Concern about our nation’s borders is much in the news. What and who should be allowed to cross those frontiers is the subject of much debate and, sometimes, confusion.

A while back, I found myself in a rather awkward situation at our southern boundary, when a Border Patrol Agent peered at my truck and motioned for me and my sweetie pie to pull into the inspection area.

Up to that point, we had spent a lovely day wandering around Nogales. There was some shopping and, if memory serves, a margarita or two. (Yes, it was the middle the day, far from cocktail hour, but, as I wasn’t driving, perhaps you will forgive me that wee indiscretion.)

When we were on our way back to the border checkpoint, I asked Ryan to stop. On the side of the road, a man had assembled an array of filigreed furniture created from artfully bent tree limbs and I wanted to take a look.

I ran my hand across the curved back of a willow loveseat, marveling at the artistry. “You think it will fit in the back of the truck?” I eyed my black Ford Ranger.

Before long, my new couch had been secured in the bed, bungeed and tied. I was already thinking of brightly-colored pillows and exactly where I’d place the piece on my front porch, when the Border Patrol Agent signaled us to a holding area where we were instructed to wait.

I checked the cab, wondering if we had accidentally missed a piece of fruit or some other taboo product that was ineligible for transport into the U.S. Finding nothing, I shrugged.

Ten minutes passed before the man reappeared. “You can’t take plants across the border,” he said, staring at a clipboard.

“We don’t have any plants, do we?” Ryan looked at me.

I shook my head.

“You do. In the back of the truck.”

Ryan checked the rearview mirror. “That’s a couch,” he said politely.

“No, that’s a plant.”

Ryan stepped out of the truck and followed the man to my loveseat.

“See here?” the agent said, indicating a row of bright green leaves sprouting from a curved limb. Then he pointed at several more. “It’s a plant. And you can’t take plants across the border.”

I leaned out the window. “But it’s a couch!” I implored.

The agent walked to the cab and began writing on his clipboard. I glanced at the side mirror and noted movement by the back of the truck. A short time later, Ryan opened the driver-side door and got in.

“Plants are prohibited,” the man insisted, staring at us with a tired expression.

“But we don’t have any plants.” Ryan grinned.

The agent sighed and focused on my couch. He squinted in the afternoon sun. Then, surprisingly, he raised one hand and waved us off.

“What did you do?” I asked when we were safely past the checkpoint.

“I turned a plant into a couch.”

“Magic?”

“No. I just pulled all the green leaves off. Now it’s just a couch.”

I smiled. “You are the smartest sweetie pie ever.”

“I know.”

While our border adventure put a dent in my mid-afternoon margarita buzz, I did get to keep what I would later learn was a bent twig couch. Its home is my front porch, where it invites visitors to settle on colorful pillows, as long as they don’t mind lounging between two once-stray cats who have claimed it for their own.

Anne Montgomery’s latest novel, The Scent of Rain, tells the story of two Arizona teenagers whose fates become intertwined. Rose flees into the mountains to escape from her abusive polygamous community where her only future is marriage to a man older than her father. Adan, whose only wish is to be reunited with his mother, is on the run from the cruelties of the foster care system. Are there any adults they can trust? Can they even trust each other?  The Scent of Rain is available at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780996390149 and wherever books are sold.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I was a teen, I had rather thick eyebrows. While beauties like Elizabeth Taylor rocked alluring broad brows, the trend was starting to fade by the 70’s, so I would suffer some brow cruelty, initially afflicted upon me by a well-coiffed woman wielding a pair of weaponized tweezers.

When I was 17, I was awarded a scholarship to the John Robert Powers Modeling School, an unwanted prize my mother hoped would make me more feminine. Note that she truly wanted a girly-girl, one who would take delight in being swathed in dresses and heels. Clearly, since I favored jeans and sweatshirts and tended to clomp around like a Clydesdale on those rare occasions I was forced into pumps, I wasn’t fulfilling that dream.

The only thing I remember about my stint at modeling school was that I hated it. All these years later, I have virtually no recollection of what I did while attending those classes, the memories a black hole save for one miserable moment.

A poised, splendidly-attired woman strode to the front of the room, gliding on pointed heels, chin up, eyes wide. “Today’s lesson will be on the importance of properly maintaining one’s eyebrows,” she said prettily.

