Fine China from Hartlex Antique Gallery in Huntsville
Author: thewritesteph.com
Hello, from Stephanie
Hi All!
It’s been a super long time since I posted at this site. I hope you’re all doing well.
I’ve continued to post at http://www.sweetgumlife.com and hope you’ll follow me over there.
Today I posted photos of fine china from my home in north Alabama and from a vintage store in Huntsville.
Talk ‘atcha soon!
Hugs,
Stephanie
The Peeping Tom of Willoughby
The Peeping Tom of Willoughby
By: Stephanie L. Robertson
I’m not a peeping Tom.
The residents of Willoughby can rest easy.
Those rumors are false!
I do have a problem, however.
An embarrassing secret:
I sleep walk.
Please…It’s not funny.
I’ve done everything from hanging bells on my doors to tying a rope from my foot to my bed post. Nothing works. I can untie rope in my sleep, apparently.
I’ve been a sleepwalker ever since I moved back to Willoughby and into my parents old house. I’ve come to the conclusion that most folks are suspicious of an unmarried 35-year-old male. It’s none of their business that I lost the love of my life ten years ago and will never love again. I suspect that the accident drove me back to Willoughby and may be the cause of my walking. More about that, later.
Whatever makes me walk, unfortunately, sent me to the window of our illustrious post-mistress. Her stupid Papillon, Smirkymonkey, woke her with her barking. (The dog’s barking, not the post-mistress!) There I was, from what I’ve heard Deputy Morris Greene say, peering into the woman’s living room window.
Fantastic.
Greene’s a good fellow, unlike that no-good drunken sheriff of ours. Greene was called to the scene and questioned me, later, at the station. He sent me home and promises to keep an eye out for me if he sees me walking while patrolling his midnight rounds…about when I start walking.
It doesn’t always work, but at least I haven’t peeked in the post-mistresses’ window lately.
Last night, I learned a secret about another Willoughby neighbor.
Apparently, I’m not the only Willoughbean who roams the streets of town at night.
I actually woke during one of my nightly rambles. I found myself outside of Mayline Crisco’s house. A noise woke me, I guess. Granted, I was probably half asleep when I saw a horned creature rise from Mayline’s forsythias. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. Two bulbous eyes bore into mine, and a twisted mouth pealed a harmony with a scream of my own.
True, I was half-asleep.
But I know I saw something.
The Basement Child of Willoughby
The Basement Child of Willoughby
By: Stephanie L. Robertson
Listen here—don’t you feel sorry for me. What happened was a long time ago, and I don’t appreciate pity. I git purty tired of them long looks Willoughby folks give me. It happened over twenty-five years ago, and let’s leave it at that.
I suspect you ain’t heard the story—being new to Willoughby and all that. I reckon I’ll tell ya, since ya’ll seem so nice.
Just don’t blame me, alright? As long as ya don’t blame me, I’ll tell ya what happened.
Well, like I say, it happened over twenty-five years ago—naw, I need to go back further than that. Hmmm. Maybe thirty years ago…
I was hurting somethin’ fierce.
“Stop pushin, Mayline,” said Doc Quimby, wiping sweat from his forehead. “This baby is breached.”
It finally got born.
“Oh!” gasped the nurse, her eyes round as gourds.
Doc Quimby’s wordlessly laid it across my chest.
I took it home, grieving it and my husband who just died in the war. I let nobody see it, and before long, time came for it to go to school. I couldn’t let that truant woman have a look at it. She came along, knocking at my door.
“My sister in Mobile has it,” I lied.
“Your child needs to come back home and get in school,” said that truant woman.
I said alright.
I had to think of somethin’.
Y’all want to know my secret?
Y’all will be the only one who knows, other than my sister. She kept it the during the whole “kidnapping” ruckus in Willoughby, twenty-five years ago. When I took it down to Mobile—that was the first time since its birth that it seen daylight.
Our no-good sheriff came and investigated. I knew I didn’t have much to worry about with him on the case. Pretty soon, the whole thing blew over and went to cold case.
I brought it back from Mobile, and it’s lived here ever since.
Now, if y’all will ‘scuse me, I gotta go take a plate of dinner down to the basement. Like I’ve done for thirty years.
Basement Child art by Stephanie.
Mixed media materials:
acrylic paint, upcycled fence piece, fabric, magazine clippings, Modge Podge, and Titebond 2 Premium Wood Glue.
thewritesteph.com 