Mark Darrah's Blog
May 11, 2024
A Bookstore Worthy of Home
Writer and friend Teresa Miller calls Tahlequah "the Athens of Northeastern Oklahoma." My hometown was the inspiration for Barbara Kingsolver's Heaven books. And, of course, David Letterman's home office was Tahlequah.
Tahlequah rests in the woods near the banks of the Illinois River in the Cookson Hills, a junior version of the Ozark Mountains. Red brick buildings barely poke above the tree line and homes built in the Victorian era aren't rare.
The town has gotten bigger in recent years. Wal-Mark #10 is now a Supercenter, and franchised and chain stores line the main roads into town. At night, one notices the pine scents of the forest.
Descendants remain of those forced to these parts by the Trail of Tears exodus in the 1830's. Back up in the hills, Cherokee is spoken by some as a first language. The Cherokee National Capital is in near by Park Hill. A lot of old hippies and nonconformists live here as do entrepreneurs and retirees. People work the land and raise cattle.
Northeastern Oklahoma State University has graduated generations of the best educators in the region. Inquiry, curiosity, and learning are shared values.
Tahlequah now has a bookstore that is worthy of its location. Too Fond of Books opened on North Muskogee in downtown Tahlequah three years ago by Tom Jefferson and Valerie Reese. https://www.tfobooks.com/about-us It carries a wide variety of titles including best sellers and recently published works. It's a colorful store with a friendly staff and helpful staff. It represents the best qualities of its community.
I'm honored my book, A Catalogue of Common People, is available here.
Mark Darrah
May 11, 2024
Tahlequah rests in the woods near the banks of the Illinois River in the Cookson Hills, a junior version of the Ozark Mountains. Red brick buildings barely poke above the tree line and homes built in the Victorian era aren't rare.
The town has gotten bigger in recent years. Wal-Mark #10 is now a Supercenter, and franchised and chain stores line the main roads into town. At night, one notices the pine scents of the forest.
Descendants remain of those forced to these parts by the Trail of Tears exodus in the 1830's. Back up in the hills, Cherokee is spoken by some as a first language. The Cherokee National Capital is in near by Park Hill. A lot of old hippies and nonconformists live here as do entrepreneurs and retirees. People work the land and raise cattle.
Northeastern Oklahoma State University has graduated generations of the best educators in the region. Inquiry, curiosity, and learning are shared values.
Tahlequah now has a bookstore that is worthy of its location. Too Fond of Books opened on North Muskogee in downtown Tahlequah three years ago by Tom Jefferson and Valerie Reese. https://www.tfobooks.com/about-us It carries a wide variety of titles including best sellers and recently published works. It's a colorful store with a friendly staff and helpful staff. It represents the best qualities of its community.
I'm honored my book, A Catalogue of Common People, is available here.
Mark Darrah
May 11, 2024
May 15, 2017
The Least Important Word in Personal Narratives
I wanna talk about me
Wanna talk about I
Wanna talk about number one
Oh my me my
What I think, what I like, what I know, what I want, what I see
I like talking about you, you, you, but occasionally...
From "I Wanna Talk About Me" by Bobby Braddock
Figure it out?
The narrator serves as the central character of every personal narrative, whether memoir, autobiography, or simply a tale from the recalled past. Paradoxically, a story from one's life becomes more compelling the less the narrator intrudes.
If you write, or want to write, personal stories, avoid the word "I."
Why? Readers already know the narrator is in the story. Personal pronouns needlessly emphasize the fact.
Good writers try to keep from repeating words. First person stories can trap a storyteller into the overuse of personal references. That's why the work of beginning memoirists often feels flat and listless. Repetitive writing in any genre feels that way.
Suppose a storyteller writes a piece about his love of sports and tells about the first baseball game he attended. He could write:
"I saw Uncle Bob swing the bat, and the ball flew a million miles."
If the writer has already placed himself at the baseball game, the phrase "I saw" is superfluous and reminds the reader of the narrator's presence for no reason.
Here's a better version:
"Uncle Bob swung the bat, and the ball flew a million miles."
Sometimes the action in one's recollection is truly about the writer. If so, the story may require the use of the word "I."
