Article Archives: Words with Woods

A Stevie Wonder Call

November 5, 2015 | by CJ Woods III

One recent Tuesday, I got a phone call from my grandson. Or more accurately, from my grandson’s cell phone. The voice on the other end of the signal was that of my granddaughter, and what sounded like twenty of her closest friends. Imani’s volume control dial is set to “10” … Read More

Reading, Again

October 29, 2015 | by CJ Woods III

A friend was sitting in a chair in my living room, watching TV while I cooked. There was an item on the news about an author’s new book and my friend reached out to touch a book on a table near her chair. “Is this the book they’re talking about?” … Read More

Law and Order

October 22, 2015 | by CJ Woods III

In 1981, Steven Bochco introduced a police drama to the country and I was one of millions who adopted it. Bochco trained as a playwright at Carnegie Tech (now Carnegie Mellon University) in Pittsburgh, and it has been said that he got the idea for “Hill Street Blues” from observing … Read More

What? The Fall?

October 15, 2015 | by CJ Woods III

I was looking at the work of an orb-weaver that had crafted a web across a good portion of my kitchen window. I idly noted a curled and yellowed leaf caught in the web. Later that day, I saw the spider. It clung to the threads at the middle of … Read More

It’s Me, Imani

October 8, 2015 | by CJ Woods III

“Hi, Cool Papa, It’s me, Imani.” When my granddaughter was about 4 years old, and her mother put her on the phone to speak to me, she would always announce herself in that way. I never thought of the announcement as unnecessary, despite the fact that I had called to … Read More