Mindy Reed
Bio
Mindy is an, editor, narrator, writer, librarian, and educator. The founder of The Authors Assistant published Women of a Certain Age: Stories of the Twentieth Century in 2018 and This is the Dawning: a Woodstock Love Story in June 2019.
Stories (75)
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The Cottage, the Woman, and the Butterfly
I walk four miles up a hill that overlooks the town of Avery. I make it a point to walk through the church grounds as it gives me a real sense of why I moved here. I stand in the sun and soak up all that is around me, and just appreciated being alive.
By Mindy Reed4 years ago in Fiction
Pounding Hearts
It is almost unbearable to accept that my life-long activism fighting social injustice has failed. I’ve traveled the world only to watch human rights crushed, cities crumble and authoritarian dictators take control. I’ve lost everything except for a single duffle-bag of belongings, a small savings account and my own two feet. Now my passion for running is the only thing sustaining me in the new millennium. My life is spent going from race to race, couch surfing and doing the occasional odd job. I live on protein shakes to save my pennies for travel expenses.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Fiction
Everything but the Tail
Simon is a Hurricane Harvey rescue. When I adopted him from Humane Heroes at our neighborhood Petco, I agreed he would be an indoor cat. Simon does stay inside, well at least most of the time, but at least once a day, he slips through the cat door to find himself a snack. If it is before his dinner of a can of Friskies, it is his appetizer. After dinner, it is his dessert.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Petlife
The Unmasking of Gemini
The Dawning of Aquarius has been heralded over time, including a song dedicated to its particular nature. But it is the unmasking of Gemini that matters in this moment. For over a year we have lived with dual faces, the masked for the public; the unmasked in our pods. Gemini—they know all too well the meaning of two faces. For over a year all signs around the Zodiac have been required, taunted, urged, and cajoled to live a duality.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Futurism
Thoroughly Modern Me:
I was in my bedroom, rummaging through my closet for an outfit to wear to our cast party. I had already pulled on my shiny black “shapewear.” I knew from experience that you cannot put these on like a normal piece of clothing. I had pulled mine out of the freezer, and flopped on my back like turtle that had been turned on its back. Then I wriggled and rolled and flopped around as I pulled what they called a girdle in my mother’s day over my defiant hips. With a final snap over my stomach, I pushed my elbows into the mattress, rocked back and forth, and hoisted myself up.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Viva
White Knuckle Driver
I was on the phone with my latest best friend Etta. She had recently asked me to take her to the airport. As well as my aversion to driving, I hated disappointing people and found it difficult to say no, especially when I thought someone needed me and had taken the opportunity to befriend me. Others who understand friendships much better than I do know there are two favors that will test any friendship, helping a friend move and taking a friend to the airport.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Horror
The Catman of Austin:
My husband, Ronald, an army brat, never had a pet. But in 1984, I convinced him to let me adopt a stray kitten. He agreed, under one condition: he got to name her. For the next ten plus years, the cats we adopted were named after his former girlfriends. That first kitten, Tomeka, crawled up on his pillow that first night with us and peed on his head. Don't ask. Tomeka was allowed to have a companion. Denise, and so the naming went until that Christmas Eve’s eve in 1996 when I rescued a sickly orange kitten, the last in the box of Free Kittens. My husband's initial reaction was, "No." Still, I took the little guy to our vet.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Petlife
Before He Was Jimi
The public image of Jimi Hendrix is often of the musician standing on the stage the Monday morning of Woodstock, playing the National Anthem to a crowd the one-tenth the size of weekend audience. But before he was known as the greatest guitarist of all time, he was James Hendrix, Butch to his friends. He didn’t even start playing electric guitar until he was fifteen years old. His first gig was in the fall of 1959 in, of all places, Temple De Hirsh Sinai in Seattle, Washington. By all accounts, the shy sixteen-year-old wasn’t that accomplished. Of course that sentiment could be because at the dawn of the rock and roll era, garage bands were expected to cover the popular songs of the day, and not show self-expression. The result was that Hendrix was fired after the first set because the teens at the party could not dance to his erratic playing.
By Mindy Reed5 years ago in Humans
