THE ANNUAL THURBER TREAT WRITING CONTEST

Despite moving to our rain site, the annual Thurber Treat Picnic was a rollicking good time, largely due to our three winners of this year's contest. The theme was Thurber House memories over the past 25 years. If you missed the picnic, here are the winners and a special piece from Thurber House's 2007 Children's Writer-in-Residence, Lisa Yee.

(In alphabetical order)
Noell Wolfgram Evans is a playwright who has had productions in New york City, Chicago, Columbus, Louisville, and Palm Springs. This summer his latest plays will be seen on stages in Canton and Cleveland. In addition he is the Theatre Editor for Umbrella Publishing and an advisor for Group Creativity Improv Projects which is based in Newe York City. He has also written for a number of magazines and online outlets but the thing he enjoys most is laughing with his family.

The New Olden Times by Noell Wolfgram Evans

Since moving to Columbus, I have had several moments of inspiration, connection, humor, and community at the Thurber House but what sticks with me the most was the afternoon there I spent spiraling into unadulterated depression.

To begin - it was a Spring afternoon, or more accurately, Spring-like. I had no particular reason for stopping at the Thurber House. I just planned to drop by, read a little something in the garden, perhaps step inside to see what was new and steal a few pens, and just generally soak in the Thurberocity of it all. My main motivator for stopping was to kill a little time as I was running early to my next appointment. I was spending the day looking for a new pair of glasses as mine had been broken that Saturday by my inconsiderate "neighbor."

Even taking into consideration his age - 4 1/2 - Gabe Brownlee was still a horrendous person to live next to. He lives two doors down and finds it intensely amusing to test my reflexes by throwing things at me. I'm not sure why this started. it wasn't, as many kids' actions are, an extension of some other game because I rarely play with children' they are a race of people I do not completely understand.

The Saturday in question was the (unfortunately) annual Johnson Start of Summer Cook-Out. I was standing around with the neighbors, each of us pretending to like each other when we knew that the opposite was more accurately the case and yet there we all were, choking down Mark Johnson' lighter-fluid flavored cheeseburgers when I suddenly saw from the corner of my eye, something flying toward me. Like any sensible adult, I squared myself to the object to get a better look and to give it the best chance of doing some damage. It turned out to be a dog's squeaky fire hydrant toy and apparently it was upset with my glasses because it smashed into them fairly hard. I didn't want to, but in all the chaos, I fell down. From my vantage point flat on my back, I saw little Gabe Brownlee fleeing the scene. I envisioned him running to his room, wrapping his dirty, stubby fingers around a Crayola and, like some tiny scientist, writing with a fiendish laugh in his notebook: "Chico's squeaky hydrant - response time 0." So that is how I found myself driving all over town trying on glasses.

As I pulled down Jefferson the radio started playing In a Big Country, an upbeat song from 1983. It reminded me of being 11 and put me in a good frame of mind. As I pulled into a parking space he song faded out and the DJ said (and I'm paraphrasing here as the hurt of his words has overcome my memory): "You're listening to the 80's classic In a Big Country by Big Country here on the home of great oldies - 107.9"

I stared slack jawed at Thurber's place while the shock set in. I was hit on two fronts - first and perhaps least important - the song is in no way a "classic." it's a fun song but classic in the tradition of Thriller, Sympathy for the Devil, Signed, Sealed, Delivered, Who Are You? - why even think that? My anger over that classification quickly gave way to a more egregious concern - a song from my youth was on an OLDIES station. This was, to use the words of a great poet of my youth, a shot to the heart. A mistake I thought, a goofy mistake. I waited anxiously for the commercial to be over so I could be sure, absolutely sure, that I had heard correctly. The commercial dropped into The Power of Love a Huey Lewis song I remembered quite well, because I had the cassette tape. What was happening? Had I just become old?

I just sat there with the engine going and the music faintly playing out. Looking into the rearview mirror I prepared to see my father smiling back at me. The music bounced around the car but it sounded different and no matter how low I turned it, it still was so loud. (I would have just turned the radio off but I really liked that song and I hadn't heard it in years.)

