Lips... were ubiquitous in the ‘50s, when a few icons of womanhood were tattooed onto my temporal lobes. - Andrea Lewis

We were a tiny redoubt of culture holding our own against the neighboring Huns of organized sports. I pretended to join the group disdain, but I knew in my heart it was already too late. After the two innings I had watched before leaving the house, baseball had reclaimed me. ...Forty years is a long time to hold your breath, but I was back.

We came down from the trees, up from the grasslands, and into an SUV. We drove. We motored. We headed for that Texas horizon, flat as the flat-line on a heart monitor, straight to the brink of extinction, all the while pumping gas.

Yes, it’s hard to explain... It sets you apart, and people think you’re nuts. ...[N]obody else saw omens, auras, colors. I once cried over a sheep dog—a day before he died—and then was cursed as if I caused it. After that I kept quiet. I pretty much kept quiet for fifty years once I realized nobody cared... Even a tumbleweed trapped under barbed wire has purpose. ...I never denied the gift, if that’s what it was, but it came with loneliness.