Author: Mark Peacock

Aaron, my computer whiz elder son, sent me a link to his mother’s just published  book Gretel and Andy, God’s Gift: The Lives of Two Seeing Eye Dogs. Here ’tis: www.https://a.co/dg7a06ev.

The book now is available as an ebook. The book’s contents are the same; the cover’s different with a photo of Marina and the two dogs, whereas the paperback has Gretel and Andy as painted by Jan Tockman from my photograph. The paperbacks have been selling well, thanks I’m sure to Facebook mentions by daughters Britta, Alice and Hannah. It’s nice to have such family support, especially for a book that’s so informative and fun.

Tonight’s WPCA-FM story broadcast was Futuro De Oro, “Golden Future” in English. The title is taken from the name of a sea bluff slum outside Tijuana, Mexico, where people from Mexico’s interior have come in the hopes of finding a better life in the city than they had in their previous homes in the country’s interior. However, like any city anywhere, Tijuana was unable to keep up or ahead of an influx of new settlers, so things like water and sewer were unavailable in Future de Oro. People bought their water from trucks hauling it from wells down by the sea below the squatters’ shacks on the bluffs. Roads were axle busters and children living in the tar paper shacks suffered malnutrition.

Those conditions were appalling to the young woman in the story who was taken around by a young man who had a hot sports car and a special dining place south of Tijuana in Ensenada. I believe Casa Rey Sol, the oldest French-Mexican restaurant in Mexico, still is there. In the story, the young woman, a law student, and her boy friend, heir to a family business,  have opposing views about what to do about poverty, about war, and about what to do if drafted into the military. Can they resolve their differences? Read Futuro de Oro to find out!

Futuro is a “talky” story with the arguing interspersed by Baja driving too fast and near sliding over the ocean- kissing cliffs into the sea. It does raise our never-resolved issues about how to raise people from poverty into a better life. Generation after generation we’ve never really solved it, despite philosophical and political efforts to find a remedy.

Again, I am grateful to WPCA-FM for its monthly broadcasts of my stories. As I’ve said, I never know ahead of time which of my 27 stories they will select for you to hear.

People have asked whether, now that I’m retired, there will be more stories. I’ve said that I really don’t know. But around 4 a.m. the other morning I had the bones of a story come–that’s the way my stories have come, usually with dialogue first and in the wee hours of the morning–and since that morning there has been nothing. This possible story felt longer than the short stories I have been publishing. Perhaps the “nothing” is because I’ve been busy with “life”, as well as putting the finishing touches on Gretel and Andy, God’s Gift, Marina’s book in which her Seeing Eye Dogs, Gretel and Andy, talk about what life is like as a guide dog. It’s a cute book and informative. You can get it for $15 on Amazon.com and your favorite book store. Marina also has written a draft about her early life in war-time Berlin, Germany and I have done a first draft of my own growing up in the Hollywood Hills, a rural oasis in the middle of a major metropolitan area. Both of these accounts will demand some of my time and may just crowd out stories for awhile. We shall see.

Marina’s book about life as a Seeing Eye Dog, as told in the voices of her guide dogs Gretel and Andy, is published now and available on Amazon.com at $15. link: https://a.co/dg7a06ev) I will be publishing the book soon as an e-book that can be read on Kindles or on your computer. The price is yet to be determined. (Mine go for $2.99.) It’s a cute book but also informative. Gretel, of course, was a much-traveled dog and flew with us on trips to Portugal, Berlin, Chicago, and Los Angeles. She could find our car in the vast airport parking lot. Andy has not had Gretel’s travel experience but can find Marina the right door to enter out of a choice of six, for example. One species helping another; I still find it amazing! The book title is Gretel and Andy, God’s Gift; The Lives of Two Seeing Eye Dogs. Although the story is told in the dogs’ words, the author is listed as Marina Heide Peacock.

I spent an enjoyable several hours last Friday at the Kenneth Larson shop in downtown Luck to do some book signing and conversation. It went well. It was good to meet and visit again with people I knew and to meet and get to know people new to me. Yes, we sold books and I signed them. The Larson shop is what I call a “destination” store. It boasts high quality items from around the world and from varied eras. Included are Kenneth Larson’s creations, some of which are exquisitely carved furniture items. I am honored to have my books included in the shop’s inventory; they reside–and not for long before needing restocking–on a special glass bookcase shelf. Kenneth Larson and Bibi are good people and interesting to visit with, while Bailey is the official greeter, welcoming everyone with woofs and yips and a wagging tail. It was fun!