With Huey Lewis hanging in the air, I found myself dropping into despair and disappointment. (It was just like the 5th grade Valentine's Day dance all over again.) I became aware of every gray hair, every wrinkle, every out of shape place on my body. It's an odd feeling, ones own blobbiness.

I turned my car off and just - sat. Doing the quick math I realized that I was just a teenager away from being 50. There I stood, facing a crisis not uncommon but also not easily fixable. Age is just a statement right? Even though the music of my summers past is playing on an oldies station I still feel young. Is it all a hollow perception though, am I deluding the truth, like the heavyset woman who shops the junior department?

It's an amazing thing, being able to piinpoint the exact moment you went from people yelling "Hey you" to "Excuse me, sir?" In the span of 3 1/ minutes my life shifted. I knew it was coming, I knew I would get old, but I never expected it to happen in a parking space in front of the home of one of America's greatest humorists.

I just kept repeating in my head "I am old. I am old." when suddenly I found the silver lining, however small. I hopped out of the car and marched toward the house - my destination was the gift shop where I was determined to talk my way into the use of what I now felt was a very deserved Senior Discount.

Martha Johnson Miller is a life-long Columbus resident and graduate of Ohio Dominican University. She has been an active volunteer with Thurber House since 1992, serving on Adult and Children's Education/Outreach Committees, among others. Ms. Miller has spent most of her career in community volunteer service and has received the Junior League of Columbus Presidents' Award and the Mayor's Award for Voluntary Service as a member of the Project P.O.W.E.R. (literacy and GED program) Steering Committee. A former Consumer Frauds Investigator for the Ohio Attorney Gerneral's Office, she now works as a substitute teacher for Columbus area Catholic schools.

Things That Go Bump in the Night by Martha Johnson Miller

For a fleeting moment, as I rolled over in bed in response to a shrill ringing sound, I thought I was dreaming. In the wee hours of an early-January Sunday morning, still mostly asleep, I picked up the phone, heard Lia's voice, and for some not-so-fleeting moments, anticipated a nightmare.

My brain processed only a few of Lia's words, notabley "alarm" and "police," but it immediately recognized her ton: apprehension edging toward fear. I asked her if she had locked the door to the apartment after setting the alarm. The surge of relief when she replied yes woke me a little more. "Stay locked in, I'll be there in 10 minutes. You can watch out the windows for me and for the police. The police should arrive any minute."

I pulled on a pair of jeans without bothering to tuck in my nightshirt, slipped into some loafers while explaining my sudden departure to my spouse, grabbed my purse and headed downstairs. With parka secured, I left the house for the reasonably short drive downtown.

With the traffic lights on flash, I made the freeway entrance in short time. Cruising south on I-71, I attempted to organize my thoughts. Lia had been collected enough to find my phone number and call me when the alarm went off at Thurber House. She was safely locked in the Writer in Residence apartment and the police were on their way. No weather or traffic was impeding my progress. So far, so good.

Lia had arrived from Baltimore just after Columbus had welcomed in the New Year with fireworks: those bursting rocket displays set off by pyrotechnic experts; thos shimmering streaks made by Mother Nature's thunderstorm; those ammo blasts from the rifle of the serial sniper haunting the south outerbelt and its nearby environs. Before she came as Thurber House Writer in Residence and Ohio State poetry lecturer, Lia and I had discussed the sniper. She'd seen the reports on CNN; eighteen incidents so far, one fatality, investigation ongoing. She didn't know enough about Columbus geography to convice her five-year-old son of her presumed safety during her residency.

"The sniper's firing five miles away on the fringe of the city," I assured Lia, and suggested using protractor-made circles to illustrate to her boy that her path and the sniper's would not intersect. The circles worked.

