MSI Press Blog

  As I sit in my “office”—a modest 10x12 she shed that, post-Covid, doubles as the inventory hub for MSI Press—I’m surrounded not by filing cabinets or ergonomic chairs, but by relics. Remnants. Reminders. Each one a whisper from a life lived across continents, cultures, and hemispheres. Hanging from the coatrack, where coats and sweaters ought to be, are artifacts that defy seasonal utility: A Christmas bell ornament adorned with camels from Jordan A painted hand fan from Korea A swath of fabric in Uzbekistan’s national colors A small woven purse from Turkmenistan A banner from Lithuania International University, where I once subbed for a professor on maternity sabbatical—a generous two-year leave that American mothers can only dream of Nearby sits a dilapidated Russian Mishka bear, its head precariously held by my own crude stitching. My daughter Echo, then 11 or 12, carried it everywhere during our shared days in the USSR. It’s more than a toy—it’s a talisman of a time and ...

  Precerpt (excerpt prior to publication from the forthcoming memoir,  In with the East: A Mary Poppins Kind of Life  by Dr. Betty Lou Leaver Fir Balsam If I had to name the scent of my childhood, other than lilac, it would be fir balsam. Not pine, not spruce—fir. The real thing. The one with flat, needled branches that broke off in a soft snap, leaving your fingers sticky with sap and your nose full of something that smelled like winter and warmth at the same time. Most people say balsam fir , but where I grew up, it was always fir balsam —likely a reflection of the Acadian French influence that shaped much of our local speech. At Christmas, all us kids would follow my father through the snow to the woods behind our house to cut down a fir balsam for our tree. He would pace through the trees with quiet authority, selecting just the right one—not too tall, not too spindly. We’d help drag it back to the house, and on the way, gather extra boughs for decorating. Some woul...

Precerpt (excerpt prior to publication from the forthcoming memoir,  In with the East: A Mary Poppins Kind of Life  by Dr. Betty Lou Leaver Blueberry Hill Farm Blueberry Hill Farm sat just up the hill from our family farm in Acton—walking distance, if you were local, maybe half a mile or so. The entrance was a long dirt road that wound its way along the hilltop, eventually opening onto wide, sun-drenched fields of domestic blueberry bushes, their rows neat and generous. It was a commercial farm back then, owned by the Robinson family, a kind and upright clan whose patriarch had done more good in his lifetime than most people ever hear about. I liked working for him. He encouraged me. And he especially liked my sister—she was a natural, one of the best blueberry pickers around. As kids, we started with pea picking, the domain of the younger crowd, ages five to fourteen. But once we hit our teens, we graduated to blueberries, which required more finesse. You had to know how ...

  Precerpt (excerpt prior to publication from the forthcoming memoir,  In with the East: A Mary Poppins Kind of Life  by Dr. Betty Lou Leaver The Pea Pickers Not only did we six to eight siblings—two arriving after I’d already left for college—harvest produce from our own truck farm in the valley swale, where we grew corn, beans, peas, and berries with me as the designated berry picker (thanks to an allergy that kept me from sneaking bites), but we were also “farmed out” to the big truck farm at the top of the hill.  It was a lot of work, and the pay was measly—three cents a pound for beans, five cents a pound for peas—but we were kids, and the money was ours to spend as we pleased. And there was plenty we were pleased to spend it on. Every morning, after finishing our own farm chores, we would hop up on the tailgate of Farmer Hobbs’ truck, legs dangling, hair blowing in the wind, singing and chattering the short way to the top of the hill—half a mile, maybe a little...