When I think of the most patriarchal of all organizations, it is not the Church that comes to my mind first. Oh, the Church makes the Top Ten list for sure, but there are so many other secular organizations that overshadow it. At the top of my list is the military. I have heard countless stories from women veterans about the sexism they faced during their military service. And one only has to look to the number of sexual... Read more
Perhaps you read Will Jesus Buy Me a Double-Wide? and remember the story of The Missionary: He grew up in Chief Joseph country, where God tucked away a stash of rough-cut mountains, several crystal glacier lakes, and acres of emerald meadows. These were the treasures the Missionary knew back when he was nothing more than the Farmer’s crippled boy. “Back in those days men counted their wealth in the sons they had. Sons were your work force. My brothers... Read more
Decades ago, back when I was a newbie wanna-be, not yet calling myself a writer, I attended the Conference on the Book at Ole Miss. The only way I knew I was a writer is because a professor at Eastern Oregon University told me that’s who I would become when I grew up. I was 38-years old at the time. George Venn opened the door on writing for me by urging me to write. He told me that even... Read more
His life ended in a one-sided shoot-out. Police said he wanted it that way. They said Afghanistan war veteran Jed Zillmer was on a suicidal mission: Kill or be killed. He was allegedly heavily armed and suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, although that had never been diagnosed. Before a claim of PTSD can be confirmed it has to be reported – by the very person suffering from it. Go figure. Zillmer had filed a claim. Said he’d lost... Read more
I am a Valentine baby. More than likely an anniversary Valentine baby. My parents married on Feb. 13th. Up until the time she was on her dying bed, my mother maintained that the reason she and Daddy married the day before Valentine’s Day was because he had to report back to duty at Fort Campbell the next day, while she stayed behind with her folks in Hawkins County, TN. That wasn’t quite the truth of the matter. As she... Read more
I dream of dead people. They speak to me. My daughter said my gift was useless. Not much help to anyone. I can’t deny it. It’s true. I’m not exactly sure why I have this gift, if that is indeed what it is. To sing like Carrie Underwood would have come in so much more useful. I’ve written about this oddity in the past, in books and in columns. I even tried to give the gift away... Read more
Grace is terrifying. It is the cast aside bloodied bandages of grave clothes. It is a tomb sealed off, so hot and stuffy that it takes your breath away. It is despair, the ever-present shadow of death encroaching. It is the beggar’s desire for a drink of cool water receiving a sip of bitters instead. Grace is harsh. It is a hard fever that takes a person to the brink of delirium and then yanks them sideways to the... Read more
Here’s a little known fact: I worked in radio long before I became a writer. True. I was a disc jockey. I spun records. Shiny black vinyl. I tore copy from an old UPI wire, read it over the air. I was working the night a woman in Springfield, Oregon said she was stopped by a black man on a back road. She said he gunned down her children, and shot at her. She was lying. She was Diane... Read more
The pro-abortion and right-to-choose segment of our society has all but co-opted the term “Women’s Choice” to be defined as the right to terminate a pregnancy: the right to end a life. Let me say by way of full disclosure that in 1974 I had an abortion. I wrote all about that in ‘After the Flag has been Folded.’ Thus, one might assume that I align myself somewhere between the pro-abortion and right-to-choose groups; anything else would be hypocritical of... Read more
I was slain in the spirit once. Splayed out. Laid flat. Old-fashioned revival time all out slain and down for the count. I know, right? Me. A journalist. Laying there on my back at the altar of God, staring at the lights of that big citified Seattle church with people dropping all around me like flies on a day in late Fall. And for the record, yes, it was weird as H-E- Double-Toothpicks. Prior to the moment when I... Read more
Karen Spears Zacharias
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