When I was a kid, my parents caught the fear bug that roamed freely around the Chicago area at that time. Kidnappers! Sadly, it was a real thing. Children disappeared on the way to and from school. Offers of candy and a ride in a nice car tempted innocents, and with the increased presence of regional news that TV brought to the 1950's, it wasn't difficult for fear to grip whole towns.
Of course, we were indoctrinated in the "don't talk to strangers" dogma, as well as the "stay in the house after dark", "if a car slows down, run," and "if a stranger talks to you, run to any house and scream 'Mama, Mama, Mama,' and you'll trick the bad guy into thinking it's your house and he'll run because he'll think your mama is going to come out and save you by bashing a broom over his head" dogmas. I learned quickly, and I tried out all of the above several times, much to the horror of cars slowing to turn the corner and a few clueless gents who just happened to be taking an innocent walk down our street.
I was old enough to run, which I did, almost for any reason because I really bought into the fear thing. Hey, I was ten years old. I didn't want to be kidnapped by some Commie Pinko which was what my mother called anyone bad.
My parents knew that me and my older sister could run pretty fast, but that "the little guys," as we called our two younger sisters, probably couldn't outrun an adult for long so my father constructed a small fenced in area where the garage currently stands to protect the little guys from all evil.
Protection was a point of view. My mother and father felt more secure that their two youngest daughters weren't going to be carried off by strangers in broad daylight. However, the little guys felt caged and soon tired of digging in the dirt with old kitchen spoons. The newly fenced in area wasn't landscaped by any degree, and consisted of dirt, a few scrubby bushes, a snowball bush, and more dirt. Here and there were a few anemic blades of grass, but it was no Eden and the little guys knew it.
I remember planting a tiny vegetable garden within the fenced area which interested the little guys for about twelve seconds. They had one thing on their little agendas: freedom. They were pretty good at escaping, too. A gate left unlocked resulted in tiny escapees toddling across the large back yard which must have seemed like the great state of Kansas to them after the little dirt pile they usually played in. My mother whose eagle eye was always scanning the fenced area for the two prisoners would go ballistic if she couldn't see them, predictably running outside and shrieking their names as if once escaped they would really run back into the fence just because an adult was loudly screaming at them. Those kids were smart. They usually hid behind the tool shed or in the neighbor's yard, but never far enough away that they weren't found and hauled back to their own little GITMO.
My mother decided that the solution to keeping the little guys safe was for my older sister and I to take turns staying in the dirt pile with them. Because my older sister had a social life (what thirteen year old doesn't?) I was most often the prison guard on duty.
It wasn't the worst thing a nine year old could do with her summer, but it was close. Bugs gave us a great diversion. We had a lot of bugs. The under the rocks kind, the crawly kind, the flying kind, and occaisionally a butterfly or some really pretty thing like a dragonfly. We made bug zoos with old jam jars
filled with (what else?) dirt and a few leaves from the bushes. We fed them sugar which we put in our pockets at breakfast. We had the fattest bugs on Campbell Street, but they didn't live long in jars so we were always catching new ones.
Often I read to the little guys or concocted some silly game for us to play. Hide and seek was disasterous in an area the size of a livingroom with no place to hide, but "I Spy," "Mother, May I?" and "Who Am I?" were favorites.
And there were tea parties using leaves for plates, and little stones and twigs for foods that with a little imagination was a feast. Mud pies were our specialty. Sometimes we looked at clouds. Others we counted cars going by on Campbell Street. Sometimes we had tickle contests. And sometimes we pounded on each other.
It wasn't the best of times, but it certainly wasn't the worst of times either, because we learned to make our own fun. We laughed a lot, and we made the best of our situation. In time, the little guys grew and the fenced yard was dismantled, but at the time, being fenced in seemed endless.
Of course, all three of us would rather have been outside the fence, running and laughing and picking the greener grass that always grows on the other side, but we had some pretty good times inside, too, and we could imagine we were elsewhere, doing amazing things and loving it.
I call that kind of imagining "Gates of the Soul" because if the soul feels trapped or fenced in, no amount of freedom for the body makes you believe you are free. On the other hand, if your soul is free, no fence can make you feel trapped.
It takes less work and stress to imagine a good thing than for the mind to bear up under the facts of a bad thing. It's easier to enjoy something imagined than to hate something real. It's better to walk though gates of the soul than to sit by the fence and long for all your worth to be on the other side.
And that's how it is these days for Gary and I. By our own choice, we are fenced in by our circumstances as we care for my mother in her last years. We rarely have more than one hour away from the house at a time, and that, never more than two or three times a week at most. We haven't had a day off in a year. No vacations. No trips to the movie theater. No eating out. No weekend getaways. No sleeping in. Ever. No concerts or lectures. No visiting friends' homes. No church. No trips to visit the grandchildren out of state.
Stated like that, it sounds like we are in the little fenced in yard once again, digging in the dirt with spoons. But in reality, we traverse the globe, meet interesting people, see breathtaking sights, take train rides, fly hang gliders, go to the opera, and travel through time. How? Through books, and DVD's, through radio, CD's, the internet, and television.
We know ourselves well enough to know the things that bring us delight
and in every way possible, we try to create those within our fences. It requires imagination, creativity, and a heart that wants to help one another and build each other up, but those are small prices to pay for being free.
And so on a rough day, we can smile and know that over dinner that evening we will be once again dining in Wales or Ireland or Paris or Italy as we watch a DVD or read a book together. We can look forward to an afternoon at the opera via the radio. We can go on vacation again and again as we look at photos from past visits with our children and their families and recall sweet moments with them all. We can plan the trip of a lifetime online by creating an itinerary, looking at hotels, attractions, photos, and reading other people's travel memoirs. In short, we can be as free as we choose to be.
It's not a perfect scenario, but what is? We are here until our job is finished. We are strong, creative, imaginative, and basically fun people who enjoy each other's company. We are happy and content and madly in love and isn't that what really counts? It certainly beats digging in the dirt with spoons.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Jake the Plumber
When Gary and I were first married, among the many firsts for both of us was the "first" of having our three grandchildren for holidays and summer vacations. They were nine, five, and one. We didn't take Sami, the one year old, til she was three, but Jake and Cassie were packed and ready to go to our house in Madison, WI, every Christmas vacation, spring vacation, and two weeks every summer.
All the way to Madison they played rocket ship in the back seat, constructing an elaborate system of communication between each other using Jake's K'Nex. When we stopped to eat along the way, they had to carefully slide out from underneath the rocket ship paraphernalia before they exited. The same happened getting back into the car.
"Captain! Captain! The aliens are coming!" Cassie would say.
"I see them. They won't get away," Jake would respond sounding like William Shatner. "Take that!" and the gun spluttering sound that only boys can make would commence.
Over the years, the three of them learned to hoe a garden and pick vegetables, make quilts and pillows, make homemade egg noodles for chicken and noodles, roast marshmallows over the gas burners on the kitchen stove, construct tents over the clothesline, take nature walks (with a detour to Dairy Queen,) and eat out a lot. They were good times, funny time, times of just being glad we were all together.
One year Sami was old enough to come along. She woke us up late at night to kill the 'pider on the ceiling of her room. She made Godzilla faces. She did everything the big kids did and that was something. And so we all went to the University of Wisconsin Geology Museum on campus, we went underground to explore the Cave of the Mounds, we explored The House On The Rock and Ronald Reagan's boyhood home in Dixon, IL. We toured the Veteran's Museum in Madison, the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, IL, and a host of other places. In between we went to lots of movies and parks.
