Why can’t we have nice things?

Dear Blog Reader

I hope that this finds you doing well. I am fine. Finally, the days are getting noticeably longer. It is nice to see that all of the parts of our landscape are still there. It has been quite a while since they have been seen in the light of day. Leave in the dark, home in the dark, that mid-November to mid-February always seems to stretch on and on. To all of my Greenland, or Norway fans, I apologize for the whining. We all have our cross to bear. I recognize that yours is  bigger than mine.

We have turned the corner. The seed order has arrived. The snap dragons and celosia seeds have been delivered to the greenhouse to get starts going. The pruning is nearly done at my favorite orchard. The sap in the maple trees is starting to rise. And speaking of bears, I suppose they are starting to stir from their hibernation. I know that I am starting to rouse from bed a bit easier everyday. All we have to do is get through that mud pit called March and the two weeks of Janpril. Then, it will be off to the grass mowing and gardening races.

The topic of today’s missive presented itself about 4 weeks ago. A lot has happened since then. The American’s solidified their claim on most boring people in the world by winning Olympic Curling gold. The spring floods have returned to the mid south. And the national gun debate has been reignited at the cost of 17 lives. This time the debate is clouded by failures of local and federal law enforcement with a bit of cowardice to make us all shake our heads.

No, about 4 weeks ago it exploded on the news. It appears that a consumer advocacy group called a news conference in DC and took on big detergent. You would have thought that the holy grail had been found. It was all over my Facebook pages for days to come. However, in doing the exhaustive research that goes into this blog, I found out that it has been a hot topic, making an annual reboot, since 2012 when Chuck Schumer proudly proclaimed “I saw one on my staffer’s desk, and I wanted to eat it.” A little self control Chuck, not to mention take a refresher course on office etiquette. What are you doing rummaging around a staffer’s desk for snacks? That staffer probably makes $30,000 a year. Go buy your own d&#%ned snacks.

Of course, the emphasis has shifted. In 2012, the focus was on young children and adults with dementia eating them and getting sick and in 10 cases dying, a tragedy. Any steps that can be taken to eliminate those deaths are a good thing. Those steps have been taken. Child resistant packaging, PSA’s, etc.  But now the focus is on high school and college kids creating a social media sensation called the Tide Challenge. Google it. I refuse to try to use my wordsmithing skills describing idiots. 

As you can tell, I feel no sympathy for this iteration of the Tide menace. I like those little, squishy, transparent packages of grime busting goodness. I fill up the washer with cloths. I reach in to the container throw one in and am off to write my blog. I don’t have to worry about where the measuring cup is. Did I take it to the barn to measure herbicide, or poke a hole it one corner and create a funnel hack for pouring oil into the car? And who hasn’t had a puddle of detergent eating the enamel paint off of the top of the dryer because the no spill spout wasn’t no spill when you twisted the measuring lid back on top of the bottle? 

No detergent pods are a nice thing and they are about to be taken away because of the youth of America. As the lovely Miss Beverly said, “once again another nice thing we can’t have because of kids.” Thankfully, the lovely Miss Beverly went proactive and bought a dozen packages to “Tide” over this little crisis.

Grace our lovely daughter was pretty excited and pointed out that this may be the first thing that her mom and dad couldn’t blame on the millennial generation. It’s true. This one is on the un-named generation. Actually, it has been named. The internet just hasn’t settled on a name. Gen-Z, iGen, post-millennial are in the running. I am currently voting for post-millennia because you have to be dumb as a post to eat detergent.

I do want to step back for a second and question the idea that this is a story. To the best of my knowledge gained from less than exhaustive internet analysis, 10 people have died since 2012 from the ingestion of detergent pods. A little perspective; last year over 20,000 people died from synthetic opioid overdoses. The trend on that disturbing number looks like a Sherpa going up the side of Everest. Why aren’t we taking on big synthetic opioids? It is hard. Addiction is hard. There are no easy answers there. Rather than talk about a difficult problem, society spends four weeks wringing its hands that Johnny and Mary walked around spitting bubbles for a few hours. When I was growing up, that is how we identified who got caught cussing by their mom. 

Maybe the mom’s of America were doing more than cleaning up our language or encouraging us to think about lying to her again. I think inadvertently they were helping us keep nice things.

Take care.

Roger

Go Your Own Way

Dear Blog Reader

I hope that this finds you doing well. I am fine. I sit here thankful that I didn’t go all Bill Murray after the 2nd. It would have been an especially difficult day to finally get right because the lovely Miss Beverly was at a conference in Florida. It would have taken self-actualization galore to get missing Beverly to turn out okay.

