One final marathon

Okay, this is the last marathon photo you’ll see. I promise.

That’s because there are no more marathon photos. This shot was on the front of the sports page of the Des Moines Register in April 1982. You can see the photo editor’s crop marks. The race was the Drake Marathon, and

My last hurrah as a marathoner. Drake was a fun race because I got to run alongside my good friend Shane Dooley (a sure fire sub-2:20 guy if not for his crushing work schedule). We got beat like a bass drum but it was a good way to go out even if the 2:20 mark remained elusive – again. It was my last competitive race.

it was mercifully my last marathon since my ankles were rapidly losing their enthusiasm for running at any distance. That’s me, #628. My good buddy Shane Dooley is 664. The guy who won the race, Pat McGuire, is in the bandana to my left. Pat tossed in a 4:50 mile from 16 to 17 and that broke Shane and I like twigs. Shane was 4th in 2:24 and I hobbled home in 5th in 2:25.

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April 22, 2013

Ellen/Reid: It was bizarre writing last week’s letter about the Boston Marathon, and no sooner were things in the mailbox than the news hit about the explosions. I don’t suppose that I would have started over if the letters hadn’t been sent. It’s just the way it works sometimes. Two women from Charlotte were there to watch their mother finish the race and were in the wrong place

Emma’s Garden…

So, Emma has tomatoes.

On May 5, the day after she was born, her Gramps used a spade to turn over the good, dark Minnesota earth to form Emma’s Garden, a smallish 10′ x 6′ plot of very black dirt.  Into the ground went cilatro, romaine lettuce, peppers, basil, flowers, and red raspberries.  And a single tomato plant.

Emma’s mom shows off State Fair-quality tomatoes on her kitchen counter. A garden is a good thing. Such good soil in Minnesota would be a terrible thing to waste.

A few months later, and thanks to a corker of a Midwestern heat wave, Emma’s plant is producing in quantities I can only dream about.

The rush to build a garden actually springs from Emma’s great grandfatherwho cultivated a garden well into his 80s.   Toward the end as his tillable plot grew smaller and smaller, tomatoes and raspberries were about all he had the energy to tend to.  But he loved the soil and his deep forest-green thumb rubbed off on me, although mine more closely resembles a pale lime green.  Maybe the deeper shade will take hold again in Emma’s mom.

My tomatoes are dwarfed by Emma’s. When I equate them to golf balls, I’m not kidding. I’ve seen bigger hailstones.

Perhaps one day in Reid, too.  Ellen even mentioned expanding the modest-sized chunk of dirt and edible plants next year.  When they were not much older than Emma is now, I vividly recall Ellen and Reid rooted at the Sugar Snap pea and Heritage raspberry plants in our garden.  Very little of those two items ever made it to the kitchen.  But there are far worse things than watching kids gobble up stringless peas and red raspberries.

I suppose a garden is something of an environmental statement which my letters have preached about on more than one occasion.  Ellen and Tim no doubt went more of an organic bend than my enduring reliance on Miracle-Gro.  The larger lesson might be that there’s nothing wrong with getting your hands dirty.  Hopefully, Emma will wash hers off, unlike her granddad.

Here’s what Ellen and Reid found in their mailboxes last week.

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August 20, 2012

Ellen/Reid: So I think we have the holiday situation kind of, sort of worked out.  Ellen, you and Tim are not opposed to coming down here for early T-Day, November 15-18?  That is great.  Reid, you will be here for Christmas, correct?  Your tickets are on me.  I’m still not sure of my plans for the official Thanksgiving and should know about that in short order.  St. Paul sounds doable.  You truly have something to be thankful for.  Maybe Thanksgiving should be May 4.