Suppose a writer tells of her quest to discover why her comfortably middle-class mother had always been an enigma. The narrator remembers watching television news programs from the 1960's as a part of a college project. She writes:
"There on the screen, I saw my mother throw a Molotov cocktail at the administration building at Berkeley."
In this example, what the storyteller saw answers the question the narrative poses. The important point is what happened to the narrator, not to what happened to the baseball.
In short, write your personal stories as you would tell them out loud to friends. Set aside the writing for a few days, and then rewrite what you've done to eliminate as many "I's" and "me's" as you can.
Your stories will read much, much better.
I promise.
Best wishes,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
Wanna talk about I
Wanna talk about number one
Oh my me my
What I think, what I like, what I know, what I want, what I see
I like talking about you, you, you, but occasionally...
From "I Wanna Talk About Me" by Bobby Braddock
Figure it out?
The narrator serves as the central character of every personal narrative, whether memoir, autobiography, or simply a tale from the recalled past. Paradoxically, a story from one's life becomes more compelling the less the narrator intrudes.
If you write, or want to write, personal stories, avoid the word "I."
Why? Readers already know the narrator is in the story. Personal pronouns needlessly emphasize the fact.
Good writers try to keep from repeating words. First person stories can trap a storyteller into the overuse of personal references. That's why the work of beginning memoirists often feels flat and listless. Repetitive writing in any genre feels that way.
Suppose a storyteller writes a piece about his love of sports and tells about the first baseball game he attended. He could write:
"I saw Uncle Bob swing the bat, and the ball flew a million miles."
If the writer has already placed himself at the baseball game, the phrase "I saw" is superfluous and reminds the reader of the narrator's presence for no reason.
Here's a better version:
"Uncle Bob swung the bat, and the ball flew a million miles."
Sometimes the action in one's recollection is truly about the writer. If so, the story may require the use of the word "I."
Suppose a writer tells of her quest to discover why her comfortably middle-class mother had always been an enigma. The narrator remembers watching television news programs from the 1960's as a part of a college project. She writes:
"There on the screen, I saw my mother throw a Molotov cocktail at the administration building at Berkeley."
In this example, what the storyteller saw answers the question the narrative poses. The important point is what happened to the narrator, not to what happened to the baseball.
In short, write your personal stories as you would tell them out loud to friends. Set aside the writing for a few days, and then rewrite what you've done to eliminate as many "I's" and "me's" as you can.
Your stories will read much, much better.
I promise.
Best wishes,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
January 5, 2017
Enid Author Fest
The Enid Public Library will hold its inaugural author festival March 4, 2017 from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm.*
The festival will host forty authors with ties to Oklahoma and will feature readings, book selling and signing, and opportunities to network with readers and authors. The book genres represented include children’s picture books, juvenile and young adult works, and adult fiction and nonfiction.
I will be there signing copies of A Catalogue of Common People. Hope you can make it if you're in the vicinity.
The event is free and open to the public. The library is located at 120 W. Maine in Enid, Oklahoma.
Happy New Year!
Mark Darrah
*This post reflects the new date of the event. The Enid Author Fest was post-phoned from January 14th date to March 4th because of impending bad weather.
The festival will host forty authors with ties to Oklahoma and will feature readings, book selling and signing, and opportunities to network with readers and authors. The book genres represented include children’s picture books, juvenile and young adult works, and adult fiction and nonfiction.
I will be there signing copies of A Catalogue of Common People. Hope you can make it if you're in the vicinity.
The event is free and open to the public. The library is located at 120 W. Maine in Enid, Oklahoma.
Happy New Year!
Mark Darrah
*This post reflects the new date of the event. The Enid Author Fest was post-phoned from January 14th date to March 4th because of impending bad weather.
December 5, 2016
Give Your Stories
The holidays have arrived, and I dread it. I hate Christmas shopping. I never know what to buy and material gifts seem so ephemeral for the occasion.
One year, my wife and I decided not to give store bought gifts to our family. We both wrote stories of our lives and of people in our lives. A friend recorded and mixed our reading of these spoken snapshots. We called the collection "A Christmas Without Shopping" and gave copies to our loved ones as gifts of our lives to them.
Several of mine now appear in A Catalogue of Common People. After listening to the recording, my parents wanted copies for their friends. My mother told me not to buy anything more for her for special occasions. She said she wanted stories from me instead.