And then, they grew up. And we moved closer. The same town, in fact. At first we saw them all the time. We drove them to museums around here, we ate out, we maintained some of the traditions we had created in Madison. But over the seven years we have been in Valparaiso, they have grown beyond most if not all of what we used to do together. Cassie and Jake are in college. Sami is halfway through high school. And we are feeling old in so many ways.
Today, Jake and his friend Andrew are installing new kitchen sink faucets for us. The old ones were installed in 1962. That about says it. Last fall they tore out a basement window frame that was rotting away, and completely constructed a new one. As I am writing this, they are under the kitchen sink, yanking out the old fittings, asking do I have this or that, and otherwise chatting back and forth the way men on the job do. It is also the way Jake and his sisters used to chat while their hands were busy sewing, painting, cooking and baking, and making gifts and crafts, and it occurs to me that all of that play when they were little, the making things, the working with us on new projects and learning new skills, all of it is like so many tiles in a beautiful mosaic that is our family's life together, that is their own individual lives.
There are many other tiles, from times and experiences with their other grandma and grandpa and relatives, from school and friends, from gains and losses, from pets, from jobs, from school, from sports. But my heart is full today as once again Jake (this time Jake, the plumber) is back at Grandma's house and for this short time, I feel like the years have not passed, that I am not old, that he is that cute little guy who posed in a photo holding a huge zucchini squash because he thought his mom would like it, that time has stood still by virtue of all of the similar memories.
I took pictures today. From under the sink Jake asked why I always take pictures. It's so that when I am too old to remember all of the wonderful times with the people I love, I will have pictures to remind me.
Thanks, Jake and Andrew, for giving me more pictures to remember and for a job well done!
All the way to Madison they played rocket ship in the back seat, constructing an elaborate system of communication between each other using Jake's K'Nex. When we stopped to eat along the way, they had to carefully slide out from underneath the rocket ship paraphernalia before they exited. The same happened getting back into the car.
"Captain! Captain! The aliens are coming!" Cassie would say.
"I see them. They won't get away," Jake would respond sounding like William Shatner. "Take that!" and the gun spluttering sound that only boys can make would commence.
Over the years, the three of them learned to hoe a garden and pick vegetables, make quilts and pillows, make homemade egg noodles for chicken and noodles, roast marshmallows over the gas burners on the kitchen stove, construct tents over the clothesline, take nature walks (with a detour to Dairy Queen,) and eat out a lot. They were good times, funny time, times of just being glad we were all together.
One year Sami was old enough to come along. She woke us up late at night to kill the 'pider on the ceiling of her room. She made Godzilla faces. She did everything the big kids did and that was something. And so we all went to the University of Wisconsin Geology Museum on campus, we went underground to explore the Cave of the Mounds, we explored The House On The Rock and Ronald Reagan's boyhood home in Dixon, IL. We toured the Veteran's Museum in Madison, the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, IL, and a host of other places. In between we went to lots of movies and parks.
And then, they grew up. And we moved closer. The same town, in fact. At first we saw them all the time. We drove them to museums around here, we ate out, we maintained some of the traditions we had created in Madison. But over the seven years we have been in Valparaiso, they have grown beyond most if not all of what we used to do together. Cassie and Jake are in college. Sami is halfway through high school. And we are feeling old in so many ways.
Today, Jake and his friend Andrew are installing new kitchen sink faucets for us. The old ones were installed in 1962. That about says it. Last fall they tore out a basement window frame that was rotting away, and completely constructed a new one. As I am writing this, they are under the kitchen sink, yanking out the old fittings, asking do I have this or that, and otherwise chatting back and forth the way men on the job do. It is also the way Jake and his sisters used to chat while their hands were busy sewing, painting, cooking and baking, and making gifts and crafts, and it occurs to me that all of that play when they were little, the making things, the working with us on new projects and learning new skills, all of it is like so many tiles in a beautiful mosaic that is our family's life together, that is their own individual lives.
There are many other tiles, from times and experiences with their other grandma and grandpa and relatives, from school and friends, from gains and losses, from pets, from jobs, from school, from sports. But my heart is full today as once again Jake (this time Jake, the plumber) is back at Grandma's house and for this short time, I feel like the years have not passed, that I am not old, that he is that cute little guy who posed in a photo holding a huge zucchini squash because he thought his mom would like it, that time has stood still by virtue of all of the similar memories.
I took pictures today. From under the sink Jake asked why I always take pictures. It's so that when I am too old to remember all of the wonderful times with the people I love, I will have pictures to remind me.
Thanks, Jake and Andrew, for giving me more pictures to remember and for a job well done!
Monday, February 14, 2011
Why Gary Is My Valentine
I was in second grade when I first heard about Valentine's day. I'm not sure why it didn't resonate with me in first grade, but Mrs. Steffey, my second grade teacher was very big on holidays and explained the origins, customs, and related hoopla to us. Mind you, we were seven or eight years old and not everything got through to us on a permanent basis, but enough did that I always thought it was a neat celebration, if only for the fact that we pretended to have mailboxes on our desks, and on Valentine's Day, those were filled with colorful Valentines Day, mail which was something I never got at home being the age I was.
The second reason I loved Valentine's Day was candy. I have loved those little hearts with the mushy words on them for more than fifty years. The fact that no one at our house ever talked that way even in jest made reading such things, especially on candy, all the more exciting. I would read things like "Sweetie Pie" and "Oh, You Kid" and "Darling" on a little heart and then pop it into my mouth trying to understand it all. Such drama! Such luxury!
As I grew older, I realized that some people really went all out for Valentine's Day. Men took their wives out to dinner. People sent each other bouquets of flowers and entire boxes of chocolates. Knowing this made me long for more, for bigger, for flashier, and for the kind of love that thought of others that way.
In fourth grade, I raised my hand high when Mrs. Picard our teacher asked who would like to help plan the Valentine's Day party for the class. Who wouldn't? This was the rooster of my holiday obsessions coming home to roost. Our little committee met and decided on the games to play, decorations, which mothers to ask for to bring treats (by then we knew the ones that went all out for school parties) and how we were going to pass out our valentines.
Another girl and I were in charge of making a giant decorated mailbox. We used a large cardboard box which we covered with elegant heart and cupid gift wrap leaving a slit for the valentines to be deposited anytime the week leading up to Valentine's Day. I also was charged with making a decoration for the table that held the Valentines Mailbox. I was thrilled that I was chosen even though I hadn't a clue what I would make.
Stopping off at the public library after school, I dug my way through books about holidays in the children's section of the library. Most of what I found there was pretty sappy but by the time I went home that night, I had an idea of what I wanted to do.
Of course, when I told my mother, she told me it was a stupid idea. My dad just looked at me when I explained it to him, but I didn't hold that against him because his mind was always a light year or two away, and he rarely heard anything I said. My little sisters were so little as to be insignificant. My older sister said I was childish. I was on my own.
My centerpiece was based upon an idea I had seen in a magazine once in the doctor's office. It was also based on the many cakes I had seen my mother decorate for birthdays and other special occaisions. My mother knew her way around a pastry bag. Give her some frosting and she was the Picasso of cake decorating. The Campbell Street "Cake Boss," if you will.
I wanted to make a cake that would be the flowing skirt of a beautiful woman, highly decorated with frosting flowers and ribbons of various shades of pink and red, and, of course, hearts. Her hat would be frosting. The bodice of her dress would be frosting. Everything she wore would be completely edible. I salivated at the thought.
Once my mother saw the drawn plans I had made, the recipes I had pulled from her Woman's Home Companion cookbook, and the naked doll I had purchased from Harvey's Dimestore for ninety-nine cents to stick into my cake, she could no longer say that my idea was stupid. I had laid it all out in careful detail. What I needed was help with the oven and some skilled hands at baking and decorating to assist me. All week I discussed with my mother how to make the flowers and lace on the doll and her flowing skirt.
