From the Praise Page…
In her book, We Learned to Live in the Castle, Theresa Griffin Kennedy bravely recounts a life riddled with neglect, misfortune, and perseverance. Equal parts astounding and unflinching, We Learned to Live in the Castle paints a picture of resilience in the face of serial struggles, set against the gritty backdrop of Portland’s less-celebrated side.
Writer and author, Theresa Griffin Kennedy can scan a room and catch every reaction and micro-expression. Ms. Kennedy provides insight into the darker aspects of life, and hooks the reader with the intricate detailing, some of which reads like a diary. She’s a natural reporter with a strong curiosity about life, and an attention to minutiae that is admirable. Kennedy is the kind of witness police want at the scene of a crime, with a philosophical perspective that examines the relationship to both the past and the future. We Learned to Live in the Castle, provides a remarkable glimpse into a woman’s life, challenged by the crossroads of changing times and the isolation that defines those times.
Theresa Griffin Kennedy has been a searcher, explorer, discoverer, all her storied life. She seeks communication, bonding and building bridges with family, friends, and strangers. She believes in the basic good of humanity. Kennedy reveals her hand. Her tales are humorous, sad, shocking, sexual, and graphic. Kennedy's descriptive story-telling lays bare rage, despair, humiliation, helplessness, heartache. She is a survivor, fluid, a contortionist. Readers will recognize issues of submission-control, separation-anger, destruction-self-worth. To be allowed in to observe Kennedy's life - her experiences, secrets, emotional pain - is a harrowing privilege. Kennedy's writing style allows the reader to be a participant occasionally dodging bullets such as divorce, violence, and death. The reader is the better for having shared Kennedy's life and walked over a bridge to better understanding of friendships, relationships with parents, siblings, husbands, daughters, friends, and citizens who walk the streets of Portland, Oregon. You've heard of summer reads. Kennedy's compilation of stories/essays is definitely a sobering read best experienced in the cold of winter.
~Robert David Crane, coauthor of CRANE: Sex, Celebrity and my Father’s Unsolved Murder
Table of Contents
One: The Rocking Horse Wish, 1967
Two: Rape and Consequences, 1979
Three: The Griffins of Thurman Street, 1980
Four: Hot Number - the Year I was JailBait, 1983
Five: Burning the Midnight Oil Among the Pretty Lights, 1983
Six: Honoring my Father - The War Hero Who Loved Poetry, 1990
Seven: The Dirty Work of Cleaning up After Other People, 1996
Eight: We Learned to Live in the Castle, 2008
Nine: To Be Beloved—a Mother’s Love for her Daughter, 2013
Ten: Wandering Water Avenue, 2013
Eleven: Street Stories - People I Cannot Forget, 2014
Twelve: Vicious Entropy - What is That Might Have Been, 2016
Thirteen: Knowing Mary will Die, 2021
~Theresa Griffin Kennedy
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