A Touch of Light

by Nicola Burnell

It is several minutes before I understand what’s going on. Electronic beeps keep perfect time to the swish and sigh of the ventilator that fills and empties my lungs. I sense people around me, busy people, too busy to notice that I am trying to open my eyes so that I might see the light of the world, one more time

I recall the moments before the light went out. I was lying flat on my back as my blood spewed all over the ecru tiled floor of the hospital corridor. The ceiling, lit by a row of oblong lights, whizzed over me as my gurney and I sped toward the open elevator. Aware that this could be the last journey I’ll ever make, I count the lights; one, two, three, grasping at every detail of what is left of my life.

New Feature!

Loving What Is

Three women write about loving aspects of their lives with which they previously struggled.

Loving What Is:
A Good Kind of Weird

by Gail Nickerson

When I was a child I always thought I was weird.

I had pneumonia when I was five. Back in 1951, that wasn’t good. They did have penicillin and I guess that pulled me through, but I was still out of school for months. I started first grade late and felt like a total outsider.

I didn’t learn how to read Dick and Jane as quickly as everyone else did and was put in the low group. Sometimes the teacher told me to just play in the back of the room with Janet, who was also supposed to be ‘slow,’ so I thought I was stupid as well.

Turns out that I’m dyslectic and so was Janet; she turned out to be a nuclear physicist and worked at NASA for a while.

Loving What Is:
An Only Child Grows Up

by Carol Michels

From my earliest memory, I was bitterly disappointed that I did not have brothers and sisters. When I was young, everyone I knew had at least one sibling, and the lucky ones had several.

I was repeatedly embarrassed when other kids discovered this defect in my character. They’d look at me strangely, amazed that such a perversion could exist.

You are invited to submit
your own story for future issues of CWO!

Email the Editor

New Feature!

Cape Cod therapist Doreen Quinn has joined our team of contributing writers to answer your life questions. In her first column, Doreen responds to reader’s concerns about parenting, child support and divorce.

Loving What Is: Wrinkles

by Johanne Kieffer

As I was flipping through the TV channels the other day, I happened upon one of those shopping networks. They were selling a miracle wrinkle cream.

It wasn’t the marketing chit-chat that kept me tuned in, it was the price. My jaw dropped just looking at the numbers, 2 - 4 - 0, YES TWO HUNDRED AND FORTY DOLLARS for a couple of ounces! Women were actually calling in and buying it!

We would like to thank artist Jo Salata for supplying the artwork for this page

Jo is a bi-costal Cape Codder, transported from California, where she taught high school English for 31 years. Although she has no formal art training, Jo taught beginning tole painting fo Brandise University Women's Extension and was a featured artist of their "Art On Wheels" program.

Her first one-woman show was held in July 2008, at the Old Selectmen's Building in Barnstable, featuring her paintings and her stained glass Tiffany lamps and windows. You can email Jo Salata here