Berta I was nine the summer I learned what cruelty was. It was then I knew it was true, what Tom had said. Berta really had killed two husbands. Berta was always there, silent and disapproving. She grimly did the chores that came with a house, a big garden and some chickens, and never ever smiled or even acknowledged the children next door. The other kids would giggle and run away when she glared at us with her dark and joyless eyes, and ageless wrinkled face. But I was shy a

1992 Gloria VanDemmeltraadt Ten-year-old McKenzie Ward turned her head as she usually did when her best friend Otis suggested a spitting contest. It might be interesting to see how far they could spit a mouthful of water before it froze, but she had more important things on her mind. They, and dozens of other eager kids had already climbed all over the city fire truck borrowed for the occasion. Kenzie and Otis were now sitting on two up-turned five-gallon buckets in front of

Morning Mist By Gloria VanDemmeltraadt A yellow bird sits precariously in the porcelain palm of the hand that is part of a small fountain on my patio. He is shrouded in fine gray mist and in his frozen ceramic state peers ever eastward searching for the sun. Stepping out my patio door, I too am surrounded by whirling and eerie morning mist. A pond borders my property on three sides. Water used to lap against the shore, but the county cleaned out a plugged-up outlet and much o