My Portfolio

Christmas Memories Being born in Brisbane, Queensland and having always lived in Australia, I find it difficult to connect to the northern hemisphere’s images of a white and snowy Christmas. The festive season is an entirely different type of celebration in Australia, where temperatures on The Big Day can often push...

Recently, a friend forwarded a story to me about the 2005 rescue of a Humpback whale. The whale was spotted off the northern California coast, hopelessly tangled in crab trap lines that had begun to cut into her flesh. The divers who rescued her talked about how the 50-ton animal made...

Holidays in our home meant company, and the preparation of a table weighed with food.  Hours of preparation yielded a large mound of pasteles and a huge pot of arroz con gandules , in addition to a turkey and a roast pork shoulder, a stand-in for puerco asado, roast suckling pig....

The Jacaranda trees are in full bloom here in Adelaide, South Australia as spring rushes into December and the start of summer. Last weekend, Santa arrived in Adelaide as the last float in the Adelaide Christmas Pageant, a tradition which has run annually for 79 years through the streets of the...

The Christmas I was seven,  I have nothing but happiest of memories about.  That year of all wonderful things we somehow got to be in Virginia on Christmas Eve.  Usually, we had to wait until at least Christmas Day to head out from Tennessee because of my dad's church commitment , but this year was different.  We were...

Let's Eat!! Holiday traditions always include great food. This week let's share some family recipes. Your special meals will be remembered by your children and grandchildren. Remember to ask your parents and grandparents for their special recipes. As you publish your family delicacies try some of the recipes of other members....

My father was tougher than nails and rarely sick but that was before lymphoma took over. He fought it bravely for a long time but cancer inevitably wins. We lived 200 miles from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and made many trips there while he was undergoing treatment. At times...

“Wolf!  Wolf!” I shrieked, slamming into the house as fast as my four year old legs could carry me. Knowing my penchant for fantasy, my older and wiser sister calmly went out to investigate.  From safely behind her, I could see the “wolf” curled up asleep inside my red wagon was...

I received an e-mail from Tom Coumier this morning to see if I was alright. I guess I am alright sort of . Just hung up on my genealogy. That’s all.I tell my wife it’s like an hound dog on a trail . you can’t quit. When I started ,y genealogy...

Milton L. Adams, Pfc; Army Ser. # 39026959; Company C, 323 Infantry, 81st Wildcat Division WWII: Written by Golden V. Adams Jr. on Veteran's Day (50th Anniversary), 11 Nov 1995 at Provo, Utah. Milton LaVar Adams was born 9 May 1910 in East Garland, Box Elder County, Utah to William Albert...

The Jacaranda trees are burgeoning with buds and starting to erupt into magnificent panicles of soft blue blossom, heralding the coming of Christmas to Australians all around our huge island home. We don't have the snow, yule logs, red-berried holly and roaring log fires which are associated with a northern hemisphere...

Mandane and her siblings Poor health seemed to plague my great-grandmother's family, the Dicks of Greenland Farm, Darby Township, Pickaway County, Ohio. My great-grandmother Mandane and her younger sister Blanche, for example, were married in a double wedding ceremony on October 19, 1892. Less than a year later, Blanche was dead!...

Describe one of your favorite holiday traditions or celebrations Holidays help to provide a sense of continuity in our lives and a respite from the hectic uncertainty that life throws in our path. A family's traditions are the glue that binds one generation to the next. Take time now to write...

Describe a dream job you would like to have pursued but didn't and why Some of us are fortunate to be working or have worked in the career we are passionate about. Others wish they could but haven't for a number of reasons. Still others look back at decades of employment...

After last Friday's class, week 3 of my 6 week 'Unlock Your Family Stories' workshop at the Campbelltown Library, one of my students came up to me and said "I wish I'd met you a few months ago, before I had to move my 98 year old mother out of our...

My recollections of the years I spent being a hospital nurse jumble together in a very mixed bag of memories, some wonderful and others hideous. Being a tenderhearted sort of person, I always found it difficult to divorce my emotions from my work. If my patient was suffering, then so was...

Sometime in the early 1990s, maybe '92 or '93, I used a software called Tapcis, which was an access program for the Compuserve Information Service. Tapcis was an automated utility that sped up access to and management of CompuServe email accounts and forum memberships for PC users. Through Tapcis, I participated...

When America was attacked on 9-11, I was in my office, Suite 217, 600 Granby Street, Norfolk, Virginia, at the United States District Courthouse. Sharon Borden, a fellow court reporter, stuck her head in my office and said a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We ran upstairs to...

I have been extremely fortunate throughout my work life and career.  I have never been layed off or fired from a job.  Although my chosen profession is teaching, it has never been financially lucrative and has been supplemented by doing family history and genealogical research.  However, there have been many choices...

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