I can't help but feel that after suffering horrible fates, some restless spirits wish to make their presence known on Earth or make their way someplace else. Me? I never wanted to get in between those spirits and any of their wishes. Around these parts, nothing exciting happened in the late 1970s during my early teenage years. There was the occasional keg party in some place where you’d hoped the cops would never find you. Something else might find you there. And when all was

My grandma Molly “Cookie” Keating would cross the Pittston Bypass and walk down William Street from Cork Lane to meet me after I suffered a rough day in fourth grade at St. John the Evangelist Grade School. She had silvery white hair mostly worn in a pristine bun. She wore bright floral dresses and ornate hats like an Irish Carmen Miranda. She led me downtown to a retail boutique— the ABC Shoppe on Main Street. Its tall, wide storefront windows trapped omnipresent vapor trail

Until my oldest brother Mike moved out of our half of a double-block home, we had three bedrooms for four kids. Briefly, I squeezed in a...