To welcome Lia at the airport, I had worn my grandfather's aged top hat accented with an obviously artificial rose. I had nourished her with a fish sandwich at Ray Johnson's before getting her settled in with rental car, routes, and house key. Her stay had been going well. She enjoyed the staff, the house, the teaching, the drive to and from campus. She'd gotten along with the ghost. But now the house alarm was soundingand the police were responding. I hope she didn't think it was the sniper.

On the exit ramp, I recalled my only other wee morning hours call to travel downtown. It had been several years earlier, a similar situation, responding to an alarm in an area a few blocks south of Thurber House. Upon arriving at my building, I had found the police cruiser parked in front, taking up two spaces. I had to park half a block away and walk back. I had walked in the middle of the street, keys in hand, whistle in mouth, as the officer, a tall muscular young man, armed, well trained in handling these situations, had waited on the front steps for me. There had been no social chit-chat, no exchange of pleasantries between us as we had headed for the door, only his inquiry, "Do you want to go in first?" I hoped I would not be meeting the same guy this trip.

I saw the cruiser as I drove up to the house. The officer was completing a walk around the premises and greeted me as I exited my car. Lia waved from an upstairs window. Signs of hope, my brain murmured. By the time we got to the door, the officer had given me a full report on what he'd found, rather hadn't found. When he reached for the door handle, there was no question, he was going in first.

Lia met us in the bookstore. Being surrounded by literature gave us comfort, being accompanied by an armed guardian of the law gave us courage. We undertook a thorough, methodical search of the house and found no nefarious intruders, noindications of malfeasance or mischief. We braved the basement, even the part the furnace doesn't heat and the light doesn't reach. I cringed at the sinister, shadowy stacked chairs and boxes, but they made no menacing moves toward us. Our offiicer was convinced they concealed no perpetrator. He had the flashlight and the gun and the trained eyes. We headed upstairs for finalities.

The culprit turned out to be a window in Susanne's office. The aged wooden frame had shifted just enough to trigger the alarm which startled us out of our respective wee hour routines. No broken glass, no bullet fragments, no bad guys. As I left the house, I swear I heard the ghost laughing.

Mark Sweetwood is the managing editor of The Vindicator in Youngstown, Ohio. He and his wife, Mary, are new to Ohio but old friends of Thurber who Mark first met as a freshman in an American Literature class at Bradley University in Peoria, Ill. where he eventually was graduated (some say "was chased out") with a journalism degree in 1982. Clearly unable to spot trends, Mark has stubbornly worked at newspapers in Illinois, New York and Florida before settling into Boardman Township. When not at work, Mark dances wih copyright infringement with his own blog, "Mark's World and Welcome to it." His second cat was named "Thurber" even though Thurber was a dog man. While his writing and editing have received numerous industry awards over the years, he considers the Thurber Treat his Pulitzer because, clearly, he's never going to win a Pulitzer.

Alarms and Diversions: A Visit to the Thurber House by Mark Sweetwood
(In which the would-be author visits the home of his literary hero only to be confronted by chaos, confusion and, of course, the threat of arrest.)

We are currently at the Renaissance Hotel in Columbus, Ohio awaiting an early evening private tour of the James Thurber House. Of course this was all the result of a curious and chaotic course of events. Only now, after a stiff drink or three, have my nerves calmed enough so that I can properly relate our story.

Needless to say, the police were involved.

Over the river and through the woods to my wife Mary's mother's house in upstate New York we go. I know the way to ferry the, er, Chevy Cavalier through the bright and, uhm, open roads.

Once you start one of those songs it can be hard to make reality fit...

We departed Crystal Lake, Ill. at 5:28 a.m. with two destinations in mind: The Columbus Renaissance Hotel and the James Thurber House at 77 Jefferson St., the boyhood home of my literary hero. This was to be the culmination of a life-long dream I've had since the home opened in 1984.

This is Stage 1 of a two-stae plan to get us to Mary's mother's house in Cornig, N.Y. in time for an Italian Thanksgiving feast. There will be three for dinner. Like a good Italian, Mary's mom will cook for 13.

