Photograph by Matthew Suárez

I feel most like myself when I’m just out walking, either alone or with my favorite companion — who doesn’t happen to be my mother.

Happy with Hotchkiss

Thank you to Georgeanne Hotchkiss for a beautiful essay (“Mama and Me”, Cover Story, March 21), and to the Reader for being a venue for voices like hers.

Jarrett Haley

Rancho Penasquitos

Memories stirred by “Mama and Me”

In the 1950s, I lived on Robinson Avenue with my mother, father, grandmother and sister (“Mama and Me”, Cover Story, March 21). We were European (Latvian) refugees following World War II. We rented a one room and bathroom in a craftsman house which had been converted to a duplex. Since then, it has been bulldozed and is currently a two story stucco apartments building. From this house, I walked to Florence Elementary School and my sister walked to Roosevelt Junior High School. My mother walked to her job, which was cleaning the Marston House. My father got a ride to his job as a maintenance man at SDG&E. We had no car, so entertainment consisted of walking to Balboa Park on weekends. I learned to swim and play tennis at the muni pool and tennis complex at Morley Field near North Park. Hillcrest and the adjacent neighborhoods still retain some of their charm, but I don’t think a low income working family of five could afford living on Robinson Avenue today. I guess at the time, we were lucky refugees and didn’t even know it.

Uldis Ports

Mission Hills

Praise from a publisher

As an editor and general trade book publisher for 35 years, I would like to thank the Reader for the Georgianne Hotchkiss writing contest winner (“Mama and Me”, Cover Story, March 21). To say this is a winner is an understatement. This reader felt echoes of Willa Cather, Somerset Maugham, and John Steinbeck. “I know that living on the edge isn’t the same thing as falling off” “A question like that bodes ill in a massage parlor.” So perfect and rich. We need to hear more of her adventures. Hotchkiss should prepare an outline and sample chapters and secure an agent. This is a highly marketable writer. Please forgive the expression, but we are talking about success. I felt wonderful vestiges of brilliant writing from the Readers past. Truly San Diego is a source of genius and you so aptly featured one of its best. Thank you kindly.

Jeff Keith

San Diego

Coyotes know what we eat, where we walk, how we live, and how to live among us.

Photograph by at

America’s Finest...Animals?

So when the Reader asks for submissions about your favorite neighborhood, what they really mean is irrelevant disjointed essays about coyotes and raccoons (“Walked by Coyote” & “Mama and Me”, Cover Stories, March 14 & 21) - got it! I’ll submit a piece about hamsters next time.

Cheryl Sonstein

Normal Heights

Did coyotes meet criteria?

I can understand there was a debate about your second-place winner (“Walked by Coyote”, Cover Story, March 14) in the Reader’s writing contest, “What’s It Like on the Street You Live On”. True, the story told of a nearby area where the coyotes live, but many of us in SD County could tell such tales. When recent construction happened in my neighborhood, the coyotes had to move. Now they actually stroll down my street, not in a nearby grove. Oh, and the lengthy descriptions of the former avocado groves…sorry, the article lost me and I had to start skimming.

From reading the guidelines to the contest, I (I think obviously) felt this was something for local San Diego County residents to write about the street they live on. From what I read in your second-place winning story, the writer doesn’t even live here. It sounded like a once-a-year visit.

While this story may have embodied elements that The Reader looks for in articles, why not pay the writer of this story, publish it, and not make it a part of your writing contest?

Charle

Alpine