I started going to bed early and getting up at four each morning to sit in the chair and stare...
Rolls of hay lean into the hillside, peppery-sweet, thick wheels, spiraling to rest in slumped shoulders of land; bonfire weather...
The primary reason Omanson had hitchhiked out from Illinois to the northwest coast in November of 1973 was to find...
Child of the Large-Beaked Bird The crows are up to no good, tapping the tin roof like it’s Miss Glover’s...
My Mother Hoped for the Best My mother would pause in her sweeping and lean on the brush to listen...
Diviners A child, I followed him around the field, held a wish-bone between my fingers. And when he paused and...
Sometime in January, 1974, Omanson received divorce papers from his wife. Caught off-guard and emotionally crushed, he just signed the...
Autumn Caledonia County, Vermont Why not write something for those who scratched out improbable livings here? Somebody has...
This photo is of my father. I hold it in my hands, a 4-inch by 4-inch Kodak memory of my...
What follows is a selection from the opening chapters of BJ Omanson’s memoir Three Years on the Nowhere Road in...
Cowhouse In the beginning they had one cow – a tough little heifer that could kick like a mule. She...
You turn the corner. Two high windows already open like eyelids. The house awake. Mum slows the car. Puts the...