I recall being bored, longing to be outside somewhere, as she held up those silver tweezers. Then, she pointed one manicured hand my way and waved me to the front of the room. She smiled, an expression that, in hindsight, bore a sadistic hint. After ushering me to a chair, she disparaged my brows, explaining that such wanton neglect was unacceptable.

I froze as she brought the tweezers close to my right eye, and winced as she plucked. Throughout her lesson, she continued to yank at my offending brow as if to place emphasis on her syrupy words.

Looking back, I can’t reckon why I allowed her to persist. I also can’t figure why she picked me. It’s not like I had something Fridaesque sprawled across my forehead or a set of brows like Mr. Spock.

When she finished, she motioned to my sore, red brow, assured the students that the tinge would soon fade, then placed the tweezers in my hand and instructed me to pluck the other brow myself. While I was relieved the assault had stopped, the thought of using the tool on myself made me queasy. Because memories mercifully fade, I don’t recall how I ultimately handled those mismatched brows.

 Years later, while working at WROC-TV in Rochester, New York, my beleaguered brows took another hit. Since the newscast was in progress, I was the only one in the newsroom when the phone rang. The woman caller wanted to know if I would get a message to that woman sportscaster. Without revealing my identity, I assured her I would.

“Tell her that I hate her eyebrows,” she said.

What propelled a viewer to take the time to make such a call, I cannot say. What I recall was hustling to the make-up mirror and staring at my eyebrows for a very long time.

I have learned that, as we age, our eyebrows naturally thin. Strangely, I am a bit wistful at what I’ve lost, especially considering that the tide has again turned. I read that fashion folks say we are currently in the decade of the eyebrow. YouTube has half-a-million tutorials on how to perfect your brows, and there are brow tattooing and transplants and tinting and threading, for those who suffer eyebrow envy.

I wonder if such procedures are painful, and then think of the woman with the tweezers and the brow beating she inflicted. I don’t think I’ve forgiven her, yet. Can you blame me?

 

Anne Montgomery’s latest novel, The Scent of Rain, tells the story of two Arizona teenagers whose fates become intertwined. Rose flees into the mountains to escape from her abusive polygamous community where her only future is marriage to a man older than her father. Adan, whose only wish is to be reunited with his mother, is on the run from the cruelties of the foster care system. Are there any adults they can trust? Can they even trust each other?  The Scent of Rain is available at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780996390149 and wherever books are sold.

 

 

 

 

“We were told the world wanted to kill us, that people wanted to destroy us and our moral values,” Raymond Jeffs told San Angelo Standard-Times reporter Krista Johnson.

Ray Jeffs is one of the sons of Warren Jeffs, the imprisoned pedophile “prophet” of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

“I genuinely believed I would be destroyed because my dad told me that constantly,” Roy Jeffs, Ray’s brother said.

Roy continued to believe in his father until three of his sisters confessed that the man had abused them. After hearing his sibligs stories, Roy realized that he, too, had been sexually assaulted by his father.

Johnson’s comprehensive reporting on the FLDS cult provides in vivid and horrifying detail the control the elder Jeffs concerted over his people, damage that will take many years to rectify.

https://www.12news.com/article/news/nation-now/this-son-of-prophet-warren-jeffs-has-54-brothers-and-sisters-yet-the-former-flds-church-member-felt-alone/465-b6a7faa3-e9cd-453a-9e67-d3a8095efe0a

Anne Montgomery’s latest novel, The Scent of Rain, tells the story of two Arizona teenagers whose fates become intertwined. Rose flees into the mountains to escape from her abusive polygamous community where her only future is marriage to a man older than her father. Adan, whose only wish is to be reunited with his mother, is on the run from the cruelties of the foster care system. Are there any adults they can trust? Can they even trust each other?  The Scent of Rain is available at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780996390149 and wherever books are sold.

“Your blood pressure is a little high,” the nurse said.

I smiled. “Could it be that you’re about to stick sharp objects in my eyeball while I’m awake?”

My flippant answer belied the fact that I was certainly nervous, since the surgeon would soon be probing the inner recesses of my eye which a scalpel, a tiny ultrasound wand, and an itty-bitty vacuum cleaner. That I had waited patiently for my insurance company to cover the surgery for years did not make me feel any better as they wheeled me into the operating room.

