And the Whippoorwill Sang by Micki Peluso

Her beautiful girl, funny and bright, who breathes life into every moment, who does cartwheels in piles of Autumn leaves, who loves to sing and dance down country roads, and above all loves her family with all her soul. Both parents are pressured by doctors to disconnect Noelle, their fourteen-year-old daughter. One of her six children is fighting for life in Intensive Care. In a state of shock, Micki muses through their delightful past to avoid confronting an uncertain future-as the family copes with fear and apprehension. On a country lane just blocks from the family’s hundred year old haunted farmhouse, lives are changed forever. A terrible accident takes place in the placid valley nestled within the Susquehanna Mountains in the town of Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Just when their lives are nearly perfect, tragedy strikes-and the laughter dies. Of course her children feel obligated to tell the world. Hearing strange noises, which all the younger kids are sure is the ghosts, Micki tiptoes down to the cellar, shotgun in hand and nearly shoots an Idaho potato that has fallen from the pantry and thumped down the stairs. She bravely attempts to be the man of the house while her husband, Butch is working out of town. Micki relives the happy times of raising six children while living in a haunted house, as the young parents grow up with their kids. From the bizarre teenage elopement with her high school sweetheart, Butch, in a double wedding with her own mother, to comical family trips across country in an antiquated camper with six kids and a dog, they leave a path of chaos, antics and destruction in their wake. While sitting vigil in the ICU waiting room, Micki traverses the past, as a way of dealing with an inconceivable future. Micki and Butch face the horror every parent fears-awaiting the fate of one of their children. After offering her mother a buck if she’ll do them, with an impish grin, the child rushes out the front door, too excited for a hug, calling out, 'Bye Mom,' as the door slams shut.

Except for the one whose turn it is to do the dishes. As soon as the last morsel is ravished, the lot of them is off in different directions. Around the dining room table of her 100 year old farmhouse Micki Peluso's six children along with three of their friends eagerly gulp down a chicken dinner. It is a day like any other, except the intense heat wave has broken and signs of early fall are in the air. A mother’s account of actual events of her family, filled with laughter, love, loss, and survival. Happy times, a sunny day, a driving drunk, eight lives forever changed.

And the Whippoorwill Sang by Micki Peluso