My plan, like all good plans written by men, left little room for error. Hence, we were at the hotel by 1 p.m. and to Thurber's house by 1:35 p.m.

Now, I had traded e-mails with Marlaine from the Thurber House earlier in the week who assured me: "Sundays are a good day to visit since we have tour guides available."

In addition, she wrote: "Safely assume we're open unless I email you again."

She did not. We safely assumed.

We were all goose-pimply with anticipation upon our arrival. We parked right in front of 77 Jefferson St. because the parking lot next to the house was locked shut. That should have been an omen. A cynic would have begun to panic.

The Sweetwoods? We took up the offer on the sign on the front door and walked right in...

Nice foyer. Now, at first, we mistook the loud alarm as some sort of signal to someone, maybe an employee in the back, that guests had arrived. Then we heard a robotic voice warn us to "Exit the building immediately. The police have been notified."

Not quite the welcome we had been promised.

This robotic phrase repeated and seemed to get louder and more ominous. Confused, we retreated to the front porch. Why would the door at this national landmark (a plaque assures us it is a landmark right there on the front porch) be unlocked if the house was closed? Why would the house be closed when a sign clearly says it is open Sundays? Why would I be e-mailed that the house was open to visitors only to be rudely threatened with arrest?

Perhaps this was not an alarm but the voice of the infamous ghost!

"The DAY the Ghost Got In?"

Our minds whirled. That whirling coincided with the lights marking the arrival of the first set of officers in a ppolice van. The alarm had stopped, apparently convinced of our ertreat, only to be started up again when the officers entered. By then, two more visitors arrived, convinced, too, by Thurber House staff, that volunteers would be running tours from 1-4 p.m. They were locals and could easily reschedule. We had driven 413 miles and I had Griswolded this stop into an impenetrable schedule calling for our departure at 6 a.m. the following morning, some seven hours before the house would allegedly be open again.

A squad car now joined the police van at the scene, apparently alerted by the new set of alarms set off by the first set of officers. I am convinced Jefferson Street had not seen so much commotion since "The Day the Dam Broke." Certainly, it had not seen so much confusion.

The latest officer joined his fellow officers inside. Mary and I amused each other by taking a set of pictures that appeared to show me stealing Thurber's pumpkins. For that, I received a Thurber sliver from Thurber's porch. I was about to turn a little surly...

"That's a great house. I have never been in Thurber's house before," one of the officers said as he exited. The officers declined to have their pictures taken.

"Nothing good ever comes out of having our pictures taken," one said, smiling.

They did contact the alarm company and someone was either going to show up to disable the alarm or call the Thurber House staff to alert them that the door was unlocked and visitors, now numbering four, were threatening to get unruly. Or, at least, threatening to take a pumpkin home as a souvenir.

Within 20 minutes, Chuck arrived. He is in charge of maintenance for the Jefferson Center, which oversees the Thurber House property. He let the four of us in, disabled the alarm, apologized for the missing volunteers, but further explained he could not stay as his mother was waiting in his car. We agreed he'd call us at 4 p.m. back at the Renaisssance to arrange the full-private-tour treatment later in the evening.

We headed back to the Renaissance, hopeful of a well-stocked bar.

Optimistically speaking, the worst we can expect are "More Alarms at Night."

Lisa Yee was born and raised near Los Angeles. She is the co-owner and creative director of Magic Pencil Studios and has also penned her own newspaper column, written TV and radio commercials, menus that have been read by millions, jingles for waffles, and television specials for Disney. The author of Millicent Min Girl Genius, Stanford Wong Flunks Big Time, and So Totally Emily Ebers, Yee was the 2007 Thurber Children's Writer-in-Resident recipient and wanted to share her "ghostly" experiences with us. For more information on Lisa Yee and her most recent works (not her ghost stories), check out her website: www.lisayee.com.

The Night the Ghost Got In . . . Or Not by Lisa Yee

I never believed in ghosts. As any sane person knows, ghosts are figments of overactive imaginations, poufs of dust or smoke, and/or hallucinations manifested by teenagers who stumble into old abandoned mansions at midnight and aren't smart enough to go home.

