Tag Archives: Scrap: Salvaging a Family

by Luanne | September 28, 2026 · 6:00 am

The Dress at Last

All my life I’ve had a habit of misplacing something important. Generally this doesn’t mean losing it forever. Sometimes it’s just a day or a month or it can be a few years.

For the past few years I couldn’t find my grandmother’s wedding dress. If you’ve read Scrap: Salvaging a Family this obviously is NOT the dress of my father’s mother, but my mother’s mother. She shows up only as a couple of mentions in the book, but she was my favorite relative and shows up in a few poems in Rooted and Winged. She also was a writer–of tiny humorous stories–and her role model was Jo in Little Women.

She is my role model for being a Grandma.

Can you imagine how I felt when I opened a box I hadn’t seen in a long time and saw her dress inside it? I had put it in an acid-free box and then put it away. Other stuff ended up in front of it and as time went on I kept searching the same places over and over, not finding it. Until I did.

WOOT! My grandparents were married in South Bend, Indiana on May 21, 1932. I wrote about the wedding on The Family Kalamazoo blog years ago.

In 1931, Grandpa had asked Grandma to marry him as he drove her in the car from Kalamazoo to her parents’ farm in Caledonia. But Grandma had to wait a year to teach and give the money to her family who were struggling financially because of the Great Depression.

Also, my grandfather’s mother, Cora, was dying of cancer.

So there was no big celebration for my grandparents. Aunt Jen, Cora’s sister stayed with Cora while they got married. They drove to South Bend, Indiana, although Grandpa was from Kalamazoo and Grandma from Caledonia, two southwestern Michigan towns. They could get a marriage license and marry immediately in South Bend.

Traveling with them were Grandma’s sister Vena and her boyfriend Al Stimson’s cousin, Herb Thorpe. They had forgotten to get flowers, so they plucked spirea along the way.

This is the dress and a close-up of the art deco belt buckle.

Just think, in six years this dress will be 100 years old.

Weren’t they the cutest?

Do you misplace things regularly or does this not happen to you? I keep wondering if it’s my ADHD.

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by Luanne | September 24, 2026 · 6:00 am

Writing Collage

The other day I got an email advertising a writing workshop. No surprise, I get quite a few of these. This one is through r/evolution story lab, a partner of WOW Women on Writing. I have never taken a workshop with them, and I do not know the person, Nicole Breit, giving this one. The course is supposed to be designed for writers who are INFP. If you know, you know. If you don’t, this is a personality type from the Myers-Briggs personality test. I am not an INFP, but an INFJ, which is supposed to be the rarest type. I suppose it would be too much to expect somebody to design a course for those few of us who are INFJ.

But there was something in the description that made me think about my memoir Scrap, which is written in pieces–flash, micro, tiny essays, poems, a short playscript. Listen to this:

In just 75 minutes you’ll:

discover how it feels to write with your brain instead of against it, using mosaic method
tap into memory and sensation as you generate a fresh new piece in fragments
cut and arrange your fragments into a cohesive narrative you can’t wait to share
connect with likeminded writers in a warm, inclusive community led by an INFP/HSP/AuDHD bestselling memoir author

Why linear storytelling blocks intuitive, INFP and neurodivergent brains — and what to do instead to make writing easy and fun!
Nicole’s mosaic method: a simple, repeatable way to generate fragments, then arrange them into a finished piece
How to work with creative constraints and spark memories you wouldn’t otherwise access
Why fragments + structure = a powerful portal into your most interesting material

Now I am wondering if a reason I couldn’t write my memoir in regular chapters is because I am not only INFJ but neurodivergent or as we said in the old days ADHD. I was diagnosed as an adult and while Ritalin was very helpful to me when I was teaching, I couldn’t stay on it because of side effects. I doubt your Myers-Briggs type has anything to do with any particular neurodivergency you might or might not have, but I do know that mine is one of the intuitive types which is why I could ace math tests without being able to show my work. Very annoying since teachers and test graders generally require your calculations.

