U-Haul trucks filled several parking spaces beside the swimming pool wall at RayRay’s Paradise. Standing at the top of the state-of-the-art apartment complex stairs, Ruby Arenas waved with both hands at her new neighbors who prepared to unload and move into their new homes. Ruby got so excited at what she jokingly called “RayRay’s commune,” […]
Eating food conducive to a good life revolves around eating plants. Fish, cheese and eggs play a small part. Avoid meat at all costs – meaning beef, pork and poultry, including the “squeezings” such as chicken fat that pours form the poor cluckers ears when workers wring the birds’ scrawny little necks. Today’s premier Sunday […]
In the flickering glow of a blue candle Ruby’s face resembled a ghost, a soul shadow from the netherworld. Bathed in purple light from the fluorescent art deco circle hanging on the outside balcony wall of her new efficiency apartment her caramel skin blended to glow as a lush ripe plum. Sitting in a white […]
Writing as revolution helps shake up and even smash the establishment. The Constitution, the Communist Manifesto and the Hairy Messenger (a subversive underground newspaper I founded in 1969 when I raised hell as a Susquenita High School senior in rural Central Pennsylvania) comprise only three radical acts of printed rebellion that required fighting words. My […]
Keeping secrets challenged most people. Not Kim Phillips. Even as a girl, Kim – who everyone knew then as Kate, Kate Leary – never gossiped, told tales out of school or spread rumors. She was no tattle tale. No snitch. As he father often said, “No rats allowed in this house.” One morning about 4:00 […]