During my Thurber Children's Writer-in-Residence interview, I was asked, "How do you feel about ghosts?"

"Ghosts don't bother me," I scoffed. "I don't scare easily."

Thurber House Writers-in-Residence enjoy a cozy two-bedroom attic apartment in James Thurber's childhood home, plus the run of his house after hours when the museum is closed. On my first night at Thurber House, I reveled in the luxury of being alone.This would be my home for the next four weeks. For a mom with two noisy kids, a noisy husband, and a noisy dog, the silence was intoxicating.

Later, I unpacked my suitcase and set up my computer in the spare bedroom. I tested the couch. I checked our th kitchen's pots and pans, though I haad no intention of cooking for a month. Then, I opened the closet door.

Okay, that was a mistake.

It wasn't a closet at all--it was a twelve-foot dead drop housing a steep spiral staircase that led to...nowhere. If that weren't creepy enough, while nosing through the dresser drawers, amidst the old maps and brochures of the area, was a typed up list of ghostly encounters past Thurber House authors had experienced.

Suddenly, I thought I heard voices. The house creaked and seemed to come alive. It sounded like there were heavy footsteps outside my door. I then realized, it's one thing to be glib about ghotss when you are on the phone 1,800 miles away. And another to be unafraid when you are all alone in a house that was built on the site of a lunatic asylum fire where many residents had perished and in the same house where a previous resident had committed suicide. Or had he?

In a panic, I made sure the door was locked and the windows were bolted. I moved the dresser in front of the creepy closet, and checked under the beds for murderers laying in wait to kill a children's book author.

As the days flew by, I stopped looking for ghosts and murderers. i mean, honestly what would I have done if I actually found one? The house was hustling and bustling during the day with visitors and staff climbing the stairs, exploring the rooms, happily chatting away. But at night, the place was mine. I'd roam around, oblivious to the alleged ghost and/or his cronies, read in the living room, linger in the dining room, sit in Thurber's bedroom and daydream.

All alone in my apartment, sometimes I'd hear someone walking around the house, just as James Thurber had reported when he was living here. He even wrote about it in "The Night The Ghost Got In." It was kind of quaint, I thought. A houses ghost. Although, I knew there really was no such thing.

Oh sure, on occasion, the bolted windows would fly open, or the light bulbs would flicker. Okay, so the radio would change channels on its own. But this was an old house, and it could all be explained away, like that spooky stairwell. (It was, I was later informed, a fire escape and led to the floor below.)

An arden blogger, I was chronicling my Thurber House experiences, and once when writing a satirical post about the literary ghost, my computer froze up, then replictaed the blog page about 50 times. Odd, I thought. Still, I didn't let it phase me.

By the time my Thurber House stay drew to a close, I had accomplished so much. I started a new novel, I taught writing workshops, and even visited the hospital emergency room. (I fell flat on my face while jogging). But I hadn't met the ghost. Like that was even possible.

I had an early morning flight back to the west coast. So, on my last night, I packed and went downstairs to put my luggage by the back door. Then I set my alarm for 4:00 a.m. and went to bed. At 4:45 a.m. I made my way downstairs to wait for my ride. Though it was still dark, I didn't bother with the lights. As I attempted to pass through a doorway from the dining room to the back office, something stopped me. I was confused, and all I could think was that it was a thick spider web. I flailed my arms and had to push to get through it.

When I turned on the lights, I expected to see the shreds of the massive web I had broken through. But there was nothing--nothing--there. yet, something had stopped me. If it wasn't a gigantic spider web, then what was it? Truth be told, it felt sort of like Jell-O. But that would be impossible. It defied logic.

Then it dawned on me.

I smiled and proclaimed, "You are real, aren't you?"

I'm not saying that I believe in ghosts. And I'm not saying, I don't. All I am saying is that I wasn't alone at Thurber House, and neither are you.