Yes, I’ve had several phone calls and a number of in-person queries about how my first week of retirement went. Some of it consisted of the mechanics of ordinary life: fixing a small leak in the bathroom sink drain, getting the golf cart up into the yard with the help of neighbor Mike Huppert, signing books at the Polk County Information Center, monitoring the air in the car’s left rear tire (that meant a new wheel; it came yesterday), doing a couple of loads of laundry, mowing grass down at the beach, searching and searching some more for the suddenly missing key to the pontoon boat, planting a hedge at the Luck house, and enjoying a meaningful lunch with our District Superintendent, Peace Kim.

Tonight’s WPCA-FM story broadcast was a story called Betsy. Betsy turned out to be the rifle our paranoid/narcissistic narrator bought for protection. Listening, I like the way the story builds a web of suspense (or at least concern) around the narrator and, of course, the surprise ending is fun and a true surprise–or so people have told me. Betsy is available in The First Gathering of The Break Time Stories and online in More Break Time Stories.

I will be signing books and visiting about storytelling at downtown Luck’s Kenneth Larson shop on Friday, July 19th from 2-4 p.m. I’ve described the shop as a “destination” store. Its high quality merchandise and craftsmanship set it apart and I am honored to have all four of my books featured there. Perhaps I’ll be lucky and I’ll see you there?

Look for me to be reading a story or two for the Luck Seniors sometime in August. I’ll let you know. The program is being arranged by the Luck Public Library’s Jill Glover.

Retirement?  Marina’s first Seeing Eye Dog, Gretel, says in her book about life as a Seeing Eye Dog, that retirement means being replaced. I don’t quite feel that way and I was hoping to get through last Sunday’s church service without crying but I failed. I was good until the end when I saw several people in tears. I ended up screeching, “God be with you ’till we meet again!” As part of our farewell, the congregation gave me a gorgeous quilt made by the new quilting group ministry, as well as some beautiful flowers, specially made jam and many cards with messages I am grateful to hear prior to my funeral. Talented Mike Mishler gifted me with a bowl that he crafted from a chunk of southern yellow pine. Mike has a real talent for creating beauty out of what appears to be worthless wood.

Tonight is a bit chilly and damp, so the wood stove is going for the first time in weeks. We are back to the cycle of rain we’ve had day after day. One challenge in the coming days is to somehow get the dead golf cart up the hill from the beach and into the yard so I can try to diagnose its problem. And then the pontoon seems to have re-sprung the leak that was welded two years ago, so we list a bit to port in the stern. Today I ordered a new wheel for the car. It appears that as the wheel rusts, the rust also gets to the inside of the rim so the wheel has trouble with a strong seal and the tire loses air. No fun to get into the car and wonder if I can make it to the closest gas station and its air pump! Ah, yes; the stuff of life!

Here’s a reaction to my reading at the Old Settlers Picnic: “A BIG THANK YOU FOR YESTERDAY! Thank you for a great program yesterday. Too bad there weren’t more folks there to enjoy it. The group keeps getting smaller. Life!” – Lyle and Marlyene Jahn

My comment: A group of between 30-40 people (I didn’t count) is more than writers usually draw for a reading, so I’m delighted that more people had exposure to my stories.And, of course, I appreciate the Jahns’ kind comments.

So yesterday I read Snow Job And The Four Dwarfs at the Old Settlers annual picnic in Cushing. It’s an event that has been going on since 1939. I prefaced the reading with a reminder that I’d spoken there a few years ago and warned that we had time here to plan for our future and what the places we love here should look like. That was before a proposed hog factory blindsided our vulnerable and unprepared townships. How do you say “I told you so!” in a nice way?

The program had been billed as a talk by me about my years in ministry, followed by a story reading. I’m reluctant to focus on myself and ministry, so I briefly talked about how I didn’t want to do the work and was “dragged” into it. But there were unexpected positives. I talked briefly about those. I am grateful to God for the entire  experience of ministry on God’s behalf.

The story reading went over well and I sold books and personalized my autographing of them. That was in contrast to the Chisago  Lakes Library reading, where good weather counter-acted good publicity and attendance was sparse. It doesn’t help that I’m an unknown author. I enjoyed book signing and story talking at Amery’s Bowman Collective two weeks ago. It’s an interesting store and I was able to admire Rene Tebdrup’s (Shiloh Arts) fine pottery and stained glass. She had a pop-up store next to my book table.