Each of us has our own unique experiences. My late grandfather used to say every person is a book. Please consider giving something more this year. Give your dreams, memories, and reflections to your loved ones.
Your stories will last longer than anything you can buy at the mall.
Best wishes and good hope,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of personal essays and commentaries
December 6, 2019
One year, my wife and I decided not to give store bought gifts to our family. We both wrote stories of our lives and of people in our lives. A friend recorded and mixed our reading of these spoken snapshots. We called the collection "A Christmas Without Shopping" and gave copies to our loved ones as gifts of our lives to them.
Several of mine now appear in A Catalogue of Common People. After listening to the recording, my parents wanted copies for their friends. My mother told me not to buy anything more for her for special occasions. She said she wanted stories from me instead.
Each of us has our own unique experiences. My late grandfather used to say every person is a book. Please consider giving something more this year. Give your dreams, memories, and reflections to your loved ones.
Your stories will last longer than anything you can buy at the mall.
Best wishes and good hope,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of personal essays and commentaries
December 6, 2019
August 14, 2016
Pawnee Public Library Reading Next Saturday
The Pawnee Public Library has made arrangements for me to present a reading of my writing, primarily from A Catalogue of Common People, on Saturday, August 20, 2016. The event starts at 11:00 am and will run 30 or 40 minutes.
The library is located at 653 Illinois Street, Pawnee, Oklahoma, and is about an hour and fifteen minutes west of Tulsa.
Pawnee is the capital of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma. Popular attractions include Click's Steakhouse and the Pawnee Bill Ranch.
Copies A Catalogue of Common People will be available for purchase. All proceeds benefit the Friends of the Pawnee Public Library.
Hope you can make it!
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
August 14, 2016
The library is located at 653 Illinois Street, Pawnee, Oklahoma, and is about an hour and fifteen minutes west of Tulsa.
Pawnee is the capital of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma. Popular attractions include Click's Steakhouse and the Pawnee Bill Ranch.
Copies A Catalogue of Common People will be available for purchase. All proceeds benefit the Friends of the Pawnee Public Library.
Hope you can make it!
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
August 14, 2016
May 28, 2016
The Navy Blazer
In 1975, John T. Molloy wrote Dress for Success which advised men how to choose and wear clothes to succeed in their chosen professions and in the corporate world. A book for women followed two years later. Both became best-sellers. When law students started thinking about interviewing for jobs, they read the results of Molloy's studies and followed his suggestions.
When I graduated from law school in 1982, I bought a gray pinstripe suit, a dark blue suit, and a navy blazer with two sets of trousers. I owned an Ivy League tie and several silk ones -- some striped, others conservatively patterned. Mr. Molloy would have approved.
I looked like most other young male attorneys of the day.
The insurance defense law firm where I worked represented a major insulation manufacturer in asbestos litigation in all courts sitting in Oklahoma. Asbestos, that platypus of the mineral world, is a stone but is fibrous like a plant. Durable and resistant to fire and heat, asbestos proved to be a versatile building material, most commonly used as fireproof insulation. In the post-World War II construction boom, the use of asbestos became ubiquitous.
Asbestos turned out to be far less than ideal. It is toxic. Prolonged exposure to its micro-particles can lead to asbestosis, mesothelioma, and lung cancer. Tiny fibers lodge in one's lungs and trigger a chronic inflammatory process that often results in chronic obstructive lung disease, cancer, and death. Years pass before symptoms develop. By the early 1980's, vast numbers of those involved in the building trades had become ill or died.
Mass tort claims were not consolidated for discovery or trial then as they are now. Each party claiming injury or death separately sued the ten or twelve major producers of asbestos and related products. One defense attorney would take a sworn statement -- a deposition -- from each injured party. Young associate lawyers attended for the other defendants and asked few questions. It seemed like everyone had an asbestos claim, and the hard-edged skepticism that well serves attorneys often descended into dark cynicism.
One early summer afternoon, I gathered with other lawyers for the deposition of an asbestos widow in the conference room of an Oklahoma City attorney. Mrs. Jones was in her mid-fifties and had the ash blond hair of a Breck model. Except for the court reporter, she was the only female in the room. The lead defense counsel began his bloodless inquiry. I looked around and realized every attorney there wore a navy blazer or had one hanging on the coat rack in the corner.
