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Shades of BlueThe Poetry, Fiction, and Photography of Sherri
Turner Stone
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About Sherri Turner
Stone The Poetry Soul of My Soul A celebration of love The Photographs Book Excerpts Van Morrison Stuff Guestbook
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| When I was a little girl growing up in the small West Texas
town of Cisco, my mind, my heart, and my soul seemed to be everywhere but in
that little town. I read the books my grandmother kept on shelves in every
room of the house, and they told me there was a great big fascinating world
beyond the one I knew. That world was filled with musketeers, Arabian
nights, Mohican Indians, desperate lovers who committed suicide, and
brilliant detectives who always got the killer. But somewhere in between
those pages, I found time to climb pecan trees and run through the fields
with my grandfather and his Brittany Spaniels, skin my knees falling off my
bike, and catch tadpoles and crawfish in the standing water beside the road
when it came a "gulley washer." And nothing will ever be nicer than the
memory of lying on top of the sheets on a hot summer night with the windows
open wide while watching the stars and the moon up through those glorious
pecan trees. Just when you thought you were going to melt from the heat,
you'd hear the trees rustle outside and then a big breeze would blow in and
catch those white curtains and float them high above the bed. The last
thought you'd have before drifting off to sleep was that you were in heaven.
And if you were really lucky, the last sound you'd hear would be the train
whistle far off in the distance or an owl or lone coyote howling at the
moon. When I was 14, many things happened that changed my life. My grandmother died of cancer and my mother remarried, so my two brothers and I moved away from Cisco and went to live with my mother and her new husband in Burnet, Texas. It was only 150 miles away, but it seemed a lifetime away from the world we had known. My grandfather soon remarried and things changed at the house in Cisco, but I still returned there often to visit. Even though things changed, there were still bits of furniture that had been my grandmother's and her books still remained on those shelves. When my life became more than I could bear, I found myself returning to Cisco again and again to heal. Often I would sit out in the yard late at night and stare up at the stars and the moon remembering, or lie awake in my old bedroom listening to the night sounds of my childhood. I would leave that place as good as new. I was able to do that for 20 years. In 1996, however, my grandfather passed away. I was 34. I felt lucky to have had him for so many years, but I was absolutely devastated when I learned the house was to be sold. I would have bought it myself, but I didn't have the money or the means at the time. My beloved home was going to be gone! Where was I going to go when I needed to be healed?! Well, I couldn't stop the sale of the house, but I did go back one last time when it was all empty to say my goodbyes. I walked through the house and the yard and cried a thousand tears, and then I drove away without looking back. I can't go back there anymore, not physically. It's funny. That little girl who wanted so much to be the great traveler now is the great traveler. I've traveled all over the United States, into Mexico, spent a summer alone in the Republic of Ireland and then went into Northern Ireland to Belfast in an attempt to understand what "The Troubles" is all about. I've trekked all over Crete on the back of a motorcycle, and I now live in England with my partner, Colin Bakewell. Only now, yes, now, the mind, heart, and soul that wanted so much to be out there in that great big fascinating world as a little girl finds itself right back there in that small West Texas town more often than not. It's where I go to heal, you know, and I suspect I will continue to find my way back there until the day I die...sitting right there on the garden swing next to my grandmother at dusk, drinking a big glass of ice tea, watching the fireflies dart in and out of the honeysuckle, and listening to that train whistle blow way off in the distance. Heaven. |
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All photography, poetry, and writing used within this site is copyright © 1997-2004 Sherri Turner Stone. All rights reserved. You may use any of the materials contained herein, but please give credit to Sherri Turner Stone and provide a link back to this site. All music used within this site (with the exception of "Brown-Eyed Girl" and "Moondance," both written by Van Morrison) is copyright © 1996-2002 Yuko Ohigashi & Lorna Ohigashi. All rights reserved. Visit Yuko at http://yukopiano.com. Guestbook by TheGuestBook.com |
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