One day in June 1972, our family room’s not-so-portable television warmed up — cathode rays tubs had to do that — and as the flickering images cleared on the Buffalo channel, the screen filled with a figure holding a press conference, mics draped with the call letters of every media outlet, national and international. The man sat in the middle of a long conference table, dressed in sky blue. His jet black coif looked bathed in hairspray, and the high collar of his coat hid the man’s neck, maybe protecting his psyche, too, from prying eyes. The entertainer was well tanned and looked healthy — looks can deceive — and his eyes, topped with mascara and framed with eyeliner, belied that glowing look, for they seemed tired. Or was that sadness I saw?

by B. J. Thompson All the months, sometimes years, of research and editing, the same being said for characters endlessly haunting, for pivotal scenes e'er repeating in one's mind...all that seasoning is a solo endeavour. It has to be. However disquieting, traumatizing, thought-provoking the work is, the scribe prays for even a modicum of that human experience to wash over the devourer of that tale, and that a silent tremor be felt in the reader's heart, if only for a while.

This post is so going viral! This post will be literary cheese to mice, shoes to Kim Kardashian, lies to Trump! I’ll receive the Bloomberg bankroll equivalent in Medium.com royalties for this baby, and I won’t even feel guilty about bilking the site readership of their hard-earned nickels and dimes while I shove meaningless tripe down their figurative throats to infect their struggling minds. Nope. Not at all… as I apply another coat of $100 Holt Renfrew lipstick to my smarmy smile-plastered lips.

I’ve heard through the online grapevine that Baby Boomers are considered Happy Warriors, and I suspect the younger gens look at this moniker as naïve. I’d beg to differ. Elizabeth is a Boomer and a Warrior, of course, and by God, thank God, because without her endless get-up-and-go-to-get-things-done attitude, no progress would ever be made in so many issues that plague American society today. You don’t have to espouse all her plans, but you darn well have to be married to her initiative, her drive, her innovation and creativity, and her plain zest for life and ebullient pride in what America should stand for.

And it resides in a rocking chair. With her final paycheck from her last week at work, Mona Thompson purchased a Lazy Boy recliner rocker. This is 1963. Not a lot of rocking chair choices for expectant mothers back then, so my Mom went all out and bought a solid piece of furniture that she thought would last. I’m not entirely sure she thought it would last this long, and have adventures few rockers do.

The day after Turkey Day, also known as Canada’s Thanksgiving, is a memorable one. The hustle, the banter, the oven disasters, humans and pets chowing down on the coma-inducing feast, all near-distant memories now. Canada’s holiday comes ahead of the State’s, and although I know there is an historical reason, all that springs to my mind are two British ships racing towards the New World wrecking in some kind of flotilla NASCAR race, the northern front crawl swimmers making shore ahead of their southern dog-paddlers, so we were thankful, first.

In any group, there’s always one. One person, who beyond knowing right from wrong, will live right from wrong, and will be the first to step forward, no matter the risk to themselves or their career, and declare to their silent members, “There is a line in the sand. There is a point of no return. Both have been crossed and met. And I, for one, say no more.”

“When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” This 1927 quote, attributed to Sherlock Holmes through the literary genius of author Conan Doyle, holds true in logic and reason today, in literature as in real life. In the mysterious death of 21-year-old University of Massachusetts Amherst nursing student, Maura Murray, on the dark and cold winter’s night of February 9, 2004, amateur sleuths, online and off, have forgotten this investigative truism. It’s the same affliction that the JFK assassination suffers from: too many emotionally charged wannabes seeing smoke in a case where there is none, steadfastly ignoring the facts that can bring about a beyond-all-reasonable-doubt conclusion. Simply put, the victim and the perp(s) have been looking us straight in the eyes since that wintry night.