STORIES
If our lives are a book, the cars we drive define the chapters.
These are stories featuring cars, trucks, and even RVs that played a role in the lives of the people who owned or drove them. Many are set in Fort Stockton, Texas and involve a cast of characters in and around the dusty southwest Texas town. A lot of the stories are shared around the table at The Grounds for Divorce, where the ‘regulars’ meet.
Pull up a chair and let Lucinda pour you a hot cuppa joe and enjoy.
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THE THING ABOUT COWBOYS, CHAPTER 6: Fate Plays Chess
This is the sixth chapter of a story that will run all week. Terry Pratchett says “Most gods throw dice, but Fate plays chess, and you don’t find out til too late that he’s been playing with two queens all along.” Perhaps that’s a pessimistic view of Fate. Jolene would have said you were a damn liar…
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THE THING ABOUT COWBOYS, CHAPTER 5: The Future He Wants
This is the fifth chapter of a story that will run all week. Jolene didn’t ask Sam to stay that night, but he did. She woke in the early morning, tangled in his arms, her cheek against his chest. His heartbeat was steady beneath her ear, his skin warm against hers. She told herself it…
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THE THING ABOUT COWBOYS, CHAPTER 4: The Slow Burn
This is the fourth chapter of a story that will run all week. Sam Snyder wasn’t the type to push. That was the first thing Jolene noticed about him. He kept showing up at the Rusty Hammer, buying things in small amounts—first the fencing staples, then a new set of work gloves, later a coil…
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THE THING ABOUT COWBOYS, CHAPTER 3: Unsolicited Offers
This is the third chapter of a story that will run all week. Jolene first noticed Dodd Frisco watching her from across the parking lot of the Eggs & Ammo, leaning against his rust-eaten Falcon wagon, sipping something from a gas station cup that she suspected wasn’t just soda. His kind of interest wasn’t new…
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THE THING ABOUT COWBOYS, CHAPTER 2: A Few Years Later
‘The Thing About Cowboys’ was a story that initially ran back on March 16th of this year. It was a tale of Jolene, her 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air, and misplaced love for a cowboy. Readers wanted to know whatever became of Jolene. Turns out there was a much bigger story. It will run all week.…
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FROM THE BACK OF THE BERMUDA, 4/6/2025
Well Spring has blown into Fort Stockton like a woman who’s been cheated on. We’re in the middle of the Great Pollening. I can go out to the garage and wipe down the Fairlane 500 with a California Car Duster and an hour later the damn thing is covered with a layer of green dust…
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UNBREAKABLE
“Why do people with superior intelligence, giftedness, or genius tend to be weird, eccentric people?” This question was posed a while back and drew a number of interesting responses. One person replied, “Partly because, being smarter and more creative, they’re by definition eccentric. They don’t take ordinary constraints on social behavior seriously, because they seem almost childishly naive…
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THE GREATEST TOOL
I wandered into the Rusty Hammer Hardware Store today to get one of those new bulbs that turns itself on when you walk into the room. Had to ask Rusty where they were. “Aisle 7, top shelf. About half way down. I got one of those for the wife for Christmas. You should have seen her face light up the first…
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A SHOCKING END
The debate has raged on for years. Nature or nurture? English philosopher John Locke compared the mind at birth to a tabula rasa, or blank slate, upon which our experiences imbue reason and knowledge. This is “nurture,” the idea that a child’s environment determines who they turn out to be. Others are not so optimistic. They choose the argument…
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A FALL FROM HEAVEN
In 1971, a plane flying over the Peruvian rainforest was hit by lightning. Sitting next to her mother on the flight, Juliane Kopecke was sucked out of the plane as soon as the lightning hit. She fell all the way to earth, two miles in all, strapped into her seat. “The plane jumped down and went into…