When the day to make the cake arrived I was almost giddy with anticipation. Now I would see my drawing take shape. No no one could say it was stupid. It would be fantastic. I knew it.
We used a large stainless steel bowl to bake the cake in. Inverted, it was as elegant a shape for a flowing ball gown as one could ask for. When it cooled, we stuck the ten inch fashion doll into the center, and then we went to town frosting and decorating. It was a wonder to behold. It was a doll. It was a cake. It was a centerpiece. I was so proud of it, and when I carried it to school for the Valentine's day party, I prayed I wouldn't trip and fall face down into it the way the Three Stooges would have done.
The cake and I arrived in one piece. The party was a great success. For a fourth grader, I achieved a momentary amount of fame and adulation, and the cake was mine to take home that afternoon to then share with my family.
So what does all this have to do with Gary being my valentine? Gary is and will always be my valentine, my heart's true love, the joy of my life, and the only man I will ever adore because he makes every day become for me just like the time I made that cake.
He allows me to dream big. He never laughs at me or ridicules me. He offers assistance whenever I ask for it. He takes as much pleasure in my successes as I do. If we run into a snag, he researches it to find an answer and then rolls up his sleeves to help in any way he can.
Last year I published my first book. I dedicated it to Gary. He made it possible in a million ways. He is the biggest fan of my writing in general, my blog and my novels in the making. I read everything out loud to him. His reactions and criticisms inspire me to keep on writing. A lot of what I write is meant to be humorous. When Gary laughs til he cries and almost falls out of his chair, I know I have hit the mark.
I have many beautiful, well-planned gardens in our yard on Campbell Street. Gary never questions when I have an idea to dig up this or that, or try something exotic or new. He looks at my garden designs on paper and believes I know what I am doing. When I fill the car with annuals or buy a pound of seeds online, his support makes me all the more certain the new garden will be beautiful.
Two summers ago I gave our granddaughters Cassie and Sami one hundred dollars for paint and supplies at Ace Hardware and carte blanche to paint an original mural on the back of our two car garage. Gary watched with pride as an enchanted garden appeared to the delight and wonder of our family and friends. He never doubted the idea or their ability. Their mural is a thing of beauty and a memory for all of us as we look back on those days when they were perched on ladders and creating sky and trees and flowers and a few surprises for the visually alert.
We have eight grandchildren. Even though money is tight because we now have just one income, Gary cheerfully plans with me for birthday gifts, for our children's anniversary gifts, for Christmas and Easter and Valentine's day, for extended family birthday and anniversary gifts and for what-have-you gifts to let our family know we are thinking about them. Never once has Gary chided me for spending our money on others.
I send a check to the food pantry every month. We have provided as many as eight hundred forty meals in one month. Gary embraces my need to help others because he has a giving and generous heart.
Nearly three years ago when my elderly mother fell and it became apparant to all of the family that she would need full time personal care, Gary supported me as I reorganized her home to make her a two room suite with a new bathroom and to turn her back room into a piano studio so I could work from home and be with her all the time. It seemed an impossible task, but Gary believed in my ability to conceptualize and organize the transformation of these old rooms into something bright and functional.
And when it became obvious that I couldn't handle teaching piano at home and caring alone for the ever expanding needs of my mother, Gary quit his job and stayed home to at first help me care for her, and then later to take over as her personal caregiver, doing things for my mother that no one else in our family could or would do.
Today he works fourteen to sixteen hour days, seven days a week caring for my ninety-two year old mother who, several strokes and one broken leg later, cannot walk or stand or rise from a chair, who requires someone to dress her, to help her use the bathroom, and who literally needs help with everything except feeding herself and using her TV remote and telephone. He hasn't had a day off in ten months.
He never complains. He does yard work in the summer and removes snow in the winter. He is available to fill in as extra driver for our daughter's family when needed. If someone calls and asks for his help, if it is humanly possible, he will.
At the end of what always is an exhausting and sometimes thankless day of work, he enjoys the hour or two we have together reading or watching a video or talking with our children or grandchildren on the phone or via the internet. He always is cheerful. He always is kind. He always is thoughtful. He always chooses to think positively and to think the best of people
And every single night, when the lights finally go out and our weary heads hit the pillow, he reaches for my hand and says, "Good-nite, Beautiful" to me. That's why Gary is my Valentine.
The second reason I loved Valentine's Day was candy. I have loved those little hearts with the mushy words on them for more than fifty years. The fact that no one at our house ever talked that way even in jest made reading such things, especially on candy, all the more exciting. I would read things like "Sweetie Pie" and "Oh, You Kid" and "Darling" on a little heart and then pop it into my mouth trying to understand it all. Such drama! Such luxury!
As I grew older, I realized that some people really went all out for Valentine's Day. Men took their wives out to dinner. People sent each other bouquets of flowers and entire boxes of chocolates. Knowing this made me long for more, for bigger, for flashier, and for the kind of love that thought of others that way.
In fourth grade, I raised my hand high when Mrs. Picard our teacher asked who would like to help plan the Valentine's Day party for the class. Who wouldn't? This was the rooster of my holiday obsessions coming home to roost. Our little committee met and decided on the games to play, decorations, which mothers to ask for to bring treats (by then we knew the ones that went all out for school parties) and how we were going to pass out our valentines.
Another girl and I were in charge of making a giant decorated mailbox. We used a large cardboard box which we covered with elegant heart and cupid gift wrap leaving a slit for the valentines to be deposited anytime the week leading up to Valentine's Day. I also was charged with making a decoration for the table that held the Valentines Mailbox. I was thrilled that I was chosen even though I hadn't a clue what I would make.
Stopping off at the public library after school, I dug my way through books about holidays in the children's section of the library. Most of what I found there was pretty sappy but by the time I went home that night, I had an idea of what I wanted to do.
Of course, when I told my mother, she told me it was a stupid idea. My dad just looked at me when I explained it to him, but I didn't hold that against him because his mind was always a light year or two away, and he rarely heard anything I said. My little sisters were so little as to be insignificant. My older sister said I was childish. I was on my own.
My centerpiece was based upon an idea I had seen in a magazine once in the doctor's office. It was also based on the many cakes I had seen my mother decorate for birthdays and other special occaisions. My mother knew her way around a pastry bag. Give her some frosting and she was the Picasso of cake decorating. The Campbell Street "Cake Boss," if you will.
I wanted to make a cake that would be the flowing skirt of a beautiful woman, highly decorated with frosting flowers and ribbons of various shades of pink and red, and, of course, hearts. Her hat would be frosting. The bodice of her dress would be frosting. Everything she wore would be completely edible. I salivated at the thought.
Once my mother saw the drawn plans I had made, the recipes I had pulled from her Woman's Home Companion cookbook, and the naked doll I had purchased from Harvey's Dimestore for ninety-nine cents to stick into my cake, she could no longer say that my idea was stupid. I had laid it all out in careful detail. What I needed was help with the oven and some skilled hands at baking and decorating to assist me. All week I discussed with my mother how to make the flowers and lace on the doll and her flowing skirt.
When the day to make the cake arrived I was almost giddy with anticipation. Now I would see my drawing take shape. No no one could say it was stupid. It would be fantastic. I knew it.
We used a large stainless steel bowl to bake the cake in. Inverted, it was as elegant a shape for a flowing ball gown as one could ask for. When it cooled, we stuck the ten inch fashion doll into the center, and then we went to town frosting and decorating. It was a wonder to behold. It was a doll. It was a cake. It was a centerpiece. I was so proud of it, and when I carried it to school for the Valentine's day party, I prayed I wouldn't trip and fall face down into it the way the Three Stooges would have done.
