Rebecca Morton
Bio
An older Gen X-er, my childhood was surrounded by theatre people. My adulthood has been surrounded by children, first my students, then my own, and now more students! You can also find me on Medium here: https://medium.com/@becklesjm
Stories (61/0)
Learning About Word Choice at Age Six or Seven
I titled my book, "The Magic Christmas Violin." I don't know what inspired it. I just remember that, one afternoon, alone in my bedroom, sitting at my blue and green cardboard table in my blue and green cardboard chair, I decided to make my own picture book.
By Rebecca Morton8 months ago in Writers
- Runner-Up in Next Great [American] Novel Challenge
Before the BadRunner-Up in Next Great [American] Novel Challenge
"All I know is that the car is blue," Mel thought, looking up the gray street, brushing away hair the cold wind kept blowing in her face. How did she get here, alone on Thanksgiving Day, waiting for a car she'd never seen driven by people she'd never met to take her to a house she'd never set foot in to have a turkey dinner?
By Rebecca Morton9 months ago in Fiction
Close Encounters of the Spielberg Kind
By the time I was eleven years old, in 1978, I, like most people who had been watching TV and movies since they could remember, was very familiar with the language of film. I didn’t know it was called “the language of film” until I took Film Studies courses in college, but I was already fluent in it by then.
By Rebecca Morton9 months ago in Geeks
- Top Story - August 2023
Henry and GretaTop Story - August 2023
Once, about five years ago, there lived two children, a brother and sister named Henry and Greta. They lived in a mountain cabin with their father, a woodcut print artist, and their mother, a photographer and fan of old black-and-white movies, particularly those starring Henry Fonda and Greta Garbo, which is how her children got their names.
By Rebecca Morton9 months ago in Fiction
- Runner-Up in Pitch Your Pilot Challenge
Little Rental House in JerseyRunner-Up in Pitch Your Pilot Challenge
Title: Little Rental House in Jersey Elevator Pitch: A century after the events in TV's Little House on the Prairie, it is 1977, and the Wingate family, like the Ingalls' of "Little House", is leaving their Wisconsin home, not for the American frontier in a covered wagon, but for the (fictional) New Jersey town of Lindendale in a station wagon, so Dad can follow his Broadway dream as the rest of the family cope with tough, fast-talking Jersey.
By Rebecca Morton10 months ago in Humor
Singing With My Jump Rope Microphone
My parents have an amazing record album collection, dating back to the mid-1960s. Their favorite was, and still is, folk music, with some Broadway showtunes and country mixed in. A child of the 1970s, I heard all of it come out of their stereo, as my sister and I would dance and run circles around our dining room table. But as I got a bit older, some of these songs gave me my first career ambition: I WANT TO BE A SINGER!
By Rebecca Morton12 months ago in Beat
1970s Radio Songs
No matter our ages, American childhoods almost always begin with the same songs: "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star", "Itsy Bitsy Spider", and "I'm a Little Teapot". Soon, we graduate to Disney songs, like "When You Wish Upon a Star", and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious". A child of the 1970s, I also learned songs from PBS television's Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and Sesame Street.
By Rebecca Morton12 months ago in Beat
"Your Sister's Face is Covered With Blood!"
I was about six years old when my younger sister and I went across the street one Milwaukee summer evening to play in our friends’ backyard. It is a vague memory for me, as it was almost fifty years ago, but parts of it are burned into my brain as it ended in a catastrophe of blood, fear, and, ultimately, wisdom.
By Rebecca Morton12 months ago in Confessions
When My Mother Gave Away My Barbie Dolls
I was twelve years old and nearing the end of sixth grade when I walked home from school, up the stairs, into my bedroom, and opened my closet door to a puzzling sight. All my Barbie dolls, their wardrobe cases, their home, car, swimming pool, camper, and airplane were GONE!
By Rebecca Mortonabout a year ago in Confessions