleep and overdrive. Rendon took time for an email interview with the alley.
Dwight: Maggie’s the matriarch, nurturing backbone of the family. If that character isn’t modeled after you, I’ll eat my hat. Just how autobiographical is the play?
Marcie: The part that’s autobiographical is the urge to do in the ice cream truck drivers.… Read the rest “Marcie Rendon’s Sweet Revenge”