The cake and I arrived in one piece. The party was a great success. For a fourth grader, I achieved a momentary amount of fame and adulation, and the cake was mine to take home that afternoon to then share with my family.
So what does all this have to do with Gary being my valentine? Gary is and will always be my valentine, my heart's true love, the joy of my life, and the only man I will ever adore because he makes every day become for me just like the time I made that cake.
He allows me to dream big. He never laughs at me or ridicules me. He offers assistance whenever I ask for it. He takes as much pleasure in my successes as I do. If we run into a snag, he researches it to find an answer and then rolls up his sleeves to help in any way he can.
Last year I published my first book. I dedicated it to Gary. He made it possible in a million ways. He is the biggest fan of my writing in general, my blog and my novels in the making. I read everything out loud to him. His reactions and criticisms inspire me to keep on writing. A lot of what I write is meant to be humorous. When Gary laughs til he cries and almost falls out of his chair, I know I have hit the mark.
I have many beautiful, well-planned gardens in our yard on Campbell Street. Gary never questions when I have an idea to dig up this or that, or try something exotic or new. He looks at my garden designs on paper and believes I know what I am doing. When I fill the car with annuals or buy a pound of seeds online, his support makes me all the more certain the new garden will be beautiful.
Two summers ago I gave our granddaughters Cassie and Sami one hundred dollars for paint and supplies at Ace Hardware and carte blanche to paint an original mural on the back of our two car garage. Gary watched with pride as an enchanted garden appeared to the delight and wonder of our family and friends. He never doubted the idea or their ability. Their mural is a thing of beauty and a memory for all of us as we look back on those days when they were perched on ladders and creating sky and trees and flowers and a few surprises for the visually alert.
We have eight grandchildren. Even though money is tight because we now have just one income, Gary cheerfully plans with me for birthday gifts, for our children's anniversary gifts, for Christmas and Easter and Valentine's day, for extended family birthday and anniversary gifts and for what-have-you gifts to let our family know we are thinking about them. Never once has Gary chided me for spending our money on others.
I send a check to the food pantry every month. We have provided as many as eight hundred forty meals in one month. Gary embraces my need to help others because he has a giving and generous heart.
Nearly three years ago when my elderly mother fell and it became apparant to all of the family that she would need full time personal care, Gary supported me as I reorganized her home to make her a two room suite with a new bathroom and to turn her back room into a piano studio so I could work from home and be with her all the time. It seemed an impossible task, but Gary believed in my ability to conceptualize and organize the transformation of these old rooms into something bright and functional.
And when it became obvious that I couldn't handle teaching piano at home and caring alone for the ever expanding needs of my mother, Gary quit his job and stayed home to at first help me care for her, and then later to take over as her personal caregiver, doing things for my mother that no one else in our family could or would do.
Today he works fourteen to sixteen hour days, seven days a week caring for my ninety-two year old mother who, several strokes and one broken leg later, cannot walk or stand or rise from a chair, who requires someone to dress her, to help her use the bathroom, and who literally needs help with everything except feeding herself and using her TV remote and telephone. He hasn't had a day off in ten months.
He never complains. He does yard work in the summer and removes snow in the winter. He is available to fill in as extra driver for our daughter's family when needed. If someone calls and asks for his help, if it is humanly possible, he will.
At the end of what always is an exhausting and sometimes thankless day of work, he enjoys the hour or two we have together reading or watching a video or talking with our children or grandchildren on the phone or via the internet. He always is cheerful. He always is kind. He always is thoughtful. He always chooses to think positively and to think the best of people
And every single night, when the lights finally go out and our weary heads hit the pillow, he reaches for my hand and says, "Good-nite, Beautiful" to me. That's why Gary is my Valentine.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Make the Possum Go Away
My name is Gloria, and I'm a cat. I live in a big white house on Campbell Street. I came here a year ago as a very lost kitten. I don't know what happened to my first family. I do remember being very hungry and dirty.
The Campbell Street family fed me, and even though I wouldn't let them touch me or even get near me, they smiled a lot and left me food and water every day out on the big porch. One day, they left a wooden box with a blanket inside for me to sleep in. I felt safe in the wooden box, and the lazy days of summer passed slowly in a haze of contentment.
I loved all the gardens. The flower gardens had several rabbit holes, and if I sat very still and watched and waited, sometimes a rabbit would come out, and then we would have a merry chase across the neighborhood. The vegetable garden with its raspberry patch was my own private jungle.
In the afternoons the tall okra and tomato plants cast cool shadows on the hot dusty earth below, a perfect hideaway to watch the many different kinds of butterflies that flitted here and there among the red and yellow and orange and pink zinnias that grew along the edge of the squash patch.
I'm a cat. I don't know a lot about the months of the year or the seasons, but at some point even I could tell things were changing in my world. The leaves started falling out of the big walnut tree in the side yard. Walnuts fell, too, and it was great fun to watch the fat grey squirrels retrieve and bury the walnuts, which I thought was a lot of senseless work since my family feeds the squirrels every day.
My family feeds a lot of animals. They have bird feeders for the birds, pans of seeds and nuts for the squirrels and chipmunks. They even leave pans of cereal and bread and peanut butter for the raccoons who creep up onto the porch after dark. That's how I first met the possum.
I was sitting in my crate enjoying the sweet summer night air when I noticed a creature slowly walking across the porch in front of me. It was large and had a long, rat-like tail and beady red eyes on either side of a long nose. He used his funny fingers to pick up food and put it into his mouth. Just like a human, I thought at the time. After a drink of water, he crawled down the porch steps into the darkness. It wasn't long before the possum returned, and then he was on the porch every night. He didn't seem to mind me watching him, and I enjoyed his company.
One day, rather suddenly from my point of view, it began to snow. Snow is cold, I learned quickly. A little snow falling out of the sky is kind of pretty, but a lot of snow makes you feel wet and miserable even if you have a fur coat like I do. My family had a heated cat house made for me, so no matter how cold it is outside, I can stay warm. That's a good thing for an outdoors cat to count on.
The funny thing is, that by this time, I had become a part outdoor, part indoor cat, having discovered the wonders of rugs and chairs and toilet and bathtub, not to mention the wondrous maze of closet floors and nether regions under the bed and dressers upstairs. Just climbing the steep stairs to the rooms above where my family lives is an exciting experience for a cat. Sort of like a vertical jungle.
Winter became an indoors summer for me. I went outside when I wanted to go outside. I stayed inside when I wanted to stay inside. I truly was the queen of my castle. I slept on the bed with the electric blanket that someone always left turned on for me. Such luxury I could not have imagined. The heated cat house paled by comparison.
Still there remain days when I feel the need for brisk cold air, to be one with the elements and to wander through my now snowy garden places, knowing I can always return to my little heated cat house until the kitchen door opens wide for me again. That is, until recently.
On a particularly cold morning, I did my usual pacing and whining at the kitchen door, and they let me out. It was snowing very hard and after a brief detour to the garage and the wilder regions beyond, I cut my adventure short and made a hasty retreat to the porch and my little house to warm up and watch the snowflakes fall in warm comfort. Imagine my surprise, then, as I entered my house to see staring back at me those same red, beady eyes of none other than the possum.
As I said before, the possum is a friendly, non-confrontational creature, so he didn't snarl or state in any way that my house was now his territory. But he did seem to be saying that it was now his house, too. This he said by not moving an inch or blinking an eye. I discovered then, that I am selfish and I do not like to share.
It's been weeks now, and the possum is still in my house. He is still eating every day out of my outside food bowl. He still rolls around and makes himself comfortable on my pink butterfly print fleecy blanket. You know the old adage: "While the cat's away, the possum moves in," and it bothers me.
