Curtiss Ann Matlock's Blog, page 13
January 4, 2022
A Smile For The Day
Explanation of my habit.
January 1, 2022
The Things that Lift Us Up
December 27, 2021
A State of Mind
Here we are in the days after the Big Day. I don’t know about you, but I breathe a certain sigh of relief. Nothing pressing, all buying, cooking and wrapping over with. It is a welcome of quiet space before the bustling of the New Year that tells us to, “Get going on all that is to come!”
Years ago, far back in 1987–my son recently asked me if I realized the fantastic fact that 1985 was thirty-six years ago–I was asked by my publisher to write a short story for a Christmas anthology. It was t...
November 24, 2021
Thanksgiving Day and Pies Again
Thanksgiving has rolled around again. Let my holiday baking begin. My baking is a tradition for me and my family. Raisin pie is a favorite. Never heard of raisin pie? I hadn’t either until my husband begged me to learn to make it back in the ’70s. I don’t recall where I found the recipe I use, but there is an elaborate recipe in an old cookbook inherited from my grandmother. This cookbook says that raisin pie is a Pennsylvania Dutch dish and known as ‘funeral pie’. The name came from raisin pie...
November 20, 2021
Book Recommendation: Becoming Future You, by Mel Jolly
I have enjoyed and benefited from Mel Jolly’s newsletter for several years, and I’m excited that she has written a book, I’ve read it, and I’m wholeheartedly recommending it.
Mel Jolly’s bio reads, in part: “Mel Jolly has been working with authors and creative entrepreneurs for nearly two decades.”
Mel is a life coach with the great gift of encouragement. Many times in the book, I thought that she was reading my mind, looking through the windows of my house to see my struggles. Her w...
November 6, 2021
I Did It, and Home!
The plan had been to blog my adventures along the way of 2200 miles to my hometown and back home again. I was excited about that, and believe, me I wrote a whole lot in my head. But when it came to getting it onto this blog, I either did not have time or was too exhausted. I spent a total of nineteen days in a whirlwind of travel and activity, one campsite to another, driving down the highway, visiting with precious cousins, finding my way down backroads. The twentieth day, the day I woke up in ...
October 15, 2021
Hometown Bound
I thought about this trip for over a year. A long trip home to take Mama’s ashes to bury in the family plot by her grandfather and get her a headstone, see my hometown one last time and visit cousins and see sights on the way. The trip was one reason behind buying my new camper the past spring. I needed something bigger, with double axles.
Yet, I hesitated and waffled, one minute Yes, I’d am going to do it, and the next minute, How could I even think of doing this long a trip by myself?
I ...
September 14, 2021
My Girl
Every time I try to take a selfie of the both of us, she covers my face so that I can’t see, or knocks my hands, or otherwise edges away. It doesn’t show in this shot, where she’s giving me ‘the eye’, but she is wagging her tail.
The rescue animal shelter had saved her off the streets. Her mother was a feral dog with three puppies only weeks old. They identified her as a mixed red-heeler, a cattle dog for herding and protecting. She was almost three months old when I took her in my arms a...
September 7, 2021
Recent Read: A New Kind of Country, by Dorothy Gilman
Dorothy Gilman remains one of my favorite writers. She was the beloved author of the Mrs. Pollifax series of spy/adventure novels, as well as a number of single-title mysteries. From the time I read Gilman’s A Nun in the Closet, I was hooked and went on to read, and re-read, everything she wrote. Not that I find every novel of hers particularly outstanding, but I have found every one of them classically well-written and to possess something special, some insight and delight within the pages.
...July 27, 2021
Solo Camper Girl
Many of you remember when I began my travel trailer adventures back in 2017–me and my dear dog, Faith. This spring I decided that this would be the year I do more traveling and follow more dreams. As everyone says to me: “Do it while you can.” I’m not getting any younger and neither is Faith. To this end, in May I bought a new, slightly larger travel trailer, and with it this month, Faith and I ventured off on 1200 mile trip that took us to two state parks, one that I got to enjoy with my siste...