Tears began to roll down Mrs. Jones' face when asked the date of her marriage to her late husband. More tears fell when questioned about his children. When asked the date of his death, Mrs. Jones wept with the heartbreak of only those who have truly loved.
The lead attorney stopped his rote questions and took a break. Not one of us gathered lawyers showed this woman any compassion. Not one. When the deposition concluded, I found my navy blazer among the others on the coat rack and drove back to Tulsa.
That jacket was put on a few more times and then set aside.
I haven't worn a navy blazer since.
Mark Darrah
May 21, 2016
Originally published "The Oklahoma Bar Journal" Vol. 87, No. 14 http://www.okbar.org/members/BarJourn...
When I graduated from law school in 1982, I bought a gray pinstripe suit, a dark blue suit, and a navy blazer with two sets of trousers. I owned an Ivy League tie and several silk ones -- some striped, others conservatively patterned. Mr. Molloy would have approved.
I looked like most other young male attorneys of the day.
The insurance defense law firm where I worked represented a major insulation manufacturer in asbestos litigation in all courts sitting in Oklahoma. Asbestos, that platypus of the mineral world, is a stone but is fibrous like a plant. Durable and resistant to fire and heat, asbestos proved to be a versatile building material, most commonly used as fireproof insulation. In the post-World War II construction boom, the use of asbestos became ubiquitous.
Asbestos turned out to be far less than ideal. It is toxic. Prolonged exposure to its micro-particles can lead to asbestosis, mesothelioma, and lung cancer. Tiny fibers lodge in one's lungs and trigger a chronic inflammatory process that often results in chronic obstructive lung disease, cancer, and death. Years pass before symptoms develop. By the early 1980's, vast numbers of those involved in the building trades had become ill or died.
Mass tort claims were not consolidated for discovery or trial then as they are now. Each party claiming injury or death separately sued the ten or twelve major producers of asbestos and related products. One defense attorney would take a sworn statement -- a deposition -- from each injured party. Young associate lawyers attended for the other defendants and asked few questions. It seemed like everyone had an asbestos claim, and the hard-edged skepticism that well serves attorneys often descended into dark cynicism.
One early summer afternoon, I gathered with other lawyers for the deposition of an asbestos widow in the conference room of an Oklahoma City attorney. Mrs. Jones was in her mid-fifties and had the ash blond hair of a Breck model. Except for the court reporter, she was the only female in the room. The lead defense counsel began his bloodless inquiry. I looked around and realized every attorney there wore a navy blazer or had one hanging on the coat rack in the corner.
Tears began to roll down Mrs. Jones' face when asked the date of her marriage to her late husband. More tears fell when questioned about his children. When asked the date of his death, Mrs. Jones wept with the heartbreak of only those who have truly loved.
The lead attorney stopped his rote questions and took a break. Not one of us gathered lawyers showed this woman any compassion. Not one. When the deposition concluded, I found my navy blazer among the others on the coat rack and drove back to Tulsa.
That jacket was put on a few more times and then set aside.
I haven't worn a navy blazer since.
Mark Darrah
May 21, 2016
Originally published "The Oklahoma Bar Journal" Vol. 87, No. 14 http://www.okbar.org/members/BarJourn...
January 10, 2016
A Streetcar Named La Mancha
"Look there, Sancho Panza, my friend, and see those thirty or so wild giants, with whom I intend to do battle and kill each and all of them, so with their stolen booty we can begin to enrich ourselves. This is noble, righteous warfare, for it is wonderfully useful to God to have such an evil race wiped from the face of the earth."
"What giants?" asked Sancho Panza.
"The ones you can see over there," answered his master, "with the huge arms, some of which are very nearly two leagues long."
"Now look, your grace," said Sancho, "what you see over there aren't giants, but windmills, and what seems to be arms are just their sails, that go around in the wind and turn the millstone."
"Obviously," replied Don Quijote, "you don't know much about adventures.”
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Blanche DuBois breaks my heart every time.
Damn you, Tennessee Williams. Curse you, A Streetcar Named Desire. What a tremendous play!
After losing Belle Reve, her family home and former plantation, Blanche arrives at the ramshackle French Quarter apartment of her sister and her mulish husband, Stanley Kowalski. Blanche seeks to calm her nerves and has taken leave from her high school teaching position. The crowded apartment becomes for Blanche another antebellum mansion and Blanche tries to live there as a refined Southern belle.
