“Duck for Thanksgiving? You’re having duck?”  Jimmy wrinkled up his nose to show his disgust.

This didn’t help the disappointment I was already feeling.  Who every heard of Thanksgiving without turkey?  But turkeys were expensive and my father was a good hunter.  It wasn’t his fault that no wild turkeys showed up out when he was out hunting. ( Read more... )

I won’t wear it!”  I argued.   I was desperate.  My mother stood holding a used navy blue two-piece woman’s suit that she had purchased at the Salvation Army.  She planned to alter it so that I would have something to wear when I performed in the yearly piano recital.  All the other girls would have new frilly dresses over cancan petticoats.  I ( Read more... )

We had moved several times before.  When I was two we left the farm to move to a nearby small town.  When I was four, we left the small town to move to a large city so that my father could further his education.  When I was seven, we left the city to move across the country to a tiny western town where my father would be the minister in the tiny ( Read more... )

I was just doing my usual Saturday cleaning when I came across an old audio tape labeled “Dad - History.” I vaguely remembered taping an interview with my father, David Gaumitz, some years ago. So I popped the tape into a walkman and started listening as I dusted and mopped ( Read more... )