And so I sit on my electric blanket on the big bed upstairs. I eat as much as I want and even beg for special treats which I always get. I amuse myself from my box of cat toys. I drink out of the faucets and sleep in the bathroom sink.
But it's just not enough. I am counting the days til the snow melts, the grass grows, another glorious garden appears out of no where for me to wander through on lazy afternoons, and life returns to another magical summertime so I can once again be queen of the jungle on Campbell Street, and, just maybe, convince that possum to go away.
The Campbell Street family fed me, and even though I wouldn't let them touch me or even get near me, they smiled a lot and left me food and water every day out on the big porch. One day, they left a wooden box with a blanket inside for me to sleep in. I felt safe in the wooden box, and the lazy days of summer passed slowly in a haze of contentment.
I loved all the gardens. The flower gardens had several rabbit holes, and if I sat very still and watched and waited, sometimes a rabbit would come out, and then we would have a merry chase across the neighborhood. The vegetable garden with its raspberry patch was my own private jungle.
In the afternoons the tall okra and tomato plants cast cool shadows on the hot dusty earth below, a perfect hideaway to watch the many different kinds of butterflies that flitted here and there among the red and yellow and orange and pink zinnias that grew along the edge of the squash patch.
I'm a cat. I don't know a lot about the months of the year or the seasons, but at some point even I could tell things were changing in my world. The leaves started falling out of the big walnut tree in the side yard. Walnuts fell, too, and it was great fun to watch the fat grey squirrels retrieve and bury the walnuts, which I thought was a lot of senseless work since my family feeds the squirrels every day.
My family feeds a lot of animals. They have bird feeders for the birds, pans of seeds and nuts for the squirrels and chipmunks. They even leave pans of cereal and bread and peanut butter for the raccoons who creep up onto the porch after dark. That's how I first met the possum.
I was sitting in my crate enjoying the sweet summer night air when I noticed a creature slowly walking across the porch in front of me. It was large and had a long, rat-like tail and beady red eyes on either side of a long nose. He used his funny fingers to pick up food and put it into his mouth. Just like a human, I thought at the time. After a drink of water, he crawled down the porch steps into the darkness. It wasn't long before the possum returned, and then he was on the porch every night. He didn't seem to mind me watching him, and I enjoyed his company.
One day, rather suddenly from my point of view, it began to snow. Snow is cold, I learned quickly. A little snow falling out of the sky is kind of pretty, but a lot of snow makes you feel wet and miserable even if you have a fur coat like I do. My family had a heated cat house made for me, so no matter how cold it is outside, I can stay warm. That's a good thing for an outdoors cat to count on.
The funny thing is, that by this time, I had become a part outdoor, part indoor cat, having discovered the wonders of rugs and chairs and toilet and bathtub, not to mention the wondrous maze of closet floors and nether regions under the bed and dressers upstairs. Just climbing the steep stairs to the rooms above where my family lives is an exciting experience for a cat. Sort of like a vertical jungle.
Winter became an indoors summer for me. I went outside when I wanted to go outside. I stayed inside when I wanted to stay inside. I truly was the queen of my castle. I slept on the bed with the electric blanket that someone always left turned on for me. Such luxury I could not have imagined. The heated cat house paled by comparison.
Still there remain days when I feel the need for brisk cold air, to be one with the elements and to wander through my now snowy garden places, knowing I can always return to my little heated cat house until the kitchen door opens wide for me again. That is, until recently.
On a particularly cold morning, I did my usual pacing and whining at the kitchen door, and they let me out. It was snowing very hard and after a brief detour to the garage and the wilder regions beyond, I cut my adventure short and made a hasty retreat to the porch and my little house to warm up and watch the snowflakes fall in warm comfort. Imagine my surprise, then, as I entered my house to see staring back at me those same red, beady eyes of none other than the possum.
As I said before, the possum is a friendly, non-confrontational creature, so he didn't snarl or state in any way that my house was now his territory. But he did seem to be saying that it was now his house, too. This he said by not moving an inch or blinking an eye. I discovered then, that I am selfish and I do not like to share.
It's been weeks now, and the possum is still in my house. He is still eating every day out of my outside food bowl. He still rolls around and makes himself comfortable on my pink butterfly print fleecy blanket. You know the old adage: "While the cat's away, the possum moves in," and it bothers me.
And so I sit on my electric blanket on the big bed upstairs. I eat as much as I want and even beg for special treats which I always get. I amuse myself from my box of cat toys. I drink out of the faucets and sleep in the bathroom sink.
But it's just not enough. I am counting the days til the snow melts, the grass grows, another glorious garden appears out of no where for me to wander through on lazy afternoons, and life returns to another magical summertime so I can once again be queen of the jungle on Campbell Street, and, just maybe, convince that possum to go away.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Saturday Mornings Fifty Years Ago
Already the title of this dates me. Yes, I remember the Cold War, Dallas, TX on November 22, 1963, hoola hoops and pop beads, Howdy Doody, James Dean, Mary Tyler Moore when she was young, and fifteen cent hamburgers. It's not a crime to be old. Or to remember.
I grew up in a house filled with chaos, disorganization, and loneliness, which makes no sense since there were at least six people milling around the place at all times. But this was the sixties. There were no TV psychology shows, Ann Landers was just getting started (but we didn't get the Chicago paper,) and, culturally, parents had a lot of latitude in their own personal styles of punishing their children because what a man or woman did in their own home in those days was pretty much sacred short of killing someone.
That being said, I escaped whenever I could, which was frequently as I was a clever kid. I was the first to offer to walk to the corner grocery or take a pair of shoes to be reheeled at the cobbler or pick up a prescription at the doctor's office. They were all only a few blocks away from our house. My older sister who was fairly unimaginative and preferred to giggle with her friends about which basketball player at their school was cuter was no competition for the errands gig. It was all mine. Neither my sister nor my parents knew I had a stash of glass soda bottles under a loose sidewalk square on Haas Street that afforded me a candy bar whenever I felt the need for one. (Anyone remember returnable soda bottles for two cents each?)
I knew every street for several miles in any direction from our house, so on the way back from the grocery store I might take a detour and see how the Smith's house painting was going, or play with the Hershmans' dog, or stop to stare at the front bay window of the big O'Neil house and the magnificent baby grand piano that so graciously stood there. I might stop at the little old lady's house. I never knew her name. She lived in a falling down little place near the Catholic school and she grew flowers. I never saw the inside of her house, but the outside was cascading mounds of lilies, roses, ivies, and more, all wonderful to a kid whose own yard had only vegetables, except for a few wild flowers my grandmother planted back in the days of Al Capone.
There were regular little escapes during the week, but for some reason, Saturdays no one seemed to care if I disappeared as long as I was back by supper time. From the moment I woke up I was filled with an excitement that even now is hard to describe. I was going downtown. Just the word had a magical ring to it.
For clarification, I must explain that at the time, our fair town boasted a population of about twelve thousand people (according to the Almanac for 1956) and it looked like a town of twelve thousand people. There were the usual little cafes, drugstores, dress shops and haberdasheries. Because we were the county seat, we had a wonderful limestone court house in the center of town. In itself, the court house was an adventure. Even on Saturday, I could walk in as though I were a lawyer or a taxpayer, and wander about the cool marble halls or climb the vast spiral staircases to the upper floors. In the basement were the washrooms, but they were nothing like I'd ever seen before. In the ladies room there were three old wooden dressers each with a huge mirror above, and across from the dressers were long wooden church pews and a few wooden rocking chairs. Fifteen years later when my children were toddlers, I would stop by this very same ladies room and let them run around, climb on the pews, and shout with glee to hear their echos in the vast space.
