Good Luck with That David

Before this last elective surgery I was working on a blog about Dylan, with a little Hemingway mixed in.  As the date for my trip to the hospital neared the list of things to get done before I couldn’t walk loomed large, and I didn’t finish it.  A random FB post had thrown me into a binge of old Dylan music, some of it on vinyl, and I became immersed in lyrics.  Before I knew it I was under the knife. 

The word elective surgery is fairly new, developed I’m sure during my lifetime.  The idea is this- “it's  not necessary to keep you alive, but if you want it done, someone will do it.  Whether they pay for it is another matter.”  

Really?  I can see the farmers I used to work scratching their heads at this idea.  Just for a little while mind you, before rejecting it completely.  The best way to avoid painful medical treatment, their steadfast goal, was to stay away from doctors first, and then hospitals at any cost.  And speaking of cost, those guys didn’t buy health insurance till the government handed it to them in the form of Medicare in the mid 60's.

Dentistry, and I mean the entire field, was seen as  elective for my Dad.  He grudgingly let  Mom take us to the dentist as kids, and even get dentures herself, but he elected to forgo dentists entirely.  He lost his teeth gradually.  Most of them blackened and sort of evaporated, the process hidden from us, until he got down to the molars.  Those he had to work fairly hard at.

I didn’t see my Dad him with pliers or vice grips in his mouth, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he secretly used them to persuade the exit of those big teeth from his gums.  I have a couple of his molars, yellow with long white roots.  He saved them in his desk drawer with the paper clips.  You tell me why.

If you wonder why you rarely see chopped sirloin on restaurant menus anymore, it’s because guys like my Dad are largely a thing of the past.  We’re now a country of straight white teeth, except of course for the poor, whom we don’t seem to care about.  Modern dentistry, along with fluoridation, has made those Americans who can afford it a country of proficient chewers. 

I made hay with a number of farmers who had complicated leather and steel trusses designed to hold in hernias.  There we were, trapped in  hay mows on long summer afternoons, hoisting 75 pound bales of hay, and sweating our asses off.  It was hard work, but I was a kid and had no intention of continuing to work that way once I graduated high school.  The men I worked with, both tenant farmers and land owners, had worked that hard their entire lives.  They worked on, burdened by the pain and trouble of hernias among other ailments, without complaining. 

“You can usually push them back in,” our neighbor once told me, after showing me what his truss did, custom made to press on the hernia and do basically the same thing.  “If you can’t get it back up in there you have to worry.  You gotta watch out they don’t get strangulated.  But if you don’t panic it usually takes care of itself.”

Those men were known not to panic.

None of the farmers with hernias elected to get them fixed that I knew of.  Not when you could manage it and avoid the doctor. 

We now consider health a worthy investment.  An improvement I’d say.  Our collective goal is taking care of our bodies so as to manage these much longer lives we’re living.  And with attitudes changing we now find ourselves with a menu of procedures to choose from.

For the purely cosmetic procedures, satisfying vanity more than improved function, you’re on your own dime.  But if you want to say, continue to use your shoulder as you are accustomed, or walk without pain, both Medicare and private insurance are more than willing to accommodate you.  Meet some low threshold criteria and the door is open for a raft of expensive procedures funded routinely every day.  I think the medical folks, and their partners in the drug industry, want the work.  And at the rates paid in the US for those procedures who wouldn’t?

Don’t get me wrong, I think this is a good thing.  I’m benefitting.  My Mom needed artificial knees in the worst way.  Had she been able to get them, she could have avoided years of pain, and enjoyed increased activity, maybe even living longer than she managed, alone there in our farm house, making it from the recliner, to the kitchen, out once a day to get the newspaper at the end of the walk, talking incessantly on the land line. 

Trouble was no one she knew had gone through that new idea of knee surgery.  No one at church, no women at the beauty parlor.  They took the best anti inflammatory pills and pain relievers the hometown family doctor could find and put up with it, so Mom did too.

I’m not willing to do that.  I want to walk down streets in towns I’ve not yet found.  I want to hike over the next hill.  I’m on this two year program to improve my mobility.  Last year I had my long messed up left ankle straightened and repaired, and this year it’s the knee on the right, maybe damaged by accommodating the weird gait of its partner all those years.  In any case, I’m joining the ranks of those with both bone reshaped, reconfigured, and repositioned to its original purpose and bionic joints, titanium replacing bone, plastic filling in for cartilage.

My legs served me well, and I used them hard.  I hitchhiked with a back pack for years in the 70’s, on four continents.  The longer I traveled the less I carried on my back, but all the same it was a load.  When vehicles stopped past me on the road I made a habit of running to them.  I thought it was bad form for a guy wanting a free ride to walk.  My backpack would bounce as I ran.  I could feel it in my knees but never thought a thing of it.

I wasn’t what you would call cautious about life then, and certainly not about my health.  That left ankle was never the same after a bad ski accident.  It was my second time on skis.  I thought I was ready for the big hill.

While elective surgery is now available, there’s still a calculation.  I’ve decided there really is no gain without pain, hard work in therapy, and recovery time.  When my friends related their new knee experiences, they encouraged me. 

“It will be nothing compared to your ankle I guarantee.”

My ankle, which was done early April of 2017, was long term.  I couldn’t bear weight on it for months.  When I did walking was tentative and gradual.  It took a long time to get to anything that resembled normal.  It’s still getting better now, 19 months later.  The surgeon told me I’d see improvement for up to two years.  I thought he was kidding me.  Funny, how we hear things but don’t believe them.  Some things seem incredible.

Knee replacement is totally different.  When you get out of the hospital there is a fully functioning knee in there.  My ankle procedure required bone to knit together.  My artificial knee was firmly attached to my bones.  Don’t ask me how.  I haven’t yet watched the video.  The physical therapist in the hospital got me up and walked me down the hall, mostly to show me it was possible I think.  Recovery in the case of my knee is getting the muscle, ligaments, and tissue around the knee back to normal after being so rudely pushed aside.

It’s major surgery.  Power tools are involved.  Protractors and stuff I’m sure.  I’ll find out later.  They’re surgeons, the orthopedic people that do this work, but just as heart surgeons take after plumbers, the orthopedic folks embody the hearts of carpenters. 

Let’s go back to my buddies with fresh new knees.  When I ask them how long it takes to fully recover from the surgery they say:

“Well, it keeps getting better for a year I’d say.  But it gets good pretty quickly.”

I’ll be a month past surgery next Friday.  I’m convinced that as humans we lack the ability to remember or appreciate physical pain.  Maybe it’s the opiates.  In any case because it’s my right knee I can’t drive.  Those pain pills became my friends.  I don’t regret doing it, but it hurts more than I anticipated.  Getting back to a decent range of motion takes work.  I think the physical therapists are actually the most important part of the deal.  I’m doing what they tell me.  I think and hope I‘ll have a good result.

Still in all, it’s a calculation.  You sacrifice freedom for increased mobility in the future.  You willingly walk into hospitals, surrender yourself to their system, allow someone you barely know to knock you out and work you over in almost sadistic ways, and then you thank them when it’s over.  It’s counter intuitive when you think about it.

Between loads the guys in the haymow, my neighbors, used to take breaks.  We’d climb down from the heat of the haymow, find some shade, a breeze if there was one, