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When Cutty Sarks Run in Your Mind by Ronald Mackay

14/6/2021

6 Comments

 
A warm welcome back to Ronald Mackay with his third contribution in this year's Authors Showcase,

You can read his fascinating story entitled When Cutty Sarks Run in Your Mind by clicking here.​

​Don't forget, If you have your own Life-Changing Event to share, I'd love to feature it on the blog. You can find out more about the submission guidelines here.

Ronald Mackay combined farming and university teaching in Ontario for more than a decade and a half. In the early 1980s 100-acre farms were inexpensive as farmers were retiring and their children had already left for the city. During his Ontario farming years, Ronald made every possible mistake – but usually no more than once! He ended up as a fairly competent farmer and, in Ontario, has had experience with beef cattle, dairy cows, pigs, geese, free-range meat-chickens, horses, donkeys and even rabbits. He has grown corn, soybeans, oats, and alfalfa. His farm had a woodlot that he managed for both firewood and for lumber. Today, he and Viviana live on Rice Lake, Ontario, on a lot of the perfect size – 50’ by 150’. More than enough for “retirement”.

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6 Comments
Syd Blackwell
15/6/2021 05:43:23 pm

When lust is in gear, the mind is in idle. Did Brenda contribute to the financial resolution? More fun to read about than to have been a participant in this event. And, I am sure you never stole another floor board (or anything else from old barns).

Reply
Ronald Mackay
16/6/2021 10:26:41 am

Spot on, Syd! After that, I returned to being my normal boring law-abiding self! How we can be led -- and mis-led -- by our passions...

Reply
Euan Lindsay-Smith
17/6/2021 01:29:50 am

Yet another example of how the best of us can be led astray by romantic notions and temptations. I am deliberately using euphemistic language here.
I am sure that such memoirs can be either edifying or embarrassing. Still, as usual, Ronald's memoir is interesting, amusing and has a moral.

Reply
Ronald Mackay
17/6/2021 11:41:56 am

Fortunately, Euan, writers develop thick skins. They must, otherwise they would never put pen to paper. Whether we write in the first person or in the third, many readers assume that what we are saying is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We writers are fortunate in that we are not required to take that oath. Your comment captures exactly what we do -- we try to interest, the reader, amuse the reader and offer a tiny spark of enlightenment onto life. Thank you, Euan!

Reply
Nila Mendoza
24/6/2021 08:50:40 pm

Stealing hearts or boards? In the end, it doesn’t matter, provided that you can weave a story full of longing and images that make the readers close their eyes to contemplate the exemplary man, entangled with the adventures of a thief of boards, or of hearts?
I am ecstatic, imagining the narrator's face and Brenda's smile. Just fantastic!
Big hug, Mackay. It’s a real pleasure to read your stories. Nila Mendoza.

Reply
Ronald Mackay
24/6/2021 09:13:02 pm

Thank you, Nila. That story means all the more to you because you know the persons and the place involved and even more of the context. Your word "entangled" is precisely the right word. Un abrazo, Mackay

Reply



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