Last Wednesday the 15^th marked my sixth year in Charlotte.  Incredible.  It just does not seem at all possible.  It seems just yesterday I was in Des Moines, and then the upheaval.  If you would’ve asked me five or six years ago (and no one has) for my impressions of the new surroundings, it would’ve been tempting to say ‘send me home’ and that would’ve been that.  But time has a way of leveling the bumps out across the job and social spectrum and now this is home for all intents and purposes.  A little too politically conservative on a lot of fronts, but that is the price to be paid for accepting the role here as an intruder.  Felicia has made a big difference, too.  Since I can work anywhere, there would’ve been a possibility of bolting for the old pastures.  But this is it and its okay.  I would like to get back to Des Moines with more frequency, but it’s hard.

Don’t hold me to it, but I’m thinking of parting with the Harley.  For whatever reason, my balance very recently isn’t what it used to be, and to navigate with a heavy beast like that takes that ability.  Perhaps it is the ribs (which feel the torque on certain turns) but something is different about riding it right now.  Even as recently as a few months ago there was some thought given to a Road King, but that’s been tabled for the time being.  There is always the off chance the next pleasant ride on the next nice weekend day will change my mind.  I hope it does because there is nothing like cruising.

Mike Hill put his dog Buddy to sleep a couple of weeks ago.  Mike posted some poignant videos of Buddy’s last meal on his Facebook page, and you should look that up.  Reminded me of our last days with Scooter.  It’s a dose of reality.

My A/C wasn’t totally on the blink after all.  Apparently all it needed was a new “board” in the upstairs unit – I don’t totally get all the technical gymnastics about it – but the board was about the size of an iPad and cost just as much, too.  So now there is at least cool air circulating in place of the hot, humid air that kept me away at night.  Just another unexpected expense.

Reid, you could do worse than a cruise line as a new client.  That sounds like a lot of fun, and they advertise a fair amount.  I’ll have to start watching for their plugs on the web, which I am sure you will do a good job of promoting and tracking.  I’ll make an exception and declare right now that their Internet ads won’t be the invasive kind.  I’m glad your mom got to get to Chicago to survey the new living arrangements and such.  I’d like us to get up there in short order, too.  Keep me posted as to your availability.   FYI…even a group like Fish makes a stop in the boondocks every once in a while.  They visit here in the next couple of weeks or something like that.  I still remember hauling you and a vanload of your boys to KC to a summer concert and being sold a total bill of goods as to when the concert started and, more importantly, when it would end.

Speaking of ending, that’s it for today.  Let’s really nail down the holiday plans so I can get tickets while they are still getable.  It would be great to have you all down here.  I’ll notify the cleaning service to do their thing just before you arrive.

Back to the old ways…

You were expecting a photo of Emma at the top of the page?  You’ll need to scroll down a bit.

Yes, she is a little sweetie (aren’t all grandchildren?).  That’s why there are no Grandchild USA contests (or at least I’m not aware of any).  No winner would ever be chosen because all the votes would be cast along family lines.

Still, Emma was the centerpiece of last week’s letter to new mom Ellen and her brother Reid. But you will note that the letter a couple of weeks ago truly wasn’t “official” since it was emailed as an attachment due to a printer ink malfunction.  But what the kids received over the weekend had a stamp on the envelope, therefore marking a return to official letter status.  I have gone back to the old ways, thanks to a new black ink cartridge.

Emma: the apple of her gramps’ eye.

As for the photo of Emma, here you go.

Here, too, is the paper letter.  Just say ‘no’ to email attachments.

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May 14, 2012

Ellen/Reid: It’s just hard to believe that Emma is almost two weeks old.  It still is all a bit surreal.  She’s just a little peanut, and already her looks seem to be changing.  I can’t wait to see her again because that’s when her growth will really be apparent.  It looks as if the next trip will be the second weekend in July.  We would come on a Friday and leave on Sunday.  I assume Emma will get her first view of the lake July 6-7-8 but you tell me what works best for us to visit.  Felicia’s excited to see her.  It is still amazing that your upstairs renovation project was completed virtually the same day Emma was born.  Talk about fortuitous timing.  Wow.  You couldn’t have scripted it better.  It’s good I lost my April 24 bet.  What a mess that would’ve been.

