A SNAPSHOT OF A MARRIAGE

 

From Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist

 Back in the days before suburban sprawl and nearby shopping malls, and a year out of high school (I attended college over a decade later), I worked in the business office of the Union Department Store (now defunct), one of downtown Columbus, Ohio’s poshest retail establishments, especially in high-end women and men’s clothing. I grossed $50.00 per week. The best part of it was the generous discount on merchandise its employees enjoyed. After taxes and other obligatory deductions much of which included charges for my newly-acquired clothes, I was lucky to walk away with bus fare in my pay envelope at the end of each week. Fortunately, I still camped out free of charge in my girlhood bedroom in my parent’s home. In addition, I danced away my Tuesday through Saturday nights as an instructor at the Arthur Murray Dance Studio, for which I was paid on commission—very little commission, because I was there for the fun of it rather than the serious business of making money.

The most enjoyable aspect of my Arthur Murray experience occurred after hours, when at 10 PM on the dot, the studio turned off the lights and a gaggle of my fellow dance instructors and I hit the downtown night clubs. And there we dominated the dance floors until closing at 2 AM. Live bands were de rigueur in the clubs back then, and in a band in one of our favorite clubs I met a fascinating musician from New York. And thus, with that captivating young man, began the second main chapter of my life, one comprising a dozen years of marriage—a chapter that carried me well beyond the borders of my Ohio home, blessed me with the birth of my son and daughter, and expanded my world and worldview to a great extent. He married a second time. His has been a long and happy marriage to a lovely woman who has been a caring stepmother to my children. I have remained single, a lifestyle that during the ensuing years has shown itself best for me. Nonetheless, that marriage provided me with the credibility to write about conjugal living in a state of matrimony.   

  

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Among the top winners in the cross-genre fiction category of the 2018 American Fiction Awards, my novel titled CRADLE OF THE SERPENT, is an in-depth treatise on the marriage of archaeologists Lily and Jacob Light—the good and the bad. One of the novel’s reviews states: “5 Stars…Gritty, deep, emotionally packed relationship story to sink your teeth into. No fluffy boy meets girl tale, but so much more. Thrilling setting and backstory; suspense galore!”©

Purchase Link to CRADLE OF THE SERPENT: goo.gl/i3UkAV 

 

Image: THE DANCERS by Linda Lee Greene

 

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