Thinking about this blog has caused an old Fleetwood Mac song to run on a continuous loop inside my head. Two months is long enough. It is time to exorcise it from my noodle. It is a good song. I just knew that I should copy its title for this blog. 

Nearly two months ago the lovely Miss Beverly received word that Bonnie, her mother, had suffered a severe stroke. Bonnie was 85 years old. Twenty years ago she had received 2 new hips. Well the warranty had expired and one hip had deteriorated and was causing Bonnie a great deal of pain. The doctors counseled that the surgery would be very risky. Bonnie decided that a chance of being pain free or even in less pain was better than the prospect of increased pain going forward.

The surgery went well but as they say there were complications. Repeated procedures left her weaker each time as her body had difficulties metabolizing the anesthesia. The stress on her body grew to the point that she suffered a stroke. She was mostly unresponsive at that point. Doctors were unable to do anymore for Bonnie so hospice was called. We used to call it the Grim Reaper. But apparently, he went corporate and needed a new image and so we call hospice now. Family and friends gathered and reminisced and said goodbye. A few days later she succumbed.

We try to capture our loved ones live and essences in a few paragraphs in the newspaper. But as Abraham Lincoln once said in the Gettysburg Address  “We cannot consecrate . . .” However, the lovely Miss Beverly did a pretty good job catching the essence of her mom in this obituary.

“Bonnie will be remembered for her love for her husband and family, her prowess for making pie, and her skill at knitting. She drove her kids thousands of miles to basketball, cheer clinics and 4H meetings. Only her well-worn black cast iron skillet knows how many potatoes she fried. Millions of inches of yarn passed through her clever fingers, transformed into sweaters, afghans, mittens, and hats. So many hats for so many beloved heads.

Bonnie’s highest renown, though, will be for her kindness and generosity to all, as her family’s boundaries did not end with her 8 children. Neighbor kids hopped in the van for rides to town.  Hired hands sat with us at our table. Nieces and nephews confided in her.  Co-worker’s waited for their birthday pie from Bonnie. Her friends shared mischief, nights on the town, and all of the heart-crushing griefs life brings. Her listening ears and giving heart will be missed by all who loved her.”

Two months later the jobs that Bonnie tended to are being shifted. The mantles of responsibility, for finishing knitting projects, bearing witness to heart crushing griefs, and maintaining and initiating the grapevine needed to keep 8 children (brothers and sisters) 46 nieces and nephews, great grands, and in-laws connected when they are spread out across the country, are being picked up and carried on. Plus, there is always more birthday pie to be baked. 

I think that I missed her most of all on January 28th when Purdue played IU. It must have been very difficult through the years for Bonnie. All of those children and only Bill going to IU. Not only that but all of those daughters going to Purdue and marrying somewhat rabid and obnoxious Purdue boys. That afternoon, I missed the one ring phone calls announcing a particularly good IU play; a late game surge, or hopeful anticipation. 

One ring phone calls really were the prehistoric text messages. Back when there was such a thing as rotary dial phones, and long distance phone charges, our grand parents would let their brood know that they were thinking about them by dialing, letting the phone ring once and hanging up. No completed call, no long distance charges. I missed that on the 28th. However, as I said the mantle of responsibility has shifted because the lovely Miss Beverly’s phone blew up with text messages all afternoon.

The other mantle that has shifted or is shifting during the past two months, and has been a little difficult for me to put on, is that we are next. I didn’t realize how comforting it was to know that my great grandmother Keenan would pass before Grandma and Grandpa would pass. And she did. It was comforting believing that Grandmas and Grandpas would depart before moms and dads did. And they did. For the past 20 years, deep down in my lizard brain, I have believed that I wasn’t my time yet. Lloyd, Stell, Doyle and Bonnie were all much more mortal than I. It is no wonder that the grief is so much greater when the order isn’t followed. It is an unmentionable expectation. And the unmentionables are often the strongest.

No, when hospice comes calling, I can no longer stand there hands in pockets, eyes on the ground, shifting from foot to foot kinda nodding my head towards the generations before me. “Take them. They have lived their life.” If I were an Inuit, I would be the one getting on the ice flow when times got tough. No, he will be here for me.  It has been a sobering realization, and yet another gift from this remarkable woman.

Bonnie went her own way. I’ll go mine.

Take care.

Roger