My vision had been deteriorating for a decade. I can now hear those coaches who have complained about my officiating screaming in unison: “We always knew she was blind!” Admittedly, while I could certainly see all those behemoths holding on the line and the players who felt it necessary to dump a defenseless quarterback on his butt for no reason, I did sometimes lose sight of the ball in the hazy glow of the stadium lights. Don’t ask about baseballs. I tried to always work the plate, because, in the field, those flying projectiles would periodically fade and, more times than I’d like to recall, I ended up with a bruise, replete with seams. Off the field, nighttime driving became difficult: headlights in the dark were punctuated by colorful sparks shooting in all directions.

According to the National Eye Institute, a cataract is a clouding of the lens in the eye that affects vision. By age eighty, more than half of all Americans either have a cataract or have had cataract surgery. While my parents did not undergo the operation until they were in their eighties, my turn came at the tender age of 59.

What caused me to begin losing my vision at a relatively young age? Officiating. It was once believed that sports officials should never wear sunglasses, an effort to cut down on the above mentioned, “Geez, ump, you blind?” quips.

Today, especially here in the Arizona desert, the idea seems ridiculous. Then again, you may recall coaches used to think it was a good idea to deny players water during practice. Thankfully, philosophies have changed. Sports officials now often wear sunglasses, but those years without eye protection took their toll.

While cataracts can result from certain health issues like diabetes and from tobacco and alcohol use – I’m hoping Chardonnay doesn’t count here – prolonged exposure to sunlight is definitely a cause. I probably spent the first twenty years of my officiating career squinting in the sun. And, since my eyes are a light blue, I was the poster child for cataracts.

As it turned out, the surgery was a breeze: quick and painless. As a bonus, while the surgeon was mucking about in my eye, I was treated to a color show reminiscent of an Impressionist painting. The drops used to dilate your pupil are heavy-duty and last twenty-four hours, so driving is out. After that, there’s only a little scratchiness and a regime of drops for about two weeks.

There are a few shocks when your vision adjusts. There’s a depth to objects that had been missing, the loss of which was so gradual I didn’t know it was gone until I stood before my rock box. I’m a mineral collector. Hundreds of specimens I’ve gathered since I was a child rest in a pine and glass case in my living room. Each night before going to bed, I look at the rocks. My friends know to be wary when asking about the specimens, since – given the right amount of wine – I am apt to tell you long stories about where and when I got them, whether you want to know or not. The night after my surgery, I approached the box to take my nightly look and turn off the lights. Colors leaped out, richer than I’d seen in years. Crystal facets glittered. It was like meeting old friends after a long separation.

However, my new peepers have also prominently displayed a few things I’d, quite frankly, rather not have seen. My house is not quite the paragon of cleanliness I’d always imagined.  Dust bunnies and not-so-immaculate tile floors accuse me of shirking my domestic responsibilities. But the biggest surprise came when I looked in the mirror. When did all those wrinkles appear? Like an aging on-camera news anchor shot through a gauzy filter, I’d been seeing myself through a similarly cloudy lens for years.

And here I thought I’d been aging so gracefully.

 

Anne Montgomery’s latest novel, The Scent of Rain, tells the story of two Arizona teenagers whose fates become intertwined. Rose flees into the mountains to escape from her abusive polygamous community where her only future is marriage to a man older than her father. Adan, whose only wish is to be reunited with his mother, is on the run from the cruelties of the foster care system. Are there any adults they can trust? Can they even trust each other?  The Scent of Rain is available at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780996390149 and wherever books are sold.

 

Karen Klein, a staff reviewer at YABOOKSCENTRAL, gives The Scent of Rain 5 stars across the board. http://www.yabookscentral.com/yaindie/22508-the-scent-of-rain

Anne Montgomery’s novel, The Scent of Rain, tells the story of two Arizona teenagers whose fates become intertwined. Rose flees into the mountains to escape from her abusive polygamous community where her only future is marriage to a man older than her father. Adan, whose only wish is to be reunited with his mother, is on the run from the cruelties of the foster care system. Are there any adults they can trust? Can they even trust each other?  The Scent of Rain is available at https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780996390149 and wherever books are sold.