Stanley resents the intruder in his home and suspects Blanche has squandered the family inheritance. You see, they have this thing in Louisiana called "the Napoleonic Code," and his wife's loss would be his loss. In the meantime, Blanche falls in love with Mitch, a gentle and upright man who is one of Stanley's poker playing buddies, and he falls in love with her, thinking he could proudly take her home to meet his mother.
Blanche has a troubling secret. Stanley learns her truth, confronts Blanche, and then shares his discovery with Mitch. Crushed by what he has found out, Mitch insists on seeing her in the light. He's just being realistic, he insists.
To which, Blanche speaks these words, "I don't want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic! I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell the truth, I tell what ought to be the truth. And if that's sinful, then let me be damned for it!"
Blanche may be mad.
When Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra wrote Part I of Don Quixote, Alonso Quixano had gone mad from reading so many tales of chivalry his brain had dried out. With Sancho Panza, his page, Quixano goes out in search of adventure and declares himself to be Don Quixote of LaMancha, a knight-errant. He battles windmills, recognizes a herd of sheep as an approaching army, and calls a barber's basin the golden helmet of Mambrino, a fictional Moorish king.
Cervantes intended Don Quixote to be a satiric takedown of the tales of chivalry. Instead, Cervantes discovered he had written what may have been the first bestseller in Western literature. His readers so loved the mad knight-errant, Cervantes resurrected the story and published Part II of the novel ten years later.
While Blanche DuBois is a tragic character and Don Quixote is a comedic one, they believed the same thing. It is what makes Blanche heart-breaking and Quixote endearing.
“When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams — this may be madness. Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!” Cervantes wrote for his mad knight-errant.
I write personal essays. The stories I tell are based on truth. Blanche DuBois and Don Quixote saw the truth, too, they just added different dimensions.
If we really want to see reality with added dimensions, maybe it would behoove each of us -- writers and readers alike -- to strive to be as the ingenious gentleman of La Mancha was described: "...a crazy sane man and an insane one on the verge of sanity."
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
January 11, 2016
"What giants?" asked Sancho Panza.
"The ones you can see over there," answered his master, "with the huge arms, some of which are very nearly two leagues long."
"Now look, your grace," said Sancho, "what you see over there aren't giants, but windmills, and what seems to be arms are just their sails, that go around in the wind and turn the millstone."
"Obviously," replied Don Quijote, "you don't know much about adventures.”
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
Blanche DuBois breaks my heart every time.
Damn you, Tennessee Williams. Curse you, A Streetcar Named Desire. What a tremendous play!
After losing Belle Reve, her family home and former plantation, Blanche arrives at the ramshackle French Quarter apartment of her sister and her mulish husband, Stanley Kowalski. Blanche seeks to calm her nerves and has taken leave from her high school teaching position. The crowded apartment becomes for Blanche another antebellum mansion and Blanche tries to live there as a refined Southern belle.
Stanley resents the intruder in his home and suspects Blanche has squandered the family inheritance. You see, they have this thing in Louisiana called "the Napoleonic Code," and his wife's loss would be his loss. In the meantime, Blanche falls in love with Mitch, a gentle and upright man who is one of Stanley's poker playing buddies, and he falls in love with her, thinking he could proudly take her home to meet his mother.
Blanche has a troubling secret. Stanley learns her truth, confronts Blanche, and then shares his discovery with Mitch. Crushed by what he has found out, Mitch insists on seeing her in the light. He's just being realistic, he insists.
To which, Blanche speaks these words, "I don't want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic! I try to give that to people. I misrepresent things to them. I don't tell the truth, I tell what ought to be the truth. And if that's sinful, then let me be damned for it!"
Blanche may be mad.
When Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra wrote Part I of Don Quixote, Alonso Quixano had gone mad from reading so many tales of chivalry his brain had dried out. With Sancho Panza, his page, Quixano goes out in search of adventure and declares himself to be Don Quixote of LaMancha, a knight-errant. He battles windmills, recognizes a herd of sheep as an approaching army, and calls a barber's basin the golden helmet of Mambrino, a fictional Moorish king.
