From the Road: Selected Short Stories

By Joseph Gentry

Observation is a true gift of our life here on Earth. What would we do if we could not laugh at the human condition, at ourselves. I love to collect people and the amazing stories that bring our real being to the surface. As much as I try, I memorialize these moments to share, to gain insight and to grow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Joseph Gentry
• Release date: May 7, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310475245

Joseph Gentry

After having worked in and around academia for the majority of my career, I have been witness to many learning experiences throughout my time here. Many people come to academia with a desire to learn, but they don't always know what it is they are seeking. Some seem to think they have to pick an area, get the degree and then the job and then the paychecks will start rolling in. Others spend their entire career in a field where they are not valued and satisfied. Few people spend the time discovering their qualities and skills and then follow path based on who it is they really are; who God created them to be. I primarily write within this space, how to get to where God wants / needs us to be. I also write true to life short stories which reveal our true human nature. Writing in truth, or what the Greeks refer to as Alethia(ἀ–λήθεια - in Greek) - the realm of truth, necessarily guarantees an authentic quality. Read my stuff if you are a core believer, know about the formal system or simply desire to discover truth in it's purest form.

Book preview

From the Road

Selected Short Stories

Joseph Gentry

© 2014

All rights reserved by the author.

All permissions granted solely by the author.

Joseph Gentry Press

ISBN: 9781310475245

Title: From the Road - Selected Short Stories

Author: Joseph Gentry

Publisher: Smashwords, Inc.

Cover Image by Joseph Gentry – Washington County Road 7, looking east towards Marine on St. Croix.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for the purchaser only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Contents

An Essential Spring Conversation

Daily Grind Sunday Morning

God Has Rained On Me

Guitar Man

Life by Day

Freddy

Georgia VW

Vermeer Revisited

Scene from the Film Of Love

Bacon Buddy

Hurtling Ball of Fury – An Apology

Letter to the Editor

Someone Remembered the Janitor

That Darn Chicken!

The Color of Certain Days

Letter to Zach in Prison

Bostonians

Williams Library

A Nap in Winslow

Arkansas

Dedication

This book is dedicated to all the people who have come into my life and altered my life’s path; the good, the bad and the ugly. For better and/or for worse, we all play a part on the stage of life. Antagonists and protagonists, we all have them and we all are them; they are intrinsic to and inseparable from our being, from our journey.

An Essential Spring Conversation

Joseph Gentry

A True Story

Farmington, Minnesota

April 9, 2014

9:14 A.M.

It was a gray day in the low 40’s, an ever so slight precipitation meandering about and a Crow had perched high in a leafless tree, half a block away. Rain, it feels like rain. The leaves will really start budding out by early May, I thought.

Good morning, I said as I walked past the woman heading into the auto shop. (I had my oil changed there not long ago).

Good morning, how are you? She replied.

Good, thank you.

Good thing it’s not snowing, ha ha ha. She replied with a smile on her face.

Ya, no kiddin’, but it’s in the forecast. I said.

What? the woman replied.

Ya, hasn’t stopped yet, maybe 10-12 inches by Friday.

What, she squawked again.

Another big one’s comin’, hopefully it will slide north of the cities.

Well, geeze, when’s it going to end. You’d have thought we had enough already.

Ya, no kiddin’.

Have a good day.

You too!

Such conversations are a requirement in spring in the Upper Midwest when the doldrums of winter are eating at us like the common cold. We tire of the heavy snow; it starts out so beautiful in November. There is a romantic, Norman Rockwell type of energy in the air, but it fades over the winter, especially this past winter when we set a record for the number of days with a below zero reading, 50 I believe.

But spring is here, and even the threat of another freezing clipper cannot push the Tulips back into the ground. The Robins sprint across the sun striped back yard and the downward spiraling cold air is replaced by a rising warmth, rising glory to the heavens above.

Daily Grind Sunday Morning

Joseph Gentry

A True Story

Stillwater Minnesota

Sunday, November 7, 2010

7:17am

Coffees hot, burned my tongue. Did ya’ try the blueberry muffin. Had one last week, fresh out of the oven. Ya, I had an apple cinnamon scone with butter and honey. They get them up at Woulette’s? I think so, they been baking pastries for years. Have you had their dinner kolache’ lately? No, are they good? I heard they are back to using an old recipe, very good. How’s George doing? Better, quite a scare, I don’t let Margaret say the word in the house. Ya, probably best. The doctor said they caught it early. Any word from the Mayo yet. No, not yet.

Hi George, how ya doing? Good, good, kinda nippy out there. Ya, sure is getting cold, winter’s coming. Ya, did ya get a deer. Sure did,