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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ROOM WITH A VIEW, Part II
The relationship between Max and Mary Helen continued in frequency and intensity. It was purely physical, the pair had nothing else in common. Max had a gift and she wanted to unwrap it and enjoy it every chance she got. If she wanted to talk, she could call a girlfriend. Max understood his role and played it well. The Pontiac Streamliner…
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ROOM WITH A VIEW, Part I
Mary Helen Hansford was getting closer to turning 40 than she’d ever admit to anyone other than her best friend. Married for more than half of her life, she’d fallen into a rut that was tedious but comfortable. She figured that rut was probably no different than anyone else’s rut who was her age. She’d accepted it. In…
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FROM THE BACK OF THE BERMUDA, 9/1/2024
Today’s post is actually being beamed to the masses electronically from Detroit, of all places. I scheduled two events in September that were outside the norm. The first was an excursion to the Motor City, the second a colonoscopy. Perhaps in a future post I will compare and contrast the two experiences. As regards the first, let…
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CHEVETTE OPULENCE
The people that showed up in one of these back in the day used to just steam my clams. I mean there was nothing wrong with the base model Chevette Scooter. But no, these people had to go FULL Chevette. Show-offs. Why not just pull up in a Porsche 911? Is a back seat and a door on…
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CHRYSLERS & CASTLES, Part II
Justice may be blind, but she can still look good in a gray two-piece suit. At least Veronica Hidalgo did, anyway. Top of her class in law school at UT, she came back home to go to work in the DA’s office before being elected to the office on her own. She had a gift. There were hopes…
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CHRYSLERS & CASTLES, Part I
Idle hands are the devil’s tools. “Particularly if they are at the end of the arms of a group of young men who could be considered tools themselves.” When the prosecutor said those words she sealed the fate of the three on trial for murder. There had been four of them initially, all seniors from Jim…
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THE INDIAN AND THE MARINE
“Women are stupid and men are no damn good.” If I had a dollar for every time I heard Lucinda mutter those words I’d be able to buy new shocks for the Fairlane 500. Pastor Peterson always cautions her to not paint people with such wide brush strokes. But most of us know she’s only referring to…
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NOW AND THEN
Lucinda and Delgado were naked in the Airstream, the sheets in a damp heap at their feet as a musty breeze whispered through the open windows of the polished aluminum mobile mansion. “I always figured that looking back on my tears would one day make me laugh,” he said as he gazed out the window…
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FROM THE BACK OF THE BERMUDA, 8/25/2024
Well, it’s been hotter than hell in Fort Stockton, hitting 107 a couple days this week. A fairly mild July had given way to a brutal August to the point that the National Weather Service has issued instructions on how to bake a lasagna in your mailbox. The heat had affected everyone’s attitude at the Grounds…