Stories

The House on Seventh Avenue

By Susan Cameron-Honaker

Walking throughout the old historic home on Seventh Avenue; the era and period comes alive—a slight creaking of the floors under feet and a somewhat smokey smell with nostalgic pictures of the use of the fireplace brings to mind the people who may have used the aged home. The kitchen with an old, large, prominent fireplace still with old kettles and useful kitchen tools for boiling water, meats for cooking could almost be seen in action and smelled; the foods of old almost coming alive. A simple wooden dish sink and noticeable, but also simply-made, wooden preparation table sits on the other old brick wall. The old wooden floor with bricks showing in small areas out from the fireplace is used but in fine condition. A large dinner table, wood worn through the eras, and hand built is the center-piece of the kitchen; showing the work of the crafters of the day and bringing to mind their simple tools used in fabrications of such family living and furniture much unlike the modern convenience of mass manufacturing or modern tools. The couch, midsized, sits directly in the middle facing the fireplace, with late, sixteenth century style, the fabric lightened but still tightly pulled to its wooden edges. Walking into the living room, one can see another large fireplace, with thinned, round-edged bricks, almost inseparable from the wooden floor, extending into it. So fine but yet simple, the room represents the comfort of home life in the days. A settee with fine, worn fabric sits on the side wall next to a window. A small Shaker-like chair with a table just the right size for usage sits next to it with a finely embroidered fabric atop the table and a book. Simple, yet the house was welcoming to the guests throughout the ages, comfortable, with those who once resided there seemingly coming alive with activity.


by Susan Cameron-Honaker

The Other Peculiars in the Joy of Gardening

Suddenly a peculiarly odd appearance of one of the largest smiles was noticable, getting closer and seeing this smile actually wrapped around one of the largest garden spiders, busy and totally unconcerned with the outer-world, but self-focused on it's endeavors of this roundabout motion, swinging around and around like a sideways yo-yo, and the strings vividly seen from the body of its round belly, rotating wildly, stretching towards the other attached ends of the twigs and branches in the garden; the silk-like fibers with water droplets vividly strecthing as the spider attempts to rotate fast as it can. He, not the faintest attention to myself or the world. His colors shown brightly along with the large smile-like appearance, mostly yellow, with black designs around, appearing in artistic form, with other speckles of designs. The garden spider in all his work is a work within himself. Whether growing petunias, Daffodils, or Tulips, there is always another addition to the beauty and art of gardening.