This workshop is $69, and you can try the link above for Nicole’s name if you’re interested. It appears that r/evolution is her own site.

Anyway, I thought it was pretty interesting that I do mixed media collage, used to make stained glass (another form of collage), and wrote a memoir in collage. It must be the way my mind works. Now I need to apply this knowledge even to writing small–poems and microstories.

On another note, Scrap has been long listed in the Chanticleer Collections and Anthologies contest. Fingers crossed!!!

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Tagged as #ScrapSalvagingFamily, collage writing, Memoir, Memoir writing theory, mosaic writing, Scrap: Salvaging a Family

by Luanne | September 10, 2026 · 7:56 am

New Piece at MasticadoresUSA

MasticadoresUSA, thanks to Editor Barbara Harris Leonhard, has published a new nonfiction flash that can be read tangentially to Scrap: Salvaging a Family. There are four end notes so as you read and find the little roman numerals they relate to the notes at the end, thus the title, “End Notes with Photograph.”

“End Notes with Photograph” by Luanne Castle

A Red Wagon/A Grumpy Filter

Here’s a new post for my GRUMPY OLD WOMAN files. Yeah, you thought only old men were grumps a la Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon?

OK, I’ll be the grumpy woman so that I can feel as young as I can.

I saw a girl featured on local television for collecting and distributing gifts to others in need. I am not giving more details than that because I am not here to diss her. She is doing a good thing, and I hope that the TV coverage will inspire others to do the same.

So what makes me grumpy? OK, just being totally up front here even if it makes me look, well, grumpy.

When I was in third grade, I got the idea that children in the hospital needed something to cheer them up. I enlisted the help of another girl in class and, with my teacher’s permission, asked the other kids to bring in toys for the sick kids. They did! When I had collected all the gifts, I had to somehow get them to the hospital. My school was about a mile from my home, and on the way with a little detour was the hospital. So one day I walked to school (age eight haha as if I would have let my kids do that) with my little red wagon.

After school, I loaded the gifts onto the wagon. I had to use a big box, and my teacher gave me something to use for strapping. Then I hauled that stuff all the way to the hospital over very bumpy, crumbling, weed-edged sidewalk tiles. I remember I was sweating. At the hospital they sent me and the wagon to the children’s floor. A (grumpy) nun met me at the entrance, thanked me, and sent me away.

That was that. No news coverage. After all it was only one classroom’s worth of toys. But I was eight and other than that very little bit of help from my teacher and my classmate, I did it all myself.

So why am I grumpy?

Is it because I didn’t get more of a thank you? Or that kids today get more praise for doing the right thing than when I was a kid? That my parents didn’t fully understand what I did and talk to me in a productive way about helping others? Is it because I’m old and remembering my childhood and feeling empathy for that little girl? Or is it because only a few months after that we moved away, and I had to switch schools in March, a very awkward time to enter a new school system, school, and classroom? And that the new teacher was horrible? I am having a hard time evaluating why seeing that news story brought back this event in my life and made me feel out of sorts.

If you want to read more about my little red wagon, here’s one in MacQueen’s Quarterly. It was published there two years ago so it’s possible you’ve seen it. Neither the following story nor the hospital toys story are in Scrap.

How I loved that red wagon. You can see it parked behind the car in the photo.

My Haunted Childhood

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by Luanne | August 24, 2026 · 12:51 pm

The Age of Anxiety

I’m borrowing Auden’s title for his book-length poem that won the Pulitzer in 1948 because contemporary life is even more anxiety-provoking than in the 20th century. Maybe it’s because I’m living in the now, but it seems to me that all our technology has brought waves of anxiety into the lives of . . . well, of most of us.

In my own family most members deal with anxiety issues and some of us–myself included–have social anxiety. I do not take medication for mine, but if I had to go to a worksite every day these days, maybe I would have to do so.

Because of my childhood, I suffered from anxiety early on, but once I was an adult and not living with my family of origin, my anxiety became significantly better. Until the advent of the computer, the cell phone, and the impersonal communication (aided by tech) of every business and medical provider I interact with, that is. Now it’s back as it was when I was a child living in my parents’ home. No, it’s worse.