I’m now paying attention to baby coupons in the Sunday paper so those will be tucked into the envelopes.  Everything about babies is really an industry into itself.  Most of the stuff they advertise in the back pages of the coupon section seems feasible enough but I don’t quite understand why people would buy porcelain statuary of babies and other baby knick-knacks.  Sounds like just another garage sale item to me.  You will not receive anything of the sort from Emma’s grandpa.  Next time I head to the store I’ll pay a little more attention to the baby aisle.  Before you know it, she’ll be walking and talking and all of that.  Just as we marveled at how quickly you two nuts grew, the same will be for your perception of her.  It all just happens in a blur.  Betsy thinks the photos of Emma are adorable and she’s been asking for regular updates so keep any information coming this way.  Your timing is also good, Ellen, in that you’ll be able to stay at home during the normal summer break for teachers.

It’s been raining outside this morning which makes for a good enough day to sit in the office.  Wish it would’ve rained this weekend so I could’ve skipped golf altogether.  I’m so tired of playing poorly.  I couldn’t think my way out of a paper bag on the course if my life depended on it.  It is just so humbling.  Reid, how did your little golf gig come about?  Don’t people camp overnight at the public courses in Chicago just so they can snag a tee time?  Good for you to get out and play.  If some kid came along and offered me $5 for my sticks, I might be tempted.  Felicia is working a lot of overtime, including the weekends, and that puts a crimp into any spontaneous plans to ride or get out of town.

The lettuce pot out front continues to pump out a bumper crop.  That’s been a good dietary diversion.  I’m sorry to report that the Swallowtail butterfly caterpillar that was munching on the sprigs of parsley apparently fell prey to some sort of predator because it was gone within a day or two of me thinking it would continue to grow and eat its way into a pupa or whatever they wrap themselves in before emerging and flitting away.  My little bluebirds, sadly, are gone, too.  When I got home from Minnesota I thought they would have fledged so I went out back to check out the nest.  But there they were, dead.  Not sure what happened.  Stories on the web show parasites are a fairly common cause of death in baby birds.  The parent bluebirds had worked so diligently to keep the little ones fed.  They are nowhere to be seen.  I’ve since cleaned out the nest and let it dry out.  Hopefully some other bird species will find it a good nesting site.   Must be that time of year for baby animals.  Saw a small copperhead the other evening, but it was dead, too, and for no apparent reason.  Must be the way of things.

Okay, over and out for this morning.  Keep sending photos of Emma, and Reid, let me know about your iPad situation.  Glad you are finding uses for yours, Ellen.  Let’s use that live video thingie at some point soon.  Ciao.

Making a mess of things…

Henry's messes are a little different. At least you can clean his up.

Life has a way of making a mess of things.  All sorts of self-created speed bumps get in the way or jangle the ride.  Distance and time do their best, too, to erode relationships and keep apart what had been close.

Perhaps that is what is behind my infernal preoccupation for letters to old cronies – not so much old in years – but folks I’ve known for a long while and have allowed the bridges between us to collapse.  That doesn’t sit right.  I don’t want to get much further down the growing-old pike without trying to rebuild or repair fences.  That’s become important to me.

But the list of friends worthy of bridge repair is incredibly and impossibly long: Pete, Pat, Mike, Pam, Diana, Jim, Mort, Steve, Glen, Ben, et al.  And on it goes.  The letters to Dave, Jane, Bob and now Ray, are just a start, and not even a good one at that.

I refuse to use the hipper online ways of doing such.  Those are too public, too cold, too lickety-split.  This blog is seemingly at odds with that statement but there is a marginal difference because this is intended for a wider – but still very small – group who want to keep up with what’s written to Ellen and Reid.  A week or so ago, Reid texted me to see if it was okay if some of the letters to him could be read at a literary conference in Chicago.  Sure, I said, ‘but they aren’t high art.’  No problem, he replied.  “It’s reality.”

My reality is that I want to re-touch lots of people who meant something to my life.  I’ll keep nickle-and-diming the long and growing list.

