B1 -- Photo contributed by Don Dunkle

How I love this picture!  My grandparents' house was humble, but it had the same stateliness and respect for the land that all great mansions have.  I miss its neat lawns, its beckoning porch and shady promenade almost as powerfully as I miss the man who tended and loved them.  The house and grounds are still my idea of great architecture.

Among my fondest memories are warm Fourth of July evenings, with tree frogs trilling and the smell of Pine Creek in the air, when my four siblings, 11 first cousins, and six second cousins raced over the damp clover, catching lightning bugs, playing stoop tag, and reveling in their freedom from bedtime.  Of the 22 of us, two -- Senie and Kalendar -- are gone now.  I imagine heaven as just such a place, with the whole noisy gang assembled there once again and an angel named Gladys standing under the cloud of moths orbiting the porch light, yelling, "Get in here! Your ice cream's melting!"

Look closely at the blowup below and you'll see the famous golden lawn ball (circled) and in the rectangle to its left, someone standing.  Could that be Sharon Willits, poised to topple the ball from its perch and harbor her awful secret for 30 years?

-- Terry