The American Psychological Association, on its website, describes anxiety this way: “An emotion characterized by apprehension and somatic symptoms of tension in which an individual anticipates impending danger, catastrophe, or misfortune.” Somatic. That means tension manifests itself physically. Frequently with anxiety we dread the known or the unknown.

When I wrote my memoir Scrap: Salvaging a Family I struggled to find ways to describe the feelings of anxiety I remembered in my memories. The descriptions crop up over and over again, often related to my stomach. My stomach surged, suffered a giant crab crawing aboard, a thundercloud, a hard rock, a gathering wave, was hooked by claws. “Dread began to fill me, coursing its way through my body” (129). Terror, fear, and anger are all directly associated with the stomach in Scrap.

I have anxiety over AI. Many people say it won’t be so bad and in fact is positive. They use the initial fear over every new invention as proof. But AI is different. It has the ability to affect absolutely everything we know, especially facts and ethics.

But it’s hard to live with anxiety pulsing through my limbs every day. So what do I do? I am riding the stationary bike every day, napping, and reading more. The gardener and I plan vacations. I push myself to see friends on a one-to-one basis. And I make sure we set up family time quite often. A dose of my sweet grandson Hudson is a perfect tonic. When I am with him, anxiety slinks out the door.

What do you do for your anxiety?

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Tagged as #ScrapSalvagingFamily, age of anxiety, Anxiety, dread, health, how to describe anxiety, Scrap: Salvaging a Family, self-care

by Luanne | August 2, 2026 · 7:38 pm

SCRAP: SALVAGING A FAMILY

Beautiful new review of Scrap: Salvaging a Family was publishing by Smokelong Quarterly and written by D.E. Hardy, the founder of the journal Claudine. She calls it “What Can I Do with the Anger He Leaves Behind?”

She has some real gems in her review. One is that she calls flash the scrappiest of literary genres. I LOVE that. Flash is so scrappy! She also makes a case for a genre called nonfiction-fiction based on the stories that I have to imagine about my father’s life and my grandmother’s life.

READ REVIEW HERE

Please pass the word on about Scrap and its excellent reviews!

Luanne Castle’s new hybrid flash memoir, Scrap: Salvaging a Family (ELJ Editions 2026), has earned a starred Kirkus review and is a finalist for the Next Generation Indie Book Awards. The book is now available to purchase on Amazon and ELJ Editions.

Scrap: Salvaging a Family explores the stain of childhood fear and anxiety on the adult spirit and the experience of reconciling with an aging or dying parent. A daughter has grown up in a household with an angry and abusive father. He keeps the secret of his own biological father’s identity from his daughter for decades. Can this family be salvaged?

PURCHASE ON AMAZON

PURCHASE ON ELJ EDITIONS

PRAISE FOR ‘SCRAP: SALVAGING A FAMILY’

“…a powerful, painful family saga that slowly gives way to hard-won understanding. A richly detailed, harrowing account of household mayhem and the struggle to forgive.”

—Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

“Spare, precise, and quietly devastating, this is the kind of memoir that stays in the body long after the reading is done.”

—The Book Revue

Almost the End of July and Gonna Need to Take a Breath!

So much has happened lately. I went to the Wisconsin Dells with my family for a week and just got back. I took a tumble while I was there. My third one, hitting my head as usual. I’m ok. Hudson had his best life (for now) there.

On his first plane ride

At the lakeshore, on boats, at deer park, and especially the WAWEE PARK!

We had a baby mourning dove (so cute) rescue at the house before we left for Wisconsin. I hope he’s doing well at Liberty Wildlife!

Kathryn Kulpa of Cleaver Magazine interviewed me about Scrap.

A CONVERSATION WITH LUANNE CASTLE, AUTHOR OF SCRAP: SALVAGING A FAMILY by Kathryn Kulpa

And LatinosUSA-English Edition has published two of my ekphrastic tanka sequences.

