Our new house was in many respects underwhelming. It was an older ranch home, yellowing white with seafoam green shutters. It boasted a small front porch with peeling white railing, but the side door was much more accessible, so we always used the long flight of crumbling concrete steps
Everything about our new surroundings felt magical—a spell that would expire, wishes granted, enchanted eggs, poisoned apples, royalty in disguise. We were leasing the house and land, but they were actually for sale. They hadn’t sold after being on the market for some time, so our aunt, a real
Just inside the pasture, to the right of a wide swinging metal gate, Dad planted a large garden. It included a wide variety of vegetables in neat rows, and we were impressed when he told us his family’s garden on the farm in Minnesota was much larger—a whole acre.
Behind the garage was Dad’s woodworking shed where we occasionally helped him with a project and where we schemed and scurried in secretive shifts before Christmas. Under the cheerful red glow of the heat lamp, we could see our breath as we eagerly built each other marble races, wooden
A little girl was playing outside when her daddy pulled into the driveway after running early morning errands. She ran to welcome him home with a hug, her nose pressing against his large, engraved silver belt buckle, the one he always wore with jeans on Saturday mornings. He opened