My maternal grandmother, Annie Sparks, lived with our family during the while I was growing up. When I came home from school, after having made a detour to the kitchen to pour a glass of milk and fix a thick peanut butter sandwich on easy-to-tear white bread, I would go up to her sitting room.

Every spring, I begin cutting my firewood for the upcoming winter. It should be cut months ahead of time so it will dry and cure.

The Ozarks are old and worn mountains from the geological past.

Greer is Missouri's second-largest spring. It is a place of pounding, frothing waters and of greeny-cool moss-covered rock, a place of fern and cliffy splendor.

Cohabitation itself doesn't cause ineffective parenting.

I grew up on Chicago's South Side in a working-poor family, so I watched everything on television. It was like my window on the world. But we also went to the movies pretty regularly - mostly on Tuesdays, because that was Ladies Night, and my mom could get in for free.

Even as a child, you can recognise the innocence of Piglet or the strange adult qualities of Eeyore. You just know you are with friends and family.

My family - my mother and father had gone through such a hard time that by the time I graduated from sixth grade, they were separated.