Sandra Rose Hughes

110.Our Nest In our nest- it’s safe and warm and dry. Outside, it’s cold and rainy grey. Stay with me, my love. Don’t walk out that door to face the world. I’ll find a way to stay- if you will. Here, there is no one who can hurt you. Or me. Safe and dry and warm and sleepy- Let’s stay this way. Don’t leave to fight those dragons. They’ll wait- believe me. They’ll still be there tomorrow. But for today- let’s stay here. Safe in our nest where no one can hurt us. Photo Link The picture at the top of the page is actually a really neat piece of installation art by artist Nils-Udo during the 1970's.

A glooming peace this morning with it brings. The sun for sorrow will not show his head. Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things. Some shall be pardoned, and some punished. -The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet , by William Shakespeare. I do not think I will teach Romeo and Juliet to my students this year. Last night we got word that one of the students at my school committed suicide. She was a senior. I'd never taught her, but I'd seen her around. She was very involved in ASB and part of a fun group of friends. Her boyfriend, a boy who'd graduated a few years ago, had been deployed and, for some reason, broke up with her recently. She didn't come to school yesterday, and when her parents came home in the late afternoon, they found her. My students are in deep shock and mourning. I found out about it last night-after my husband and I had gone out to celebrate the new baby my brother and his wife are having. It will be the first baby on our side of the family- My pare...

108. San Francisco After a vast, lifeless desert I find myself sitting in a green park in Washington Square Listening to an Italian accordion A friendly aging dog waddles past With a stiff labored gait I read some beat poetry Glorious in its required tired anti-establishment vibe Venerable Asians sit stretch Tai Chi A tour bus drives by I am desperately grateful to find an oasis in my pen After passing through the wasteland

The Kern Valley Sun ran my article about Cheesy Bowls this week! I haven't gotten any feedback from readers yet, but I hope to soon. I promised I would post it after the Kern Valley Sun had used it, so here it is. Consider it a spoof on recipe blogs, such as my sister-in-law's excellent food blog, "Green Megs and Ham." Unlike the recipe below, you might actually want to try one of hers at home. How to Make a Cheesy Bowl in the Trailer. Approximate time: 15 minutes Nutritional info: Figure it out yourself. 1. Come home from work at 6PM and notice that there is no food in your tiny pantry except for a half used jar of spaghetti sauce, some cheese, a can of beans, and a stack of corn tortillas. 2. Look in the sink full of dirty dishes for the two bowls you own. Evaluate whether they actually need to be washed. For example, if you ate something reddish last night, like spaghetti sauce, or watermelon, or sherbet, you might not actually need to wash the bowls. Give them...

You may not know this about me- but over the past few years, I have become a tightwad. Yes, I am a plastic-bag washing, thrift-store shopping, aluminum-foil-hoarding, toilet-paper-roll-crushing cheapskate. I wasn’t always this way. Sure, I always had saving tendencies. I enjoyed saving money as a child, and was raised in a family where, though we always had plenty to eat, money was tight. My father was a Southern Baptist minister and my mother stayed at home for most of my childhood. With three children, this put us at the poverty level for most of my childhood. But we didn’t need new clothes, lots of toys, or nice cars- we had a mom who stayed at home, and that mattered much more than anything money could buy. Once we were old enough to go to high school, my mother started working full time and we almost forgot that there was time when we couldn’t buy new clothes or have a nice car. Through a combination of student loans, parent loans, scholarships, and working, I went to a private Ch...

106. Real Estate God made us women with plenty of curb appeal With windows and angles in all the right places. So Adam would say, “Yowza! I want this one!” But God didn’t stop there. God gave us women more than just curb appeal, Nice closet space and an amazing view. He poured us a deep foundation with plenty of steel, And extra insulation so we could keep our men and babies warm. God gave us rooms within rooms of moods and questions and thoughts. He gave us the power to nurture, to protect, to guard our families, and even civilization as we know it against the cold. The Master Architect created us in his image to have function, form, and much, much more. Here is why I wrote this poem: Respect is extremely important to me. I may be a cute young woman, but I don't want people to think that about me first and foremost. I have been teaching high school for five years now, and during my college years, I travelled extensively. I may not be a mother yet, so I don't claim to know any...

1. The editor of the Kern Valley Sun, Cathy Perfect, emailed me yesterday to say that the humorous article, "How to Make a Cheesy Bowl in a 30 Foot Travel Trailer," I sent her will probably appear in the Oct.20th edition of the KVSUN. I wrote it on a whim last week as a parody on recipe articles. I liked it so well that I sent it off to her before posting it on my blog. My husband thought it wouldn't make a good newspaper article, and that almost stopped me- but I decided to go with my first instinct on this one. I respect his opinion, but sometimes I have to be strong enough to follow my own judgement, especially when it comes to writing and submissions. I haven't submitted many articles to the Sun lately, and I was afraid the editor would be like, "we haven't heard from you in a year- why should we publish your stupid article?" But she didn't say that at all! I think she liked it. I wish I could churn the funny articles out once a week or even once...

On my recent trip to San Francisco, I got to visit the world famous home of Beat Poetry- the City Lights Bookstore. This bookstore is famous (or infamous)for being the place where Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and all those other beat poets first got their start. I am a pretty conservative person, but I do have a special place in my heart for poetry that deals with pain, idealism, and disgust with greed and arrogance. I bought a little book called City Lights Pocket Poets Anthology . One poem in particular spoke to me. I wish I had written it. #25- by Larwrence Ferlinghetti The world is a beautiful place to be born into if you don't mind happiness not always being so very much fun if you don't mind a touch of hell now and then just when everything is fine because even in heaven they don't si...