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Do you ever notice how your interests follow you all your life and then . . .  Bam!  One day, there they are, staring you in the face?

• I was thrilled when the Ohio Writers' Association selected my story, "Best If Used By" for their anthology.  "Outcasts" will feature a forward by Dan Fogler, one of my favorite actors (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them).  

• I grew interested in Middle Eastern poetry as an undergrad and later found books in London, written by authors like Jordan's King Hussein bin Talal. I delved into Middle Eastern poetry, religion, and politics.  I hint at my concern for U.S./Middle East relationships in "Best If Used By," and also, in Valley of Dry Bones, a novel being released in 2022.

• Lesson learned.  If you do it once, you don't get to say, "I made it!"  But if they ask you back, you might be writing something the world needs to read.

• I hadn't visited the "Hellfare" story since its debut in 2017, so I felt tentative about sharing stories of my painful childhood.  However, it is now irrevocably a part of my short story oeuvre.    

• I didn't have time to write short stories in 2017-2019.  I was drafting several novels.  Yet I felt, after being honored by WOAP to put it in their 10th anniversary collection, that I should continue writing these stories to draw attention to children who became victims of abuse. Since then, I keep a steady stream of short stories coming, and I keep my finger on the "Submit" button.
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• Thank you, WOAP, for the chance to write--and read--my story, "Hellfare."  

• "Hellfare" serves up a harsh slice of life about being poor and Appalachian, about growing up on welfare (no other word for it: that's what is was and is).  I write it true and pull no punches.  I want all kids to have a better chance than I did.  

• Thank you, especially to Kari Gunter-Seymour, Ohio Poet Laureate, and to Ms. Kathleen Burgess, Senior Editor of Pudding Magazine, for faithfully editing this publication.  Your work and your poetry inspires and keeps me going.

I and my critique partner, Meghan Hill, cofounded Southern Ohio Writers' and Readers' Collaborative (SOWRITERS).  Our goal was to bring together the southern Ohio community in a shared goal of reading and promoting books.

"Creek Kids" is available below.  Let me know if you like it.  It's part of an ongoing Creek Kids Anthology I plan to publish.  Also, if you have a story you think I'd be interested in publishing, contact me.

I'm an eco-warrior.  My goal is to teach others how to respect the earth, while sharing all I know of organic herb and vegetable gardening.  My eco-activism includes writing stories and novels with themes that focus on habitats and species we are destroying.  

In "Crotalus Horridus," I focus on the endangered Timber Rattler, being slaughtered.  It's an indicator species: what happens to it also happens to us.  Of more importance, the venom is used in the treatment of breast cancer.

The Legacy We Leave is another anthology by members of SOWRITERS, which Meghan Hill and I cofounded.  The story is part of a collection of earth lore that will also be published in an upcoming anthology to be announced.

I read "Hellfare" at Marshall University in Huntington, WVA.  I felt honored to be among fellow authors and peers, but I confess: it was eerie reading my story in the state where my daddy was born and raised.  

I could feel Daddy's ghost there with me, and I felt his sorrow.  Like every man with a life and family wasted by alcohol, he died with regrets.  I'm sure if he could come back, he'd do things differently. 

Although my audience didn't know all this, or why I'd written "Hellfare," I took his ghostly apology, and I told Daddy, "I forgive you."