This essay is a valentine to my ten sisters who several years ago became obsessed with the Oregon-based musical group PINK MARTINI.
Originally, this piece won the Writers at Work narrative nonfiction contest and was later published in the journal Quarterly West. Later it was republished by Phone FIction, which is where you can read it today.
“My only brother Brent was patient zero. It was he who first heard on National Public Radio about the musical group Pink Martini and in turn began infecting my sisters with the hysteria of the group’s hot Latin, jazz and classical mix. But it was my brother-in-law Scott who is responsible for bringing my sisters to near ruin. He was the one who, munching Cheerios one morning at the table with his children, read in the newspaper that the Martini was due to perform in our home state of Utah. Without thinking—I am sure he was not thinking—he told his wife, my sister Stephenie, who screamed so loudly at the news that five-year-old Ben turned to his younger sister Gracie and said, ‘My Heck! What’s with mom?’” Read the entire essay on Phone Fiction