Cervantes intended Don Quixote to be a satiric takedown of the tales of chivalry. Instead, Cervantes discovered he had written what may have been the first bestseller in Western literature. His readers so loved the mad knight-errant, Cervantes resurrected the story and published Part II of the novel ten years later.
While Blanche DuBois is a tragic character and Don Quixote is a comedic one, they believed the same thing. It is what makes Blanche heart-breaking and Quixote endearing.
“When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams — this may be madness. Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!” Cervantes wrote for his mad knight-errant.
I write personal essays. The stories I tell are based on truth. Blanche DuBois and Don Quixote saw the truth, too, they just added different dimensions.
If we really want to see reality with added dimensions, maybe it would behoove each of us -- writers and readers alike -- to strive to be as the ingenious gentleman of La Mancha was described: "...a crazy sane man and an insane one on the verge of sanity."
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
January 11, 2016
November 28, 2015
Don't Give Your Wife a Leaf Blower for Christmas
When I turn my yard into a Zen garden, I will do yard work but not until then.
I don't own a lawn mower and have never mowed the grass at my house despite many years of residence here. One autumn, I raked and bagged one hundred and twenty-five thirty-three gallon black bags of leaves. That was one time and I haven't done any yard work since.
I'm not lazy, but lawn care was a major pastime in two soulless suburban neighborhoods in which I lived growing up. While it is not this way for many people, yard work feels compulsively soulless to me.
"Hon, we ought to get a leaf blower," my wife said to me one fall.
My wife knew my history when she made this statement. She, though, tends to our little gardens and oversees those who actually cut the grass and edge the sidewalks.
I concluded my wife meant she wanted a leaf blower, that "we ought" meant "I want."
Her birthday approached. I was so happy. I knew what I was going to get for her -- a leaf blower. Without her knowing, I went to the Sears down the street and bought a lightweight Kenmore leaf blower. The box was too big to wrap so I covered it in a quilt and put it out for her several days before her big day.
She was curious, very curious. If truth be known, I think she was a little excited, too.
Her birthday arrived. The celebration began. My wife pushed away the quilt. You should have seen the look on my wife's face.
Guess who didn't want a leaf blower for her birthday?
I still don't know why she said we ought to get a leaf blower when she obviously didn't want one. She's never used the device, and it hangs virtually unused on a hook in our garage. I did learn a lesson, though.
If you think your wife wants a leaf blower for Christmas, don't buy her one. Consider getting her a copy of A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of collection of essays and commentaries, instead. Readers of all ages seem to like these stories.
Your wife will think you given her a thoughtful gift.
She doesn't need to know you even considered giving her a leaf blower.
Good luck shopping,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common
People
November 28, 2015
I don't own a lawn mower and have never mowed the grass at my house despite many years of residence here. One autumn, I raked and bagged one hundred and twenty-five thirty-three gallon black bags of leaves. That was one time and I haven't done any yard work since.
I'm not lazy, but lawn care was a major pastime in two soulless suburban neighborhoods in which I lived growing up. While it is not this way for many people, yard work feels compulsively soulless to me.
"Hon, we ought to get a leaf blower," my wife said to me one fall.
My wife knew my history when she made this statement. She, though, tends to our little gardens and oversees those who actually cut the grass and edge the sidewalks.
I concluded my wife meant she wanted a leaf blower, that "we ought" meant "I want."
Her birthday approached. I was so happy. I knew what I was going to get for her -- a leaf blower. Without her knowing, I went to the Sears down the street and bought a lightweight Kenmore leaf blower. The box was too big to wrap so I covered it in a quilt and put it out for her several days before her big day.
She was curious, very curious. If truth be known, I think she was a little excited, too.
Her birthday arrived. The celebration began. My wife pushed away the quilt. You should have seen the look on my wife's face.
Guess who didn't want a leaf blower for her birthday?
I still don't know why she said we ought to get a leaf blower when she obviously didn't want one. She's never used the device, and it hangs virtually unused on a hook in our garage. I did learn a lesson, though.
If you think your wife wants a leaf blower for Christmas, don't buy her one. Consider getting her a copy of A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of collection of essays and commentaries, instead. Readers of all ages seem to like these stories.
Your wife will think you given her a thoughtful gift.
She doesn't need to know you even considered giving her a leaf blower.