So next Sunday is it: final retirement (my third). The Wolf Creek rascals have ads in the local papers inviting people to my last service and cake and coffee following. It’s an 8:15 a.m. service, so we’ll see if anyone shows. The way things have been going lately, it’s bound to rain. Yesterday I got soaked just a I uncovered the lawn tractor to mow grass that’s encroaching on “as high as an elephant’s eye”. If one is going to have a good final appointment in ministry, it could not have been better than these past six years at Wolf Creek United Methodist Church. I will miss the people very much.

June has several things that turn my crank. First, daughter Alice and granddaughter Samantha blow into town enroute to Kooch, the camp up on Rainy Lake. While here, Alice will be doing some recording with her friend John Gorka over in Minneapolis. The camp dates from 1924 and is on Grass Island on Rainy Lake. There is a girls’ camp there now, too and Alice finds she really enjoys serving as staff there and shepherding groups of eight twelve-year old girls out for two weeks of wilderness canoe camping. They also do music together. One year each girl left camp with a CD with music the girls had composed and performed.

Second, I’m returning this coming Sunday, June 9th, as guest preacher at St.Luke’s United Methodist Church in Frederic, Wisconsin. Service time there is 10:30 a.m. It’s a very beautiful building with exceptional stained  glass windows. I’ve preached there a number of times over the past 30 years.

Third is my coming reading at the Chisago Lakes Area Library. I’ll do two stories, one of which will be a “mangled” fairy tale. Cross the river? I don’t mind it a bit! I’m hoping to return soon to the White Bear Lake Library. It has been a few years since I read stories there. The Chisago Library date is Thursday, June 13th at 6:30 p.m.

Fourth, I’m doing a book signing and a bit of discussing storytelling on Saturday, June 15th from 2 to 4 p.m. at Bowman Collective in downtown Amery, Wisconsin.  And fifth, as I noted on this site previously, I’ve been invited to read a story at the Old Settlers Picnic on Sunday, June 23rd in Cushing, Wisconsin. The program begins at 1:30 following a potluck lunch for the large group that usually attends. I’ll read one of my “mangled” fairy tales.

And sixth, I’ve been asked to return to the Polk County Information Center to autograph copies of my four books that they carry now. Years ago I was secretary of the Polk County Tourism Council when we built the building housing the Information Center and the offices of St.Croix Falls and its police department. The Information Center works to direct people to the locations in Polk County that carry my books, but it’s nice that they have some for people in search of cabin-time reading. (The St.Paul Pioneer Press’ Mary Ann Grossman said my Six Short Stories are good summer reading. She has not seen the other three books.)

And, finally, June 30th marks my third retirement. That means I’m finished as pastor of the Wolf Creek United Methodist congregation. I will miss the people; they are some of our world’s very good people. I will not miss things like statistical reports, charge conferences, finding musicians, selecting hymns, the Christian year, and the weekly grind of working to have something to say on the coming Sunday that might be worth a listen. I don’t have a file of old sermons that I can dig into to find a old message I can update and I don’t work from a written sermon or even, sometimes, notes to myself. That makes each week a challenge. I use the Lectionary, which forces me to grapple with things other than my favorite topics, but that also saves the congregation I serve from hearing the same-old, same-old thing week after week. (The late Charlie Zeigler suggested once that I could use the sermon I preached the week before because “We don’t remember what you said anyway.” I thought that was pretty funny.)

A final note: Marina’s book, Gretel and Andy, God’s Gift, is about ready for purchase. I have a proof coming. The next thing will be to insert photos of the dogs and of Marina working with them. The story about what it’s like to be a Seeing Eye Dog is told in Gretel and Andy’s voices. It’s very cute!

I have been asked to return to read at the annual Old Settlers Picnic that is held nowadays at the Cushing Activity Center in Cushing, Wisconsin. This time they’ve asked me to read one of my stories, which, given the commemorative aspect of the area’s history and of people long gone, to me calls for some lightening up. That means a “mangled” fairy tale.

I spoke at this event several years ago. Describing myself as “a recovering city slicker”, I told the group that when I left southern California fifty years ago the municipalities were buying up vacant lots in the San Fernando Valley to create parks. They would be small parks but at least they could be green. Development had pushed so quickly–a phenomenon of greed and money–that parks has been passed over. They were an afterthought. I said that we had the comparative luxury of planning how we wanted our area to grow and develop as the Twin Cities pushed eastward. We needed to think about the legacy we wanted to leave and to plan for it. Since then, of course, we’ve had the proposed hog factory fight that still has to be resolved. At any rate, as I teeter on the edge of my third retirement, it’s nice to be asked. When I asked which story the group wanted me to read, the response was: “You pick; they’re all good!” Well now, how nice and flattering! I’d like every reader to feel the same way.