On summer nights my family and I would sit around my grandmother’s kitchen table and tell stories.  You wouldn’t believe the tombstone tossin’, out the window flyin’, coke-bottle throwin’, packin’ a sack and leavin’ kinds of stories that swirled around for hours leaving us children wide-eyed with envy.

Over the years, my cousins and I competed; adding to the table gut-busting, big bone breakin’, down the stairs fallin’, gettin’ on a bus and goin’ stories of our own.  When we were big enough, we ran out into the world to collect more.

I packed my pencils, paper, and brushes, and drove to Orange Country. After about four years, the orange men told about a big apple that I should see.  So I went.  It was full of exotic people with strange tales.  Surely, I would have the best stories when I went home.  Well, just when I thought I’d get a good one going, an aunt, uncle, or mother would grab his or her belly in a laugh, slap his or her knee, and say, “Yeah, that’s a good one, but let me tell you about the time when…”

So I packed my pencils, paper, and brushes and...

Shadra studied design, illustration, and writing at Syracuse University.  She earned her M.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts.  She now collects stories in Brooklyn, NY.

Bird (Lee and Low Books)

The Dancing Shoeshine Boy (Tantani Media)