Podcast
6-minute Stories
Hosted by Randell Jones · EN
True, personal stories from new voices and experienced writers resonating with the themes of the Personal Essay/Story Publishing Projects: "Bearing Up" (2018) and "Exploring" (2019).
35episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
"Lessons from Our Forefathers" by Randell Jones
1w ago00:07:45Summary ready“Before Liberty”—again!Even through the misty lenses of history, they were not giants—neither are we. Randell Jones is an award-winning writer about the pioneer and Revolutionary War eras and North Carolina history. During 25 years, he has written 150+ history-based guest columns for the Winston-Salem Journal. His newest release is the expanded 2nd edition of the 2005 biography and travel guide, In the Footsteps of Daniel Boone (2024) and the related video, Boone’s America: Boone Trace, 1775. In 2017, he created the Personal Story Publishing Project and in 2019, the companion podcast, “6-minute Stories” to encourage other writers. He lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Visit RandellJones.com and BecomingAmerica250.com.
Summary"Three Gee-Flying Free" by S.G. Benson
2w ago00:07:50Summary ready – “I’m Gus. Climb in; I’ll give you a ride.”The gravitational force pushed the seat straps into my shoulders and my stomach leaped. I couldn’t breathe. S. G. (Sandy) Benson lives in Warne, North Carolina, where she is a member of the North Carolina Writers Network-West. Her work has appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers, and she received awards from the Nebraska Press Women. She published her first book in 2021, My Mother’s Keeper: One Family’s Journey Through Dementia. Her second book, Dear Folks: Letters Home from World War II, 1943-1946 was released in 2024. She is working on a collection of autobiographic short stories, Girls Can’t Do That. Details at https://www.sandygbenson.com/
Summary"Town Hall Clock Tower" by Jeanne VanBuren
3w ago00:08:10Summary ready – I was unwilling to pour out good beer.I received their conversation and stories and momentary camaraderie as an exchange for the communal feast.Jeanne VanBuren, from Winston Salem, N.C., is a contributor once again to the Personal Story Publishing Project. She is working on a collection of her life adventures that come from being a widowed mom of five sons and growing up in a huge family of 12 siblings. She has been documenting life's travels and changes over 25 years, annually enjoyed in Christmas newsletters, with promises of creating the award-winning novel or screenplay. She is fine tuning the art of storytelling through writing with guidance from projects such as these. Personal stories express to her that we are all uniquely the same, just living out experiences in different ways.
Summary"A Hollow and Forgotten Place" by Mark K. Marshall
4w agoSummary ready – I found the village of plundered houses strangely peaceful.The broken remains of a swinging bridge across the Gauley, I supposed, had once been someone’s way out. "A Hollow and Forgottten Place" by Mark K. Marshall Randell Jones - voice Mark Marshall moved to Nashville in 1977 from his home state of West Virginia. He worked for 40 years as a career coach where he heard and shared stories with thousands of people from every walk of life. His writing draws on how growing up in a small lumber and mining town shaped his own life. Mark is member of the writing group, The River Writers. His stories have been featured by The Tennessean, Personal Story Publishing Project, Art Walk Richwood, WV Writers Association, Old Mountain Press Anthology.
Summary"Orange Juice and Golf Balls for Free" by Bob Amason
Jun 300:08:00Summary ready – He wasn’t cheap; he just liked free things.He charged into snake-infested palmetto bushes with gusto, flinging balls out to the fairway like a crazed Walmart shopper on Black Friday.
Summary"All God's Children Got Shoes" by Phyllis Castelli
May 2700:08:36Summary ready – Going barefoot is fun…if you have shoes in your closet.Even in old age, Mama remembered hopelessly tugging down the faded blue dress, trying to hide her feet.
Summary"My Free Soul" by Mary Floyd
May 2000:07:58Summary readyI had to hide my secret.Without my bubble, I would cease to live, just blow away like dust.
Summary"A Visit with Uncle Gilbert" by Ginny Foard
May 600:08:46Summary ready –He could not send others into dangers that he was not willing to face himself.The locals know that date. They honor it. They value it because it gave them freedoms that they live to this day.Words and their friends fill Ginny’s days. Sometimes they come in a well-organized dignified gathering so that Ginny can enquire about the spellings and meanings of the ones she hasn’t met before. Other times, however, they spill out and fly by quickly as if they flew out the window of a speeding car. Ginny likes to imagine what those words might have been, try out using them and guessing their derivations.A fascinating thing is that you can rearrange words over and over. And Ginny keeps doing that. Every time out comes a different story. Real stories. Ginny shares her little post office box on Sullivans Island, South Carolina with many words and hopes to keep on doing so.
Summary"The Green Roach" by A. A. Krombach
Apr 2900:07:34Summary ready – “If you turn around now, I’ll get you home.”A 1955 Chevy Nomad station wagon, her faded, chalky green body panels and acid-etched roof and hood left no doubt as to her ancestry.
Summary"A Light in the Tunnel" by Emily Rosen
Apr 2200:08:37Summary ready– There are all kinds of marriages.Freedom is not cheap. And it is never “pure.” Emily Rosen lives in Boca Raton, Florida, where for over 20 years and until her 95th birthday, she instructed classes in memoir writing, publishing two anthologies of stories from her classes, and the book, Who Am I? (Emily celebrates her 99th birthday in April 2026.) For two decades and until the local weekly newspaper folded in 2021, she wrote the column “Everything's Coming Up Rosen.” Her travel and feature articles have appeared nationwide while her poetry has mostly languished in the pages of a fat notebook. Some of her poetry was rescued in 2024 from its “languishing” and turned into a short chapbook, Lingering over a L-o-ong Life: Selected Poems from My Journey (Available on Amazon.) Emily has worked as a copy writer, travel writer, columnist, elementary and community college teacher, mental health counselor, and owner of the now defunct “singing telegram” company, Witty Ditty. Her long-lived history puts her at an old Philco Radio listening to FDR’s “Fireside Chats.” (www.emilyrosen424.com)
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