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August 2, 2011

Ray: The invitation for the October wedding I’ve been expecting has yet to show up in my mailbox.  Perhaps that is a signal that my courtesy visa to Iowa has expired, along with the rights and privileges therein.  I’ll keep wandering over to the mailbox in the hopes it arrives.  You’ll know as soon as I do.

Just got back from five days of backpacking in Wyoming with a group of 11 that I’d assembled, and the term ‘herding cats’ comes to mind.  We had a great time and comfortably overcame all of the group dynamics which no doubt you can identify and relate to.  Even Ellen and her hubby, Tim, came along for the walk which was a close to a pleasure cruise of backcountry hiking as you can get.  As you saw with Ellen back in our camping days in Minnesota, a premium was placed on clean sets of laundered clothes each day, and as the days wore on and she ran out of fresh stock, things approached near crisis proportions.  Really, she was a good egg about it and fit in quite nicely with the troops.  She’d never done anything like this before and she did a great job.  When we were squatting beside the camp fires, more than once I thought of the storytelling we used to do with the kids, augmented by the occasional spewing of flammable liquor into the fire for dramatic effect at the right time in the tale.  Those were the days.  Caught a fair amount of trout that ended up fire-roasted with lemon pepper, so that made the otherwise bland meals palatable.

We saw a fair number of bikers up in the hills, some headed toward Sturgis, others bent on avoiding it.  The assumption here is that you’ll have already come and gone by the time you read this.  I miss that trip even though 24-48 hours was plenty enough time for me around the Buffalo Chip and the campgrounds.  You can only see so many displays.  It was the going out that had most of the appeal.  Just don’t tell me you trailered your Road King.  They still make t-shirts that honor that mode of travel, sort of.  It’s been at least 10 years for me to make that visit.  My most recent Sturgis hat reads 2001.  My ’03 Heritage is still plugging along, although it’s been so damn hot here it has discouraged riding.  Hopefully I’ll be able to fire the mother up in the near future.  The riding is pretty good down this way if you like twisty back roads.

The only firm travel plans now on the drawing board is Thanksgiving up in St. Paul.  Ellen just rejuvenated her kitchen and that will be my debut trip to see it.  Reid is intent on making the trip, too, as will my girlfriend of about three years, Felicia.  She’s a North Carolinian to the core.  I’ve yet to acquire her twang, although I’m said to be working on it.  She likes to ride the bike and we’ve been all over creation down in these parts.

Well, I’d best get back to the job that pays most of the bills.  If the invitation comes through, I’ll make plans for an added day or so, probably toward the front portion of the trip.  I’m sure Curt can flash-freeze pheasants and toss them in a shipping box.  I’ll depend on your shooting to fill it.

Culinary baptism by fire…

Marshal Dillon kept the peace.

We picked up one more straggler for the trek into the Bridger: Ellen.  Her ticket is already in hand and there’s no disguising how much I look forward to her joining our little band of hikers.   She’ll be a good addition although she’s already reminded me yet again that she doesn’t eat red meat (like we were going to tote steaks around) and she’s about to get a culinary baptism by fire with camp cooking.  She also professes to not like fish, but if she’s hungry enough, she’ll warm up to roasted trout sprinkled with lemon pepper soon enough.  Assuming we catch any.

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June 27, 2011

Ellen/Reid: What is worth looking forward to this week is a short Friday.  My boys Tom, Mike and Todd are planning a grudge match at some local course on Friday afternoon.  They all have high pressure 24/7 jobs at the bank and they are really looking forward to getting the three day weekend off with a bang.  Of course, it will be at my expense since those thieves demand strokes.  Not that your inheritance is at risk but I’ll need to keep my hands on my wallet at all times.  It is near criminal.

Got a pretty clean bill of health from my four month checkup on Wednesday.  The doctor is on one hand a no-nonsense guy in that it is all about data/results, but he shows his softer side, too from time to time.  I go back in September and that will be the real litmus test.  He took me off guard by saying that everything has yet to heal fully and by September it should be all buttoned up, so to speak.   His assistant paints something of another picture.  There’s this troublesome diverticulum (kind of a large balloon or bulge) on the bladder which creates what is essentially an unintended reservoir.  That’s why things don’t empty as they should.  The thinking of the assistant is that this creates a long-term set of problems (infections, etc.) if not corrected.  It doesn’t have to be right now but it’s a strong point of consideration.  Not real invasive surgery, but they go in and cut out this protrusion and sew the hole in the bladder shut.  It would put me down for up to two weeks with another 30 with “no lifting or straining.”  Literally, we were talking a January timeframe (so as to miss the least amount of golf and riding) when the doctor came in.  He immediately nixed those plans.  His reasoning is since I feel good and all the numbers point to things being mostly okay, he doesn’t want to operate in the absence of symptoms.  He reserved the right to change his mind when the September results are in.  I’m not opposed to the knife although he cautioned that every surgery has its risks.  So we’ll see.  But I feel good as of this writing.

Felicia came through her melanoma surgery in fine shape.  Basically, they carved out a chunk of her left calf and sewed it up nice and snug.  The assumption is they send the tissue to pathology to check it out, and no word so far on the results.  She was hobbling around like Festus on Gunsmoke and I had to ride her about just taking things easy for a while.  If it were me, I would’ve milked her nursing for everything I could get.  But she’s headstrong and she was doing it her way.  There are no stitches per se.  They glued the wound (can you really glue human skin?) and then did some other kind of non-stitch thingies and kept it together.  It will be interesting to see how it all looks once the bandage is removed and the non-stitch thingies go away.  It’s good they moved up the surgery a week or so because that gives her more time to heal before we head to the Bridger.

Enough health morbidity.  Apparently they no longer manufacture the tent pegs I want.  That, or people simply buy them out.  I’ve been to REI and another couple of stores more than once and everyone is flat out of good tent pegs.  This weekend we resolve to fire up the MSR stove and fumble our way around erecting the Mountain Hardware tent so we’ll know what we’re doing when the time comes.  I’ve put up a tent in heavy, wet snowfall before and it’s no fun and that’s no time to figure out how to erect a tent for the first time.  The menu is beginning to take shape although I am all ears when it comes to innovative breakfasts as long as it does not involve freeze dried food.  No doubt it will be the traditional instant oatmeal and whatever additives come to mind.  I just hope the weather is decent and we can have fires.  People are relatively outraged that there will be no smores or other fresh foods available.  What keeps coming to mind for me is: bears.

Well, off to the races (as in rat races).  Be good, stay cool and have fun.

The education gene…

Ellen is a teacher and my dad finished his career as an educational administrator,  so the education gene runs in the family, or at least those two.  Even Reid has his moments about graduate school.  The chance of the gene skipping me is a foregone conclusion.

I try to be supportive of Ellen in her efforts but it’s a struggle these days for teachers.  A preoccupation with testing, lack of materials and a lack of parental involvement (an old story) make teaching tiresome.  Even in education supportive Minnesota, there’s an assault on schools but largely for budget reasons.  Yet the attack is nowhere near as overt as it is here in North Carolina.  It not only stems from our woeful budget situation, but it is a philosophy of politicians that teaching kids is not the highest priority.  For some reason, they don’t tie the three R’s to job creation/growth, an educated citizenry and a better society.  But Ellen knows I’m in her corner and that of teachers.  And kids, too.

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June 13, 2011

Ellen/Reid: If you want to know how stinky hot it is down here, re-read the first paragraph of last week’s letter.  Nothing has changed.  It is still oppressively hot.

Reid, you had to get slammed with the same weather when you were in Tennessee for Bonaroo (sp?).  Better you than me.  I can’t even imagine it, plus I can’t imagine the clean up either.  How you slog through days on end of camping in the muck with 80,000 other concert goers is quite a tale, and I’m sure there are tales.  You’ll have to tell me about it.  How many years of this has it been for you?  At least three or four that I’m aware of.

Ellen, glad you’re footloose for the rest of the summer.  Unwind, unwind, unwind.  Although the kitchen project is going to be a joint test of patience and resolve; i.e. ‘I resolve to not let it get under my skin’.  Nothing ever goes easy/smooth/on time with that kind of massive gutting an re-assembly of a kitchen.  Just get up in the morning, trundle over to the coffee shop with Henry in tow (or him towing you) and get a good mocha-latte-lite roast-non-fat maci-something or other that you get.  That’s the best plan.  I hope you will make the jaunt to the Bridger to join us.  That would be fabulous.  You, too, Reid.  The ticket is on me.  Into the back country on July 28 and a retreat to the cushy world on July 28.  I bought a new MSR stove (I will pay handsomely if either of you know where the old MSR stove is) and other gadgets for the trip.  My goal is to pack as light as I can.

Ellen, at one time I had the dream that maybe one day you’d come down this way to shown ‘em how teaching ought to be done but now I’m glad you didn’t pull up stakes from Minnesota.  CLT just lost the superintendent that people were very split on; he was a big “tester” and some folks thought that drove teachers to teach for scores rather than for teaching.  I tend to agree with that.  He got out when the getting was good.  Our legislature, in its GOP wisdom and under the guise of a sour economy, has essentially gutted public education and cut out a raft of things that were simply good for kids, notably early childhood education.  In these parts they just don’t value a good public education which is ironic because that is what brought the South up.  Here, only the “haves” have the means of sending their kids to tony private schools where the tuition is more than most state universities.  Our legislature doesn’t view education as a way to create good people, give the potential labor force good work skills, keep them off the streets, or foster job growth.  None of that.  I’m not sure how they look at it.  They are very anti-teacher, probably in part because teachers have their state version of the NEA.  Your grandfather is probably rolling in his grave at the thought of yahoos disassembling the engine of forward movement for people.  It’s a travesty.  You can bet your bottom dollar if it involved guns or other redneck priorities, they’d embrace it.  But they don’t.  It’s really the one thing that galls me about both Carolinas; they just don’t want to educate people beyond this inane desire to test kids as the one barometer of showing progress.  No Child Left Behind is a misnomer because they’re all going to be left behind.

Well, I’d best sign off and get back to it.  I am always available by phone (Reid) so don’t be strangers.  Stay cool, relax, and get on with things.

Bridger update…

Things are moving ahead on the July trip to the Bridger Wilderness in Wyoming.  A group of eight of us from Charlotte are on board (there is room for plenty more hikers).  Most will fly into Jackson Hole, about 75 miles from our spot in the Wind River Range.  We assemble in Pinedale on Saturday, July 23 and after all the gear is straightened away and the food is packed into ‘bear barrels’ we head into the high country on Sunday the 24th for three to five nights.

The locals met for an update a couple of weeks ago and I’m relieved a die-hard and experienced hiker has decided to join our little band of outdoors people.  He knows his stuff.  I told the group this will be far from a forced march; rather, it will be the original pleasure cruise of backpacking.  Three or four miles by foot per day, frequent stops, lots of fishing. If this holds a smidgen of interest for you, climb aboard.  No experience necessary.

Alas, Ellen and Reid likely won’t make it.  Reid is talking about walking the Oregon coast with a buddy, and Ellen will likely opt to spend her time in northern Minnesota.

If there’s a high point for the trip, beyond the peaks themselves, it’s that my friend John’s two daughters, ages 11 and 14, both Carolinians to the core, will get their first taste of the truly wild-and-wooly outdoors.

The law of the jungle…

My son-in-law Tim sent this surveillance photo of Henry and Ellen snoozing away a big chunk of a nice St. Paul Sunday morning.

