12 Comments

Conflict and mothers. Brilliant, incisive and touching memoir.

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Thank you Robert!

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wow, Sue, beautifully written, I'm glad Perky is out of the suitcase and with you in a controlled manner. I love that you and Ellie have held onto many of the Evans traditions! Enjoy your trip to DE

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Hi Lou, The best part of every Christmas day was talking to you on the phone about what we both got for Christmas - ha! (And decorating cookies that Mom made.) I'm sending lots of positive vibes and love to the Johnston-Peter-Jahn family this week.

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Only Love Prevails.

I can’t bring them back again

Those moments I hold fast in memory

Dear ones dancing in my dreams

Still reaching out to me

When Spring has come and gone again

And brilliant Summer pales

And Fall sets sail in frosty winds

Only love prevails

No, I can’t change the flow of time

Tho sometimes I’ve wished that I could

But my heart shall bind up all loose ends

And keep them mine for good

So let us recall some old songs

And sing them out around the fire

And hail once more our loved ones before

The hour that we retire

When Spring has come and gone again

And brilliant Summer pales

And Fall sets sail in frosty winds

Only love prevails

Malcolm McKinney 2016

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Malcolm, that's beautiful. Have you put it to music? Thank you for sharing it with me and all of us.

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Thanks for your comment. I am working on a new CD. That one will be on it.

Here's one I recorded.

heart not big enough

https://youtu.be/RurxhD2Sceg?si=uA9qLyEoTihDgvG0

It's the last ray of evening

Burning in the sky

The clouds have built a fortress

And you've slipped inside the gate

Your light leaves my heavens

And the sun dips below

And my heart's just not big enough

To bear the weight

I gave you a locket

I gave you a child

I gave you a garden

With the love growing wild

I gave you a lifetime

Of laughter every day

Now you leave me here alone

In tears

While you slip away

While you slip away

I cling to the vision

Of your beauty in my eyes

And the sound of your voice

In my ear singing true

I cling to the feeling

Of your body in my hands

Cause my heart's just not big enough

To let go of you

I gave you a locket

I gave you a child

I gave you a garden

With the love growing wild

I gave you a lifetime

Of laughter every day

Now you leave me here alone

In tears

While you slip away

While you slip away

My heart is just not big enough

No, no no

My heart is just not big enough

To let you go

Big enough to love you

But not to bear the weight

When you leave me here in tears

While you slip away

While you slip away

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Aw, that's so lovely. I wish you all the best with your new CD!

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i hope the new venture thrives for the selfish reason it makes writing like this financially practical for you and available to us stowaways to read

and ohhhh: the cookies!!!

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Thank you Appleton - I'm with you! And stowaways welcome!

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I’m sitting here having read this with tears in my eyes. We try and try to reconcile over the transom of time and memory, and the only place where things change is in our hearts before we’re snapped like a rubberband into anxiety. Such gorgeous writing. 🙏🏻

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Thank you Elissa. I don't know why, but I fall into this "what if" mode too frequently - probably something I will always come back to in my writing - but you're right that the only place things change is in our hearts. And I guess a lot of the reconciliation has to come with ourselves.

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