Tanka —02 by Luanne Castle

Tanka —01 by Luanne Castle

I still have lots of unpacking and email catching up and I am SO TIRED. Living with a 2-year-old for a week hahahahahaha.

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by Luanne | July 13, 2026 · 6:06 am

Tornado Salvaging

Sharing a few more photos I found scanning.

There are two micro stories in Scrap: Salvaging a Family about the May 13, 1980 tornado in Kalamazoo, Michigan (pp 90-92 in paperback). It’s sort of a transition period in the book where I am now an adult, albeit young, whereas what had come before in the book was focused on coming-of-age. It’s also foreshadowed by an earlier scene of being a kid in the basement during a tornado warning. Scrap is comprised of three parts, and the tornado is the end of part I.

I mention how my father bought up storefronts that nobody else seemed to want and tried to fix them up just enough to rent them as he had little money to invest in remodelling. I describe a wooden “canvas” hanging on the wall of my father’s store:

What I think is that he makes something usable that wasn’t. He doesn’t have the money to make them beautiful. But every once in a while, he recognizes something that is. Inside the luggage store, he’s hung a board that a painter used to clean his brushes. He calls it his Jackson Pollack (sic).

Weirdly, even though I remember looking up the correct spelling of the artist’s name, I still misspelled it in the book. For some reason, I want it to be spelled Pollack instead of Pollock. Maybe it’s because for all its interesting details it’s still a fake. (If you read Scrap you might realize why the theme of “fake” resonates with me).

Dad’s “Jackson Pollock” on the wall

Here are a couple of photos of the tornado that day.

Gilmore Brothers department store–the entire back wall of the 5 story building was blown off

ISB Bank building–all the windows were blown out

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by Luanne | July 10, 2026 · 6:28 am

Thank you, Beetley Pete!

Beetley Pete has let me take a space on his blog today to share a story a bit related to Scrap: Salvaging a Family. It’s a story my father and uncle told me (together) when they were 85. My uncle and my parents were visiting me at the same time, and they were getting into unearthing memories. This one is about the 1920s, 30s, 40s, and there are photos from the early days.

POST ON PETE’S BLOG

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Tagged as #ScrapSalvagingFamily, Family, family history, flash memoir, lies, Memoir, memories, Scrap: Salvaging a Family, secrets

by Luanne | July 3, 2026 · 9:55 am

Scrap’s Ebook Now on Amazon!

Great news about Scrap! You can now order the ebook on Amazon!

Sorry for shouting! I’m just excited. Here’s the link:

ORDER SCRAP IN EBOOK

ORDER SCRAP IN PAPERBACK

If you haven’t read Scrap: Salvaging a Family I hope you will. And if you have, I hope you like it and will share with others who might like it or find it helpful, especially with generational trauma, family dysfunction and abuse, or writing outside the boundaries of genre.

If you’ve written a review for Scrap and are on BookBub, the book will show up there soon–it’s pending approval. I’d appreciate it if you could copy your review over there!

Years ago I was writing posts inspired by the Dawn Raffel book The Secret Life of Objects. My magical music box, one of the objects, has shown up in Scrap. I still own it, too! Actually I wrote about it twice on this blog. The first time was to introduce the music box. At that time I didn’t know what music it plays. The second time was after I discovered the song it plays: La Paloma.

Magical Music Box

The Origin of Poetry

You know what I just realized? I’ve never let Hudson hear or even see the music box. He spent the night last weekend and then was here all day yesterday because school was closed. He’s almost 2.5. Can you believe it?!

I’ll have to share the music box with him. He loves music, and I want him to experience it as I did.

Yesterday we went to storytime at the library (lots of exercise for Grandma as story is more like “story” called movement), got lunch with chocolate milk, swam (with Grandpa), played with Mickey Mouse playdough (his favorite character is not the usual for kids today–it’s Minnie Mouse!), played the piano, and painted. Of course painted. He insisted and kept bringing it up. He paints with acrylics on canvas so it’s quite a mess. But another beautiful painting was added to his portfolio.