I am publishing a series of articles about my recent trip back to Indiana.
Throughout this month, December of 2018, quite distinct articles will be posted on this site. Some will be seasonally related, about holidays and organizing for the new year, but you will be able to find all “back home again in Indiana” articles under a tag of the same name. A new category, Autoethnography, will be introduced and a subcategory of Autoethnographic Salvage will be used for all articles, posts, and images related to this series.
Use search and these categories to find articles in the series.
Technical Note: Because the site, and indeed the entire Women’s Legacy Project is under massive reorganization after switching to a business grade hosting company that better meets my needs and the needs of my clients, the urls to articles may change without notice. All 1000+ urls changed in ways I was not anticipating when I activated the physical transfer. This is what you get when you are a die-hard do-it-yourselfer.
These are reflections about the wonder of finding and salvaging handmade furniture and heirloom items from past generations of family. These are writings about being last person on Earth who can tell the stories of people and families who owned and sometimes cherish old, abandoned, items.
smashed crocks 
broken windows 
debris-filled rooms
These are also stories of family dysfunction and disintegration. The series is personal but it is also auto-ethnographic. It is about the end of a way of life, about the way conflicting bits of cultural change can poison individuals as readily as DDT or Agent Orange, while related bits of social shrapnel tear at the flesh of families and communities.