Paul Merkley
Bio
Co-Founder of Seniors Junction, a social enterprise working to prevent seniors isolation. Emeritus professor, U. of Ottawa. Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Founder of Tower of Sound Waves. Author of Fiction.
Achievements (1)
Stories (55/0)
Of Small Stuff and Sweat
This Caribbean vacation was turning out to be a bad idea. My friends back home warned me not to go. "Mitch," they said, "you don't like lying on the beach. You sunburn in 10 minutes flat. You're in to the dermatologist every two months to get something cut off. You don't sail, you don't surf. You don't speak Spanish."
By Paul Merkleyabout a year ago in Fiction
Guide Stones
The outside world was unknown to her, but she could see a glimpse of it through the window in his room. It was a very small window—from the ancient book her grandfather had given her, she wondered if it was what had been called a ‘clerestory’ window, whatever that meant—and she had to stand on a chair to see out of it, but this was the last place in the colony where she could look out, and this apartment had become hers yesterday when her grandfather, her only living kin, passed. She peered out through the dirty glass. She missed her grandfather and this way she felt a bit closer to him.
By Paul Merkley2 years ago in Fiction
Operations
10 a.m. I think there is nothing more beautiful and satisfying than a perfect operation. Call me Jeff. I don't go by that name, but I need to anonymize things just a bit in order to tell this story, and I do want to tell it to you. I love games, mysteries, and operations. You say you're not into operations? Well you are missing out on a wonderful part of life. Maybe I can draw you into that world.
By Paul Merkley2 years ago in Criminal
Thanksgiving gone South
I fear that, as you read this, you will ask questions like how could I not have known? How did I allow this to happen? Why did I.... Well stop right there. Why is a sucker's question. Why gets us nowhere. When things go as far south as they did on that 2012 Thanksgiving, the "Allower," myself, the one who you may say dropped the ball, can usually explain how, but seldom why. So I will tell you how.
By Paul Merkley2 years ago in Families
Jack Dempsey. Runner-Up in The Aquarium Challenge.
It was hard to give Jack up. We'd been with each other through thick and thin. When we moved here there hadn't been much for me at first. I'd left my friends behind. Cousins too. I had no brothers or sisters, so not much. Lots of TV stations in this new place, but there's only so much Jeopardy and Perry Mason a guy can watch, you know? And Sundays, Sundays were slow. Not even the FBI on Sundays. Dad was stuck on Ed Sullivan and Have Gun Will Travel. Topo Gigio is okay, but even so...
By Paul Merkley2 years ago in Petlife
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