Smencils were the gateway drug. Smencils were (and still are) scented No. 2 graphite pencils packaged in recyclable plastic freshness tubes. Root beer, bubble gum, tutti-frutti, grape — every kid’s favorite was covered. An affordable habit, even as a school fundraiser, they were only a ...

I can’t tell you the day, the month or even the year that it happened. But I can tell you the moment. Standing in front of an 8th-grade class, teaching a lesson on writing, I said, “This paragraph is pretty good, but we need to tweak it a bit.” Some soft titters came from the back of ...

My mother was a redhead. My father was dark Irish. Because of this, my childhood mind illogically believed that Lucy and Ricky Ricardo were actually my parents. Small details like never hearing my father speak in a foreign language or that he was a lineman, not an entertainer, weren’t ...

Deer flies have speeds up to 25 miles an hour. And despite my best efforts, I wasn’t pedaling that fast on my mountain bike, the day hubby Bill and I rode into Camp Santanoni. It’s been a hot, humid summer, so those little buggers have flourished. That the five-mile road to the camp was ...

The lone earring lounges on the table, looking like a rejected blind date at a bar. Its match, its rightful partner, is nowhere to be seen. Once again, that “perfect spot to keep something safe” wasn’t. And, like so many objects before it, an earring has been lost. So now, I am looking at ...

Each day this past week, I have eagerly scanned the photos of Cop Camp, more officially known as the Saranac Lake Police Department Youth Academy. The department facilitated such activities as dusting for prints and gathering evidence in a mock crime scene. And let me tell you, I was ...