Category: A Trilogy.
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CLIPPED WINGS, Part III
The final story of a trilogy. After circling the Coast Guard cutter Pontchartrain for nearly an hour waiting for the sun to come up, Captain Ogg could no longer wait. The passengers were prepared for what was to come. The fuel tanks in the Boeing 377 were nearly empty. The crew on the deck of the Coast Guard Cutter had…
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CLIPPED WINGS, Part II
The second story of a trilogy. One morning early in October of 1956, Vernon Whitney woke up in his studio unit in the Benjamin Apartments, a young attractive stewardess by the name of Nadine Nimbus asleep on his arm. Whitney couldn’t tell how long she’d been there, but his arm had lost all feeling. Glancing down…
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CLIPPED WINGS, Part I
The first story of a trilogy. From the time he was a boy Vernon Whitney gazed up at the sky in wonder. His mother thought him to be slow. But he was as bright as the next boy in his classes at Alamo Elementary, San Jacinto Junior High and Jim Bowie High School, “Home of the Fightin’…
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LIVING HER BEST LIFE
Tilda, or Charlie Underwood as she was known to her legion of dedicated readers, grew in popularity with each novel she published. On the heels of Turquoise and Tombstones came Sharpened Arrows, Shattered Dreams about a woman who lost her husband in the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. Captured by his killers, she eventually became integrated into the tribe. Her marriage to the…
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TILDA SPREADS HER WINGS
Tilda stayed at Palo Duro Canyon long enough for all three children to come in for her husband’’s funeral service. A minister from Amarillo said words that were kind, if generic. They scattered his ashes on the edge of the canyon at sunset, not sure of the legality, and well after the minister was on his way…
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ANYTHING BUT SPARTAN
“Maybe it’s time to leave Fort Stockton,” Tilda said while she poured him a cup of coffee from the chrome Westinghouse electric percolator. Her words hung in the air. He was deep into page three of the Stockton Telegram-Dispatch, not really listening. When they finally did sink in, he dropped the paper on top of the Formica kitchen table. “What…
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1974: TWO PICTURES AND A PONY, Part III
Part III of a Trilogy Nineteen-seventy-four. Roman Polanski was bringing Chinatown to theaters, years before charges of raping a 13-year-old girl would be brought. Michael Corleone was in the theater just down the hall at the local Cineplex, killing off his enemies one by one. Even his brother Fredo, who went out on the boat on Lake Tahoe, ended up…
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1974: TWO PICTURES AND A PONY, Part II
Part II of a Trilogy The Godfather was the unexpected, yet undisputed box office smash hit of 1972. The novel of the same name had been a bestseller, making Mario Puzo rich. Nobody was quite sure that the story would translate well into film, and very nearly didn’t. The fact that it was made at all is a miracle. The…
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1974: TWO PICTURES AND A PONY, Part I
Part I of a Trilogy It’s impossible to look at a point in time without referencing other points that preceded or followed. It’s impossible to look at one cultural touchstone without seeking others. Everything is woven together; nothing exists in a vacuum. In 1974 Chinatown came out. The script has been called the greatest ever written, but the movie was…
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TRAVEL TRAILER TANGO, Part III
The final part of the trilogy. The scene around the picnic table next to the Vagabond, and behind the Cadillac woody was as bucolic as it was ironic. A group of perspiring middle aged city fathers gathered on one side of a picnic table, sweating in their long sleeved shirts and fat neckties that sat atop…