So on an average Saturday morning, I would strike out for town about eight-thirty, stopping by my arsennal of soda bottles under the loose piece of sidewalk on Haas Street to take enough bottles to the corner store (also on Haas Street) to allow me a bit of snacking in town.
Then on to the library, my mecca, the home of the holy grail for me: unlimited books and magazines. By twelve I had outgrown the children's department. I had read every book of interest to me, and at the downstairs librarian's suggestion, I made my way upstairs to the adult section. Mrs. McCarron, one of the upstairs librarians, was also my Sunday School teacher and she kindly explained the Dewey Decimal System to me and the index card drawers. The summer I was twelve I discovered Charles Dickens. Later that winter it was Lloyd C. Douglas and Thomas B. Costain. On to Emily Dickenson and T. S. Elliot, the war poets, and Grace Livingston Hill.
I often stayed at the library til hunger drove me to check out my armful of books and head to the Rexall across the street where I could sit in a booth with a hotdog and a green river feeling like a queen as I thumbed through my library books. Best of all, no one yelled at me or told me to stop reading and do something useful.
The Rexall had many delights besides food. It boasted the best novelty gag counter in town. Red pepper chewing gum, handshake buzzers, itching powder, rubber soap bars, plastic ants, x-ray glasses and more tantalized the imagination of a kid who loved to pull pranks. My dad never remembered from April 1 to April 1 that the soap on the bathroom sink was rubber and that was why there was no lather. My sisters all flinched when I offered them a piece of gum remembering stinging tongues from red pepper or aching fingers from the kind that had a moustrap spring. Plastic ants always got a rise out of my mother who was an antophobe.
The makeup counter was a constant source of wonder to me. Lipsticks, rouge, powder, eyebrow brushes, eyeliner, and other delights intended to transform ugly ducklings to swans made me wonder what I would look like if I had some myself. Alas, at that age I believed I would never know since my parents didn't believe in face painting. They never noticed that sometimes I darkened my eyebrows with crayon and used my Prang water colors to make my lips look red.
One thing the Rexall had that I could enjoy for free was the people who stood in line for prescriptions. I would sit in one of the row of brown leather and chrome seats looking at the faces of those waiting for their own elixir, and I would try to guess what disease each had. Occaisionally I would see a neighbor or a teacher or someone I recognized from passing them on the street. Once I saw my dad, and I skittered off before he saw me.
But no trip down town would be complete without stopping at Harvey's Dime Store, the beginniing and ending of shopping for me. Three floors of everything I needed or wanted to buy or even look at. The main floor had a candy shop, houseplants, sewing notions and bolts of fabric, jewelry and greeting cards, hair care products and shoe polish, silk scarves and gloves, yarn and thread, household notions, pins and needles, pencils and writing paper, and paper back books on revolving racks.
You could take an elevator to the basement or you could walk down the wide stairs to toys and games, model planes and cars, china dishes and glass serving pieces, bathroom supplies, rugs and towels, kitchen utinsels and pans, plumbing supplies, tools, electrical supplies, oilcloth by the yard on huge rolls, contact paper and paint, curtains and draperies, public washrooms and a mechanical horse that jerked you around for a minute or so for ten cents.
The third floor had ladies', mens' and children's clothing, crafts, dressing rooms, and the lunch room. At twelve, I didn't have enough money or courage to eat alone at Harvey's lunchroom, but by the time I was in jr. high I had both and discovered the joy of vegetable soup and coconut cream pie made by little Mennonite ladies with no fear of whole cream or lard.
Late afternoon saw me making my way home, full of greasy hot dog and happily burping green river burps, knowing that my town and I had had another great Saturday together, and knowing that no matter how toxic my life might be during the coming week, Saturday was always on the calendar and would be every week for the rest of my life.
I grew up in a house filled with chaos, disorganization, and loneliness, which makes no sense since there were at least six people milling around the place at all times. But this was the sixties. There were no TV psychology shows, Ann Landers was just getting started (but we didn't get the Chicago paper,) and, culturally, parents had a lot of latitude in their own personal styles of punishing their children because what a man or woman did in their own home in those days was pretty much sacred short of killing someone.
That being said, I escaped whenever I could, which was frequently as I was a clever kid. I was the first to offer to walk to the corner grocery or take a pair of shoes to be reheeled at the cobbler or pick up a prescription at the doctor's office. They were all only a few blocks away from our house. My older sister who was fairly unimaginative and preferred to giggle with her friends about which basketball player at their school was cuter was no competition for the errands gig. It was all mine. Neither my sister nor my parents knew I had a stash of glass soda bottles under a loose sidewalk square on Haas Street that afforded me a candy bar whenever I felt the need for one. (Anyone remember returnable soda bottles for two cents each?)
I knew every street for several miles in any direction from our house, so on the way back from the grocery store I might take a detour and see how the Smith's house painting was going, or play with the Hershmans' dog, or stop to stare at the front bay window of the big O'Neil house and the magnificent baby grand piano that so graciously stood there. I might stop at the little old lady's house. I never knew her name. She lived in a falling down little place near the Catholic school and she grew flowers. I never saw the inside of her house, but the outside was cascading mounds of lilies, roses, ivies, and more, all wonderful to a kid whose own yard had only vegetables, except for a few wild flowers my grandmother planted back in the days of Al Capone.
There were regular little escapes during the week, but for some reason, Saturdays no one seemed to care if I disappeared as long as I was back by supper time. From the moment I woke up I was filled with an excitement that even now is hard to describe. I was going downtown. Just the word had a magical ring to it.
For clarification, I must explain that at the time, our fair town boasted a population of about twelve thousand people (according to the Almanac for 1956) and it looked like a town of twelve thousand people. There were the usual little cafes, drugstores, dress shops and haberdasheries. Because we were the county seat, we had a wonderful limestone court house in the center of town. In itself, the court house was an adventure. Even on Saturday, I could walk in as though I were a lawyer or a taxpayer, and wander about the cool marble halls or climb the vast spiral staircases to the upper floors. In the basement were the washrooms, but they were nothing like I'd ever seen before. In the ladies room there were three old wooden dressers each with a huge mirror above, and across from the dressers were long wooden church pews and a few wooden rocking chairs. Fifteen years later when my children were toddlers, I would stop by this very same ladies room and let them run around, climb on the pews, and shout with glee to hear their echos in the vast space.
So on an average Saturday morning, I would strike out for town about eight-thirty, stopping by my arsennal of soda bottles under the loose piece of sidewalk on Haas Street to take enough bottles to the corner store (also on Haas Street) to allow me a bit of snacking in town.
Then on to the library, my mecca, the home of the holy grail for me: unlimited books and magazines. By twelve I had outgrown the children's department. I had read every book of interest to me, and at the downstairs librarian's suggestion, I made my way upstairs to the adult section. Mrs. McCarron, one of the upstairs librarians, was also my Sunday School teacher and she kindly explained the Dewey Decimal System to me and the index card drawers. The summer I was twelve I discovered Charles Dickens. Later that winter it was Lloyd C. Douglas and Thomas B. Costain. On to Emily Dickenson and T. S. Elliot, the war poets, and Grace Livingston Hill.
I often stayed at the library til hunger drove me to check out my armful of books and head to the Rexall across the street where I could sit in a booth with a hotdog and a green river feeling like a queen as I thumbed through my library books. Best of all, no one yelled at me or told me to stop reading and do something useful.
The Rexall had many delights besides food. It boasted the best novelty gag counter in town. Red pepper chewing gum, handshake buzzers, itching powder, rubber soap bars, plastic ants, x-ray glasses and more tantalized the imagination of a kid who loved to pull pranks. My dad never remembered from April 1 to April 1 that the soap on the bathroom sink was rubber and that was why there was no lather. My sisters all flinched when I offered them a piece of gum remembering stinging tongues from red pepper or aching fingers from the kind that had a moustrap spring. Plastic ants always got a rise out of my mother who was an antophobe.