Back in the day when I was Ellen and Reid’s age, workplace stress seemed somewhat different than what I perceive it is now.  It was… softer.  Your job was cut-and-dried.  You knew your role, your task(s) and you either liked your job or you didn’t.  People seemed to get along.  Perhaps we wore blinders back then or maybe it was just the places I worked (a TV newsroom and a school system) but things weren’t as hurried.  Maybe it is that the workplace is now so hyper-computerized that it makes it easier for us to keep up – or keep an eye – on each other and what someone is doing and how they’re doing it.  Something has changed and I have trouble putting my finger on the precise change and its root cause.

Ellen is teaching.  If her Minnesota district is like those down this way, teaching to tests, and I don’t mean the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, is sort of a side-door assault on teacher creativity.  Reid has been downsized once and is scratching his way up the ladder.  Both are on-the-job pressures I thought would take them years to experience, but here they are.

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April 11, 2011

Ellen/Reid: My little lettuce pot on the front porch is producing more romaine and arugula than can possibly be consumed by the average adult.  I douse it with homemade dressing based on balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, garlic and olive oil.  If this were Iowa the rabbits would mow it down to the dirt but down here they don’t even give it a second look.  The spinach has been wonderful but it will run its course soon enough.  Now, it’s on to tomatoes.  One plant will be plunked in a pot this weekend.

Whew, last week was a rough one at work.  I will spare you the gory details other than to describe them as gory, but a meat cleaver would do a more humane job of slicing and dicing when compared to some folks downtown.  I mentioned to my boss that my faith in workplace humanity had taken a hit but he reminded me the “law of the jungle” prevails and he’s right.  I have discovered a new pragmatism whereby the bad or iffy things roll off my shoulders and down my back and away.  It is all about survival and just like the animal kingdom, it is usually reserved for the fittest.  We all have our burdens to shoulder whether it’s in schools or digital agencies or banks.  It’s just that the names of the protagonists that change along with the circumstances.  On the way in this morning I was wondering what I would write to you about surviving in your jungles but you guys probably have a better handle on that than me.

No doubt it would require some mixture of pragmatism, patience, knowing what battles to fight, turning a blind eye, an honest work ethic, and perhaps a thickened skin.  Improving one’s skills would fit in there somewhere but survivability is as much pluck and grit as much as anything else.  When I master all those traits I’ll let you know.  But I’m nowhere close to that right now so don’t bother holding your breaths.  Sometimes the notion of achieving for the common good gets misplaced or forgotten altogether as the engine of commerce grinds forward.

As long as I’m whining I might as well move on to another sore subject.  Mike and Mort were in town this weekend, and we played Friday afternoon at a nice course in Fort Mill, SC.  Not terribly penal but it can bite.  Sure enough, after a few holes my swing collapsed like a house of cards and those two took infinite joy in reminding me of my abundant hitches and stops/starts every time I try to hit the ball.  I think what I will do is just live with the demon rather than try to overcome it for the umpteenth time.  Nothing seems to work and it’s a flaw I’ll just have to coexist with.  I did walk the course pushing a cart and emerged none the worse for wear.  No repercussions to report.  Mike is about to start a series of Stephen King films and that appears to be his swan song.  He’ll exit film editing, he says, when the series is complete.  I think the total is three to five films, something like that.  Mort is doing pretty well and I encouraged him to give his stalled Western book another jump start.  He’s a good writer but has a case of writer’s block, the same as the rest of us get more often than not.  We ate more than we should and just basically hung out most of the time.  They treated Felicia and me to a fun dinner Friday night at a local bistro over at that mall you like, Ellen.  We traded lies and old stories but it was great fun.  Saturday night we had bad storms and heavy rain, so heavy it was like, to cite an indelicate quote from Pat Drickey, “a cow pissing on a flat rock.”  It really came down.

Late next week it’s on to Grand Island to see your grandmother.  She did not sound very good on Saturday and I can’t wait to get out there.  I am very apprehensive about it.  Your uncle says she is gaining weight which is good, but when she sounds like she does it scares me.  Keep your phones on that weekend and I’ll let you say a few words to her in her room.  That should perk her up a little bit.  She could certainly use it.

The seeds of life…

The bounty of lettuce on my front porch. I hope Ellen can replicate it in Minnesota.

Every now and then I spin out a fast one-off letter on some minor or inane topic.  Yesterday, one such note went to Ellen (or Cakes as I often call her).

She and her hubby Tim have a sunny spot at the top of their back concrete entry way.  It is the ideal spot for a middling pot of fresh lettuce.  It would be safe from ultra-ravenous neighborhood herbivores (aka bunnies) that would mow down anything at ground level.  I’ve planted lettuce varietals in just such an arrangement for the past couple of years, and the yield has been more than one person can consume.  Of course, Felicia’s appetite for greenery has stressed my lettuce/spinach production.  The note below was hand written on legal paper.  The seeds will likely break ground before Ellen can decipher all my scratchings.

————-

April 14, 2011

Cakes:

Here are the seeds of life (or at least salads).  Plus a tiny bit for a pot.

Get a wide pot.  Plastic is fine.  Doesn’t need to be real deep.  Dirt from your garden is fine, mixed with a little potting soil.

Use your finger as a dibble (the thing to create shallow holes for the seed).  Put 3-4 seeds in every hole.  The entire pot should be filled with seed holes.  Roughly 1/3 of the space should be allotted for each seed packet.  Holes should be about this far apart:

(I attempted to draw circles about 3 inches apart in all directions in the pot.  An artist I am definitely not.)

That way you fill the whole thing.  In about 40 days: bon apetit!

Love, Dad

Then and now…

It seems light years ago when this little letter writing enterprise got going.  It’s odd for me to compare and contrast the letters of recent times versus those from years ago.  That was then, and this is now.  Things have evolved from simply filling idle time for Ellen and Reid to becoming a somewhat deeper descriptor of life’s ebb and flow.  I suppose that is the way of all things.  You change with the times or the times change you, one of the two.

————–

January 18, 2004

EB and Reid:

So, Reid, you’re a Phi Psi (sp?) now?  Well, that’s just great as long as you don’t come home giving us secret handshakes and the like.  Butler is a good spot for that because it’s not so big that you don’t see other kids you are already friends with.  Just don’t wear striped ties (rep ties, they call them) and penny loafers around campus all the time.

Whew, enough of Orlando already.  It was cold and rainy a lot of the time, which made things just miserable.  Thank goodness we bought that umbrella during our “brief” layover in the Chicago because I parked one day and walked about half a mile in the POURING RAIN to the convention center.  The lower half of me was just soaked.  I left puddles of water in the convention center.  The day before I’d taken the shuttle bus from the hotel (a real flea trap) and it took me 90 minutes to go less than 2 miles.  So I thought I’d beat the rush by parking the rental car and walking.  Right.  They had 110,000 attendees at the home builder show.  Never did get by Disney or Universal.  Enclosed are a few trinkets they gave away by the thousands.

Thus, today I am a zombie.  Just staring at the computer screen even though there is work to do.  Very tired.  Exhausted.  Sat next to a very large man – very large – out of Orlando Monday morning.  A nice enough guy (from Ft. Wayne, IN), but he took up some space, if you know what I mean.  Never, ever accept a center seat if you can help it.  Always ask for exit row aisles when you check in.

How is 2^nd grade, Ellen?  A little calmer, one would hope.  I’ll bet there’s a big difference between the two grades.  What school are you in and where is it?

Scooter seems to be rebounding a bit.  That cruise week took something out of him.  But his appetite is slowly coming back.  But he’s just an old dog.

By now Jeff is getting schooled in Italian.  He’s going to want a good old fashioned cheeseburger and fries by the time it’s all said and done.  Pasta is great, but every day, all day?  He’ll have a lot of fun.  Ciao!

We have reservations in Indy at the Embassy Suites (I think that’s it, isn’t it?) for graduation weekend.  Nonnie will come with us, Grandma and Grandpa will drive separately.

Well, that’s enough for now.  I’m bleary eyed and just trying to hit the right keys.  Be good, have fun, do the right thing.