At The Old House my “writing room” guarded by my writing assistant Ivory. I’m a member of a wonderful writing group called “Ripplers.” We have a weekly discussion topic. This week’s topic is “finding inspiration to write.” There are several ideas I have. As always, your comments and ideas are welcome. Writing Inspiration Inspiration does exist,...

Living in a “headlight culture” Curt Iles curtiles@aol.com www.creekbank.net Maybe it’s a Southern thing (like fried catfish and pink flamingos in front yards) but I’ve always liked headlamps—or as we call them headlights. In our rural community of Dry Creek, it really gets dark. No streetlights and few houses make for beautiful nights. On these ink black nights, I love putting a...

The first short story in my first book, Stories from the Creekbank, continues to be one of our reader’s favorites. It is entitled “The Evening Holler” and I’ve told it and read it to literally to hundreds of groups over the past ten years. At the end of this short story is a special picture from Africa and a postscript to this story. The Evening Holler I sit in the woods on a cold still...

  My beloved uncle, Bob Plott, died last week after a long illness.My mother’s only brother, he never married.Uncle Bob lived with my grandparents until their deaths in the early 1990’s. He then moved full time to his fishing camp on Texas’ Sam Rayburn Lake. He was so good to my two sisters and I.We will miss him. Uncle Bob bought me my first shotgun, took me on my first fishing...

On beginning the year of 2009 Being a writer, I always equate the first day of a new year to the blank page in a new journal. As I open the notebook and leaf through its empty pages, the potential for what I will write there is limitless. However, from being a journal keeper for nearly thirty-five years, I know some of my entries will be sad and painful, as well as joyous and funny. That is the...