Columns

When I was discharged, the U. S. Navy paid my train fare from Portsmouth, Va to Charleston with a small severance pay in cash. I saw my mother on the platform at the C&O Depot. Still angry, I wanted nothing to do with her. My life was screwed up and I blamed her.

Once upon a time, having a job at a newspaper meant working in one of the most imposing buildings in town, inhaling the acrid aroma of fresh ink and the dusty breath of cheap newsprint and feeling mini-earthquakes under our feet every time the presses started to roll. For those of us old enough to remember those days, National Newspaper Week 2019 could be one big, fat elegiac nostalgia trip.

Even back when I was growing up a long time ago, bullying in the schools was customary. The bigger kids knocked around little kids physically and psychologically as they do now and parents when told about it, had to navigate through the pain that their children were experiencing in hopes of really understanding their feelings and circumstances to do something about the problem, as they do now.

Indianapolis, IN (September 1, 2019) -The Roller Skating Association International encourages kids to become physically fit and active 365 days a year.

I don't know if all kids who grew up during the Great Depression were addicted to lying and petty theft, but I certainly was. I often would pilfer my mother's tip jar she kept in the kitchen. Usually, it would be small change, and she wouldn't notice.