Good luck shopping,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common
People
November 28, 2015
November 8, 2015
Barbara Kingsolver Loves My Hometown
Heaven is Tahlequah.
When I heard Barbara Kingsolver say this during a radio interview, I almost drove my car off the road. As she spoke, she reminded me of all the things I grew to love when my family moved to the Capital of the Cherokee Nation: the beauty of the Ozarks, vivid spring days, the vibrant scents of the woods on summer nights. Most of all, I came treasure the potpourri of people, their commitment to our community, to each other, to strangers. We lived an unspoken commitment to democracy and participation of all regardless of economic status.
It's been years since I've lived in Tahlequah, and memory provides its own rose colored glasses. My family had lived in six very different Oklahoma communities by the time we moved to Tahlequah when I was in high school, but when I got here, I knew I had found home.
Next weekend, I'm going back for a book signing and open house at the Purdy Cabin Guest Retreat on the scenic Illinois River. If you've read or seen Where the Red Fern Grows, you'll be near where the book was set and the 1974 movie filmed. When you visit, you'll get to experience the heaven of Barbara Kingsolver's Pigs in Heaven.
The colors of autumn make it the most amazing season in Tahlequah. I hope you can join Beth Cohenour, the kind hostess and proprietor of the Purdy Cabin, and me on November 14, 2015 at 10:00 am. Copies of A Catalogue of Common People will be available for purchase.
Purdy Cabin Guest Retreat: https://www.facebook.com/purdycabin/
From The Tahlequah Daily Press: http://www.tahlequahdailypress.com/co...
Follow the map found here: http://www.purdycabin.com/map.html
I look forward to seeing you.
Mark Darrah
When I heard Barbara Kingsolver say this during a radio interview, I almost drove my car off the road. As she spoke, she reminded me of all the things I grew to love when my family moved to the Capital of the Cherokee Nation: the beauty of the Ozarks, vivid spring days, the vibrant scents of the woods on summer nights. Most of all, I came treasure the potpourri of people, their commitment to our community, to each other, to strangers. We lived an unspoken commitment to democracy and participation of all regardless of economic status.
It's been years since I've lived in Tahlequah, and memory provides its own rose colored glasses. My family had lived in six very different Oklahoma communities by the time we moved to Tahlequah when I was in high school, but when I got here, I knew I had found home.
Next weekend, I'm going back for a book signing and open house at the Purdy Cabin Guest Retreat on the scenic Illinois River. If you've read or seen Where the Red Fern Grows, you'll be near where the book was set and the 1974 movie filmed. When you visit, you'll get to experience the heaven of Barbara Kingsolver's Pigs in Heaven.
The colors of autumn make it the most amazing season in Tahlequah. I hope you can join Beth Cohenour, the kind hostess and proprietor of the Purdy Cabin, and me on November 14, 2015 at 10:00 am. Copies of A Catalogue of Common People will be available for purchase.
Purdy Cabin Guest Retreat: https://www.facebook.com/purdycabin/
From The Tahlequah Daily Press: http://www.tahlequahdailypress.com/co...
Follow the map found here: http://www.purdycabin.com/map.html
I look forward to seeing you.
Mark Darrah
October 22, 2015
A Catalogue of Common People Now Available for the Nook, Kindle, and Kobo
I may be a simpleton, but it still amazes me I can tap a few keys on my Kindle (or my laptop with the Nook and Kobo apps) and in a matter of seconds, a book appears. It's even more amazing when I realize it's a book I've written.
A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of personal essays and commentaries, is now available for downloading on Kindle, Nook, and Kobo. My publisher says it will be at iTunes soon. The price is $4.99.
Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Catalogue-Commo...
Nook: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-cat...
Kobo: http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/A-Cata...
Did you know you can give an ebook just like you can do a paperback?
My best to you,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
October 22, 2015
A Catalogue of Common People, a collection of personal essays and commentaries, is now available for downloading on Kindle, Nook, and Kobo. My publisher says it will be at iTunes soon. The price is $4.99.
Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Catalogue-Commo...
Nook: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-cat...
Kobo: http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/A-Cata...
Did you know you can give an ebook just like you can do a paperback?
My best to you,
Mark Darrah
Author of A Catalogue of Common People
October 22, 2015
