Sometimes he dipped his popcorn into his coffee. He only did that when the popcorn was burnt. Today, it was the coffee that was burnt. The popcorn was soggy. But it was breakfast. The same breakfast he had eaten every day for most of his adult life. Popcorn was cheap. Coffee was cheap. Milk never agreed with him anyhow. The sun still was not up, but the sun always rose later in Mississippi. When he lived in the city he never made it awake before the sun. But that was many years ago. Now the … Continue reading The Trapper by Alex Lowe→
I’ve never seen my father cry. This is surprising because he’s not one of those “boys don’t cry” sorts and never scolded us for tears. With four small boys running around the house, he saw ours almost daily as we grew up, most often for scraped knees or easily forgotten boyhood tragedies. To him, tears were to sadness what laughter was to mirth—each held an important part in the yin and yang of the emotional spectrum. But I thought I saw him cry once. It was the day of my grandmother’s funeral. I only remember … Continue reading My Father’s Tears by Jean Auguste Gravel→
by Laura Marello Three years ago I phoned Specialty Exterminators in Lynchburg. My side yard, viewed from my screened porch, was starting to look like a cheap horror movie: rats, mice, and baby mice, running from my yard into the neighbors’ yard and back. Specialty Exterminators sent the rat baiter: an appropriately slim, tanned, wrinkled, grizzled–but in a handsome sort of way–sixty-something in a uniform much like a gas station attendant or a tow truck driver, park ranger, or sheriff would wear. As it turned out, I needed all five, and more. The Rat Baiter … Continue reading The Rat Baiter and Me→
A few years back I took a trip to Texas with Bill Clinton. It was not a fun trip. Clinton is pathologically self-referential and by the time he’d repeated the phrase, “Let me tell you one more clever thing I said when I did something bad,” for the eleventy-twelfth time, I was ready to leave him by the side of the road in Alabama. I sputtered at the car CD player (which is where books-on-tape lived before they became books-on-Audible…did I mention Clinton was on the CD and not in the car?), “I don’t care … Continue reading The Consternations of Traveling South with Paul Theroux→
Calling all fans of Streetlight and contributors past and present. If you are a fan of Streetlight or if you have ever had a story, poem, or piece of art published in Streetlight (both print or on-line versions) join Streetlight Lamplighter’s social network and forum and become a lamplighter. I am a lamplighter. Lamplighters unite! This call goes out to all artists and writers. When the nice people at SL agreed to let me author this post, they expected a piece exalting the virtues of an art community. They won’t be disappointed. But there … Continue reading Gather Around the Light→
See who’s in focus at this year’s Look3 Festival of the Photograph, June 13 through 19 in Charlottesville. One of 11 featured artists, National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting launches the week with his natural history images hanging from the TREES on the downtown mall. Showing the world through animals’ eyes, Lanting says his mission is to use photography to help create leverage for conservation efforts from local initiatives to global campaigns. He’ll discuss his mission at 7:30-9 p.m. Wednesday June 15 at the Paramount Theater. “No one turns animals into art more completely than Frans … Continue reading Look3 Festival of the Photograph→
Geoffrey Stein, intrigued with “the seen and unseen,” employs paint and collage to reveal portraits of power and vulnerability. “I paint to find out what I think about the world; to discover the things I do not have words for. I savor the slips of the hand that express one’s unconscious feelings about the person being painted. I am interested in the conversation between abstraction and realism,” says New York artist Stein. “I do not want to make an academic copy of the model or a photo realistic illustration. My paintings explore the … Continue reading Geoffrey Stein: Revealing The Seen and Unseen→
By Laura Marello Imagine that, 20 years ago, my father and I were visiting my sister in her apartment. It was a warm, sunny day. My sister was making us ice tea. I was sitting in the living room with my father. He was complaining about his wife and her children. He said: Sometimes I want to take the gun out of the drawer and shoot the whole lot of them. I thought, The gun, out of the drawer? Not a gun out of a drawer? Articles matter. For another example, let us consider … Continue reading Articles Matter→
By Katie Davis Around Washington people say Anacostia as a code word for poverty, crime, isolation. Many add in a low voice, “Don’t go there.” In fact, a city-wide website left it off the map entirely and pushed Virginia up into D.C.. I say, go to Anacostia in South East Washington while it is still a mostly black neighborhood with a rich history. Cross the Anacostia River, not something most white Washingtonians (including me) have often done. Walk along Martin Luther King Avenue and see the life sized posters pasted onto the walls, a … Continue reading Anacostia Unmapped→
By Laura Marello I’d never owned a house before, and when I finally bought one in Lynchburg, I found that I enjoyed decorating it. The rooms would take on a life of their own, sometimes a history of their own as I began to decorate them. The dining room was painted a pale gold and cream, and when I unpacked a Louis chair for the living room that had matching gold striped upholstery and ebony stained wood, suddenly the room took on a personality, but one I didn’t like. Some old, fusty person had taken … Continue reading What Happens When an Explorer from the 1750s Manifests Himself While You Are Decorating Your Upstairs Sitting Room→
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