The makeup counter was a constant source of wonder to me. Lipsticks, rouge, powder, eyebrow brushes, eyeliner, and other delights intended to transform ugly ducklings to swans made me wonder what I would look like if I had some myself. Alas, at that age I believed I would never know since my parents didn't believe in face painting. They never noticed that sometimes I darkened my eyebrows with crayon and used my Prang water colors to make my lips look red.
One thing the Rexall had that I could enjoy for free was the people who stood in line for prescriptions. I would sit in one of the row of brown leather and chrome seats looking at the faces of those waiting for their own elixir, and I would try to guess what disease each had. Occaisionally I would see a neighbor or a teacher or someone I recognized from passing them on the street. Once I saw my dad, and I skittered off before he saw me.
But no trip down town would be complete without stopping at Harvey's Dime Store, the beginniing and ending of shopping for me. Three floors of everything I needed or wanted to buy or even look at. The main floor had a candy shop, houseplants, sewing notions and bolts of fabric, jewelry and greeting cards, hair care products and shoe polish, silk scarves and gloves, yarn and thread, household notions, pins and needles, pencils and writing paper, and paper back books on revolving racks.
You could take an elevator to the basement or you could walk down the wide stairs to toys and games, model planes and cars, china dishes and glass serving pieces, bathroom supplies, rugs and towels, kitchen utinsels and pans, plumbing supplies, tools, electrical supplies, oilcloth by the yard on huge rolls, contact paper and paint, curtains and draperies, public washrooms and a mechanical horse that jerked you around for a minute or so for ten cents.
The third floor had ladies', mens' and children's clothing, crafts, dressing rooms, and the lunch room. At twelve, I didn't have enough money or courage to eat alone at Harvey's lunchroom, but by the time I was in jr. high I had both and discovered the joy of vegetable soup and coconut cream pie made by little Mennonite ladies with no fear of whole cream or lard.
Late afternoon saw me making my way home, full of greasy hot dog and happily burping green river burps, knowing that my town and I had had another great Saturday together, and knowing that no matter how toxic my life might be during the coming week, Saturday was always on the calendar and would be every week for the rest of my life.
Sunday, January 9, 2011
MaryEsther and Louise in The Hospital
MaryEsther and Louise were each sitting up in a hospital bed in the same room in the county hospital.
"I'm bored. What shall we do?" asked MaryEsther.
"I don’t know. What do you think we should do?" replied Louise.
"There’s not much we can do. That nurse with the mustache said we couldn’t get out of bed. I think she made up that rule. I don’t like her eyes. I had a cat with eyes like that once."
"Well, we’ll just have to think of something to do in bed. Now, let’s see...what do people do in bed?"
"They sleep."
"I know, but there must be more we can do."
"I have a bedpan."
"I don’t need a bedpan right now, thank you."
"No, I mean maybe we could use our bedpans like catcher’s mitts and play catch. Want to try?"
"OK," said Louise.
MaryEsther thought for a second. "We need a ball. Do you have a ball?"
Louise’s face brightened. "I have a baked potato from last night’s dinner tray. I put it in my bedside table. That will work, won’t it?"
"It will do. OK, what are the rules for the game?"
"Do we have to have rules? Can’t we just throw the potato into the bedpan?"
"I guess so, but can we think of another name for the game? ‘Throw the Potato Into The Bedpan’ sounds so clinical...like a medical procedure or something. I don’t like the sound of it. It’s not lady-like."
"OK. We’ll call it, ‘Spud in the Tub.’ How’s that?"
"Much better, thank you."
Louise took the foil-wrapped potato in her right hand and screwed up her face the way she remembered Whitey Ford doing and gave the potato a fling toward MaryEsther’s waiting bedpan.
With the deft response of a Yogi Berra, MaryEsther caught the potato in midair. The game was on.
Back and forth, back and forth the potato was thrown, occasionally losing bits of foil and drops of butter as it flew through the air.
At one point, just as Louise gave the potato a really good fling, the nurse with the mustache and the cat’s eyes walked into the room so quickly and unexpectedly that the flying potato hit her square in the side of the head.
"It’s... bath... time,ladies," she announced in a somewhat strained voice.
"Can we have bubbles?" asked Louise.
"Actually, I always use a little JOY dish soap and some epsom salts in my bath. Do you have any JOY and epsom salts?" asked MaryEsther.
The nurse left the room.
"She’s really very helpful, isn’t she?" asked Louise.
"Yes. I really shouldn’t have mentioned her mustache earlier. Maybe I can tell her about Mama’s mustache remover. I have the recipe in her old Grange Cook Book."
"Yes, she is an angel of mercy and we have to remember that. But she does have very cold hands, doesn’t she?"
"Maybe she needs some of your spring tonic. It always puts fire in my veins."
"Yes, and I’ll make her some honey and sesame seed bars," said Louise.
MaryEsther and Louise smiled, closed their eyes, and took a nap, knowing they were about to brighten someone’s day.
"I'm bored. What shall we do?" asked MaryEsther.
"I don’t know. What do you think we should do?" replied Louise.
"There’s not much we can do. That nurse with the mustache said we couldn’t get out of bed. I think she made up that rule. I don’t like her eyes. I had a cat with eyes like that once."
"Well, we’ll just have to think of something to do in bed. Now, let’s see...what do people do in bed?"
"They sleep."
"I know, but there must be more we can do."
"I have a bedpan."
"I don’t need a bedpan right now, thank you."
"No, I mean maybe we could use our bedpans like catcher’s mitts and play catch. Want to try?"
"OK," said Louise.
MaryEsther thought for a second. "We need a ball. Do you have a ball?"
Louise’s face brightened. "I have a baked potato from last night’s dinner tray. I put it in my bedside table. That will work, won’t it?"
"It will do. OK, what are the rules for the game?"
"Do we have to have rules? Can’t we just throw the potato into the bedpan?"
"I guess so, but can we think of another name for the game? ‘Throw the Potato Into The Bedpan’ sounds so clinical...like a medical procedure or something. I don’t like the sound of it. It’s not lady-like."
"OK. We’ll call it, ‘Spud in the Tub.’ How’s that?"
"Much better, thank you."
Louise took the foil-wrapped potato in her right hand and screwed up her face the way she remembered Whitey Ford doing and gave the potato a fling toward MaryEsther’s waiting bedpan.
With the deft response of a Yogi Berra, MaryEsther caught the potato in midair. The game was on.
Back and forth, back and forth the potato was thrown, occasionally losing bits of foil and drops of butter as it flew through the air.
At one point, just as Louise gave the potato a really good fling, the nurse with the mustache and the cat’s eyes walked into the room so quickly and unexpectedly that the flying potato hit her square in the side of the head.
"It’s... bath... time,ladies," she announced in a somewhat strained voice.
"Can we have bubbles?" asked Louise.
"Actually, I always use a little JOY dish soap and some epsom salts in my bath. Do you have any JOY and epsom salts?" asked MaryEsther.
The nurse left the room.
"She’s really very helpful, isn’t she?" asked Louise.
"Yes. I really shouldn’t have mentioned her mustache earlier. Maybe I can tell her about Mama’s mustache remover. I have the recipe in her old Grange Cook Book."
"Yes, she is an angel of mercy and we have to remember that. But she does have very cold hands, doesn’t she?"
"Maybe she needs some of your spring tonic. It always puts fire in my veins."
"Yes, and I’ll make her some honey and sesame seed bars," said Louise.
