Sarah Walker Gorrell, Author

Yesterday, on our trip 'cross the MS River Bridge to check out Helena, AR we had a wonderful unplanned experience. We were looking for food - fast food, any food. We never saw a McDonald's, Burger King, Popeyes, nothing but I did manage to encourage Mike to continue in a direction that he really didn't want to go. (The River Bridge, back to MS, was the "other" way.) Suddenly, around a curve, sat a small local restaurant. I convinced Mike that we should stop. It said, "Rosie's Diner" and "Soul Food." (I had to 'splain to MIke what Soul Food was - and after my explanation, he had a strange look on his "I don't know if I want to stop or not," face. We did.) We ordered what Mike said was the best Pulled Pork Sandwich he had ever had. They were cooking it, right there, in the little wooden shed out to the side.....where black smoke was just rolling from the roof and windows. OMGosh, I'm hungry for another one....

I had just taken over driving (Mike usually does the driving, but the sun had made him sleepy) when I saw the Exit sign for Kahoka, MO. I said to him (who had already dozed off), "I really want to see this place." Mike is "easy"......so he said, "I don't care, go ahead."  It was a good thing, because I had already gotten off at the exit! Now, the reason I wanted to see this little town, which was about 10 miles off our route was because, in 1932, his parents had come here to get married. I had always wondered "why?" We drove the 10 or so miles to Kahoka, which is the county seat of Clark County. It's the first courthouse in northeastern Missouri, just south of the Iowa border. Back in 1932, there was no waiting period, no doctor's exam, nothing needed to get a Marriage License. This was the "Marriage Capital" of the Midwest. People came from Iowa, from Illinois, from wherever to get married in Kahoka, MO. It was the ...

On the floor, to the right of me, is a young woman and her son from Chesnut Ridge, NY.  (Her name is Hannah and his is Maxwell.) They were on their way to Dallas. Farther down, a young man sleeps, on the floor, with his head on his backpack. Across the way, a young couple sits.....eating a sandwich. To my left, stretched along the wall.....anywhere there's an outlet, so that a cell phone can be plugged in, there are people. We're all stranded, for the night, in the Shreveport airport. No hotel rooms available, because of the 9 flights that were diverted from Dallas due to the terrible storms. Our flight was one of the last to disembark. There are people here from everywhere......trying to get anywhere......everywhere. I wonder what happened to the flight, from Mexico. There is no Customs Agent, here, so they were unable to get off the plane. We sat, on the plane on the tarmac, for 5 hours. The pilot gave updates, every hour, and the horrible weather attacking Dallas, cont...

There's an old saying....."you can't go home, again".........and maybe if you can, you shouldn't. A friend and I decided to make a trip, while in Des Moines, down SW 9th Street. For approximately 13 years, I had worked in an office at the end of a small strip mall on that street. The man, for whom I worked, owned a chain of McDonald's Restaurants and a chain of Camelot Dry Cleaners. We drove from Fleur Drive across Bell over to SW 9th. Nothing looked the same - everything had changed. Of course, I had to take into consideration that it had been well over 30 years! I suddenly realized that we were passing what looked like the small strip center, so we turned around and went back. Mike pulled the car into the parking lot, and I decided to get out and go into what was once the old Vegas Corp. offices. It was now an eVape shop. Once inside, I explained (to the very unconcerned young man behind the counter) why I was there. I asked if I could look around...

I'm not quite sure where the name "Sluggy" came from, but my two Texas granddaughters gave Douglas Bynum that name when they were younger.  And, it stuck.  Strangely enough, they called Hilda Grace "Mary" (that was her mother's name - but Miss Mary died before they were even a gleam in their mother's eye.) On Saturday, granddaughter Sydney and I went to Meridian, to the hospital, to visit Sluggy. Neither of us was prepared for what we saw.  He wasn't the Sluggy that Sydney remembered - nor was he the Doug that I remembered. We both knew that he was in the end of life stages - or as a cousin says he was about to finish his journey. He didn't know we were there. The visit was more for us and for "Mary" than for Sluggy. It brought back memories of the final days of Sydney's "Papaw."   Late last night, we received the text message that the time was getting close - and then, the final "he's gone" message...

I've been a little "under the weather" lately, so blogging has been slow (well, non-existent.) In my previous blog, I discussed the upcoming (next month) "Author Extravaganza" at Main Street Books in Hattiesburg, MS. Main Street is owned by Jerry and Dianne Shepherd who are also very involved in community life. After retiring from the Petal School System as a Principal, Jerry and Dianne, who had retired from USM, opened Main Street Books in 2002. They are tireless promoters of local authors. Last week, on October 31st while I was having a Heart Cath in the Laurel, MS hospital, Jerry Shepherd was undergoing surgery, in Hattiesburg's FGH, for a Brain Tumor that had been discovered, just days before. My diagnosis was better than Jerry's. The Brain Tumor is a Glioblastoma - which is a very aggressive type of brain cancer. This sweet man, and his family is desperately in need of prayers. Our family has had two occurrences with this type of can...

Behind the doors of Main Street Books,      in downtown Hattiesburg, are shelves and tables filled with books of every genre. This unique, independently owned bookstore is one of the few jewels remaining where Indie authors (those who are self-published), local authors, "newbie" authors, Mississippi authors both known and unknown can display and sell their books. Many well-known authors (James Patterson, John Grisham, Eudora Welty, etc.) can be found among their stacks - but the display of books written by lesser known Mississippi authors is plentiful and varied. Book signings are held often, and every year since December 2003 an "Author Extravaganza" is held where recently published books are available. Tables are set up where authors can sit and sign books, answer questions about the background of the story and/or the author, as attendees also browse among the store's many offerings. I am so very pleased to be invited to participate in this 15th yea...