Submissions for the Creative Non-Fiction category are open to one work of creative nonfiction completed for coursework in the last calendar year. Submissions should not exceed 20 pages. Elizabeth Florence wrote the 2nd place submission in the Creative Nonfiction Category for the 2021 President’s Writing Awards.
About Elizabeth
Elizabeth Florence grew up in Pocatello, Idaho, but is now happy to call Boise home. She is currently a Writing, Rhetoric, and Technical Communication major at Boise State University. Liz is passionate about all things reading and writing, and loves sharing those passions with those around her. When she’s not writing essays, Liz can be found cooking, reading a good book, or exploring Boise’s hiking trails.
Winning Submission – A Sunday Morning on the Day I was Born
If you listened closely, you could probably hear the mountain bluebirds sing, welcoming the late spring. Their homes were found among the juniper trees dotting the hills surrounding Buckskin Road. The trees were still green, the hills still alive with wildflowers and sagebrush; fire had not left its scars on the land yet. On either side of the long, winding road would sit houses, large ones, with plenty of room in between them too. People liked their space down there. Space for large green pastures home to horses and cattle, and plenty of dirt and gravel for their chicken coops. Our house would sit atop an inclined, winding driveway, hidden away from the road.
Our nearest neighbor, a man in his 40s, would take his dog out for a walk. Sunny was her name- a vibrant and loveable golden retriever, as goofy as they come. The pair would probably watch as riders on horseback passed by, the clip-clop, clip-clop of hooves echoing through the small valley. They might become aware of other noises, too. The clucking of chickens, the caws of roosters, and, without a doubt, the ever-present obnoxious chatter of the magpies.
Upon closer inspection, many of the homes would have frenzies of boxelder bugs scuttling about the garages and the porches; April was about the time of year they gathered up the courage to peek out from their winter hideaways. Something about the old wood, or the very nature of these homes, seemed to attract them in swarms. There was probably a conversation, neighbor to neighbor, about how so-and-so used some chemical to make the bugs disappear, and how somebody else would rather rely on the spiders to kill them off.
But mostly, things would be quiet. Buckskin road would be a sort of haven on this Sunday morning; a place away from the noise and the traffic that even a small town like Pocatello could harbor. While the neighbors would stay mostly to themselves, the gentle hum of life would be constant; the plants and creatures and wind would rehearse their Sunday hymn in harmony, an ode to Mother Nature and the new life she brings.
No one was home to observe the quiet Sunday morning; my father would be in California, at a hotel for a business meeting, with no expectation of soon meeting his baby daughter for the first time.
My mother would be in bed at the quiet house, when she went into premature labor- three months premature, to be exact.
The quiet Sunday on Buckskin Road would boast very different scenery than the chaotic Sunday soon to be unfolding at the University of Utah NICU. But the neighborhood, in all its easygoing, mundane glory, waited with gentle open arms.