MaryEsther and Louise smiled, closed their eyes, and took a nap, knowing they were about to brighten someone’s day.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
A New Year
I remember the first time I watched the big red ball go down the side of the Times Tower in New York City. I was probably in my early teens. Since then, I've tried to mark the end of each year doing the same thing. I've watched Dick Clark change from an incredibly handsome young man to a close to embalmed creature that no one under thirty remotely recognizes outside of his yearly TV appearace each December 31. I've watched the dance of the day shift from classic rock 'n' roll to The Swim and The Mashed Potato (which always made me feel more like eating than dancing) to the wild flailing around of the eighties to the amorphous moving of today. To quote Don Ameche, "Things change."
Boy, do things change. I haven't gone out on New Year's Eve in twenty-five years. The last exciting New Year's Eve I had was in 1994 when my eight year old granddaughter Cassie and I visited my son Matt's family in San Antonio for Christmas. Matt and his wife went out to a New Year's Eve party leaving Cassie and I to watch their eighteen month old twins. The babies went to sleep around nine o'clock. Cassie and I watched TV, and like the rational people we were, we planned to watch the big red ball slide down Times Tower and then go to sleep.
Texas is an interesting country. I say country because it feels like one. I suppose all states are like countries with their own special traditions, foods, cultural styles and celebrations. But Texas was the first place I ever spent New Year's Eve where the tradition was to sit in a lawn chair on the roof of your house and shoot off shotguns and pistols to bring in the new year.
At the first shotgun blast from the guy across the street, I pulled Cassie off the couch, and we ran to the babies' room. We each grabbed a sleeping infant and carried them back to the master bedroom where we all lay on the floor as flat as we could. Cassie asked if we were going to die. I assured her that dying was not part of my plan for the evening. I sounded in control, but I think she knew I was as frightened as she was. The two of us prayed out loud as the babies slept and gunfire resounded in repeated volleys outside.
Not since the Guns Of Navarone have I thought so much about firearms of any kind. The wild shooting seemed to go on for hours. In reality, it was probably forty-five minutes or so, which when you think of it, is a heck of a long time for crazy people to sit on their roofs at midnight for any reason, but especially if they're blasting away their shotguns like Clint Eastwood in a spaghetti western.
We survived. The shooting finally stopped. Matt and his wife came home. Cassie and I and the babies slept til morning. Life went on.
This New Year's Eve I plan to sit in my quiet little TV room and with my husband watch the big red ball go down the side of Times Tower. I may fall asleep a few times before that actually happens because I am a lot older than I used to be. Gary and I will reminisce about past New Year's Eves, about days gone by and people, sadly, no longer with us. We'll eat a few gluten-free cookies, drink some caffeine-free tea, and talk about the good old days.
But this year, there will be an air of expectancy in our voices. Because life doesn't stop when we get old. It continues in the lives of our children and grandchildren. This year we'll talk about our twin grandchildren Nico and Bella in Texas who will graduate from high school in June. We'll talk about their younger brother Danny who at fourteen just carved his first deer last weekend and hopes to shoot his first deer before the season ends. We'll talk about our thirteen year old grandson Steven and our eleven year old granddaughter Nina in New Hampshire who are getting ready for another year of soccer and baseball and running in marathons. We'll talk about our fifteen year old granddaughter Sami in Indiana who will be taking driver's ed soon and how it seems like yesterday that we held her in our arms as a new baby. We'll talk about how our twenty year old grandson Jake in Indiana is going to buy a boat, works hard, is getting good grades in college, and is the one we call when things break around here. And we'll talk about our lovely Cassie, the little girl who hid on the floor with me and her baby cousins that New Year's Eve all those years ago, who is twenty-four now and who on Christmas Eve this year became engaged to be married to her Matt, making us all very happy even if we do feel pretty old.
Things change. Some things get worse, but mostly things get better. And they get better because we relive yesterday in the lives of our children today, and in the lives of our grandchildren tomorrow. Browning said, "Grow old with me; the best is yet to be." He didn't sit on a chair on the roof to make his thoughts be known. He wrote them down in simple and true words that speak to us today, a hundred and fifty years later. That's the thought I leave with you for this new year: "Things change," but "the best is yet to be!"
Boy, do things change. I haven't gone out on New Year's Eve in twenty-five years. The last exciting New Year's Eve I had was in 1994 when my eight year old granddaughter Cassie and I visited my son Matt's family in San Antonio for Christmas. Matt and his wife went out to a New Year's Eve party leaving Cassie and I to watch their eighteen month old twins. The babies went to sleep around nine o'clock. Cassie and I watched TV, and like the rational people we were, we planned to watch the big red ball slide down Times Tower and then go to sleep.
Texas is an interesting country. I say country because it feels like one. I suppose all states are like countries with their own special traditions, foods, cultural styles and celebrations. But Texas was the first place I ever spent New Year's Eve where the tradition was to sit in a lawn chair on the roof of your house and shoot off shotguns and pistols to bring in the new year.
At the first shotgun blast from the guy across the street, I pulled Cassie off the couch, and we ran to the babies' room. We each grabbed a sleeping infant and carried them back to the master bedroom where we all lay on the floor as flat as we could. Cassie asked if we were going to die. I assured her that dying was not part of my plan for the evening. I sounded in control, but I think she knew I was as frightened as she was. The two of us prayed out loud as the babies slept and gunfire resounded in repeated volleys outside.
Not since the Guns Of Navarone have I thought so much about firearms of any kind. The wild shooting seemed to go on for hours. In reality, it was probably forty-five minutes or so, which when you think of it, is a heck of a long time for crazy people to sit on their roofs at midnight for any reason, but especially if they're blasting away their shotguns like Clint Eastwood in a spaghetti western.
We survived. The shooting finally stopped. Matt and his wife came home. Cassie and I and the babies slept til morning. Life went on.
This New Year's Eve I plan to sit in my quiet little TV room and with my husband watch the big red ball go down the side of Times Tower. I may fall asleep a few times before that actually happens because I am a lot older than I used to be. Gary and I will reminisce about past New Year's Eves, about days gone by and people, sadly, no longer with us. We'll eat a few gluten-free cookies, drink some caffeine-free tea, and talk about the good old days.
But this year, there will be an air of expectancy in our voices. Because life doesn't stop when we get old. It continues in the lives of our children and grandchildren. This year we'll talk about our twin grandchildren Nico and Bella in Texas who will graduate from high school in June. We'll talk about their younger brother Danny who at fourteen just carved his first deer last weekend and hopes to shoot his first deer before the season ends. We'll talk about our thirteen year old grandson Steven and our eleven year old granddaughter Nina in New Hampshire who are getting ready for another year of soccer and baseball and running in marathons. We'll talk about our fifteen year old granddaughter Sami in Indiana who will be taking driver's ed soon and how it seems like yesterday that we held her in our arms as a new baby. We'll talk about how our twenty year old grandson Jake in Indiana is going to buy a boat, works hard, is getting good grades in college, and is the one we call when things break around here. And we'll talk about our lovely Cassie, the little girl who hid on the floor with me and her baby cousins that New Year's Eve all those years ago, who is twenty-four now and who on Christmas Eve this year became engaged to be married to her Matt, making us all very happy even if we do feel pretty old.
Things change. Some things get worse, but mostly things get better. And they get better because we relive yesterday in the lives of our children today, and in the lives of our grandchildren tomorrow. Browning said, "Grow old with me; the best is yet to be." He didn't sit on a chair on the roof to make his thoughts be known. He wrote them down in simple and true words that speak to us today, a hundred and fifty years later. That's the thought I leave with you for this new year: "Things change," but "the best is yet to be!"
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