Exploring the Jungle - a Column by Mary Lott

I looked about in wonder. The prairie — the vast, great American prairie, which reputedly had vistas so wide that the horizon was far off in the distance — filled my vision. But the vistas I saw were not wide, and the horizon was not far off. This place had…

“Toto, I have a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.” Dorothy Gale in L. Frank Baum’s “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was quite disoriented when a tornado whisked her and her dog, Toto, out of their home in Kansas. Everything was different, and she had to find her…

Usually, I can pinpoint a cause for the challenges I face. I know exactly when, why, and how I broke my nose and ended up looking like a raccoon for more than two weeks. I wish I’d asked a responsible person to monitor the pool when I attempted a back…

Way back in 1974, my now husband, Mike, asked me a question as we waited for the beginning of our next class at Auburn University in Alabama. He started off by telling me of his plans for the upcoming weekend. We were both music majors, and after about five minutes…

“Mom, how did you know that?” My youngest child was astonished that I knew of a particular naughtiness they had done. My two older children groaned. They knew my stock answer was coming. They had gone through this phase earlier and had ceased asking me that type of question. “Easy,”…

It was a rather inauspicious start to a visit. I arrived after midnight one night and my daughter Gail didn’t allow the kids to wake me up the next morning. So, after gaining consciousness and orienting myself to my surroundings, I moved out of the basement bedroom and went upstairs…

I gave up with a sigh. Yet again, I’d spent over half an hour lying in bed, hoping to beckon Hypnos, the Greek god of sleep. His absence was exasperating. Once again, I started my get-to-sleep method. I can’t completely blame my insomnia spells on cold agglutinin disease (CAD).

“Are you OK?” The young woman’s anxious query affirmed to me that I was’t imagining things. I’d just stood up from the wheelchair and entered the women’s bathroom at the airport. “Yes, I’m fine.” “I was concerned. Your attendant wasn’t …” She paused as she searched for a good description.

Mile after weary mile, the oxen plodded ever westward. “When would we get to the end?” I wondered. My husband and I had started our journey several weeks earlier. At least I was riding on the wagon. Many in the wagon train were walking. I couldn’t do that. These were my…

The all-too-familiar tickle in the back of my throat warned me: I was getting a cold. I would rather have malaria than a cold. I hate everything about it, from the achy, run-down feeling, to the stuffy, I-can’t-breathe clogged nose. But the constant sting in the back of my throat…