Poems and short stories written by Elizabeth Gamble Wahl.
 
From the foreword by David Wahl:
 
“When my grandfather, Daniel Gamble, returned from Goldendale and Victoria to his homestead on Paradise Ridge, he built a new home for his family. Following Irish tradition, he gave his home a name: Brooklawn.
 
It was here that my mother grew up on a farm with the woods nearby. She learned to love the flowers and birds of field and woodland, and the passing seasons. The seasons show themselves distinctly here in the Palouse Country, and sometimes all four seasons come on one March day.
 
Both her father and her brother Bert could write poetry. Before she was eleven, she and her sister Lola would make up their own stories. She decided that she would like to be a writer. She payed close attention to people, seemingly ordinary people, who worked in the fields with her brothers, or helped with chores and cooking. Among these people was “Shorty Hill”, a ranch hand and a real cowboy. Although he was not a writer, he was a master storyteller, and he helped my mother learn how to write the way that people speak. The short stories are fiction, but they have the good times among the hard times, the closeness of nature, and both the mischief and the warmth and caring of real people woven into them.
 
Our family has enjoyed her stories and poems, and it is my hope that this book will bring as much pleasure to many others. Perhaps her words will help you to see that there are no ordinary people, and that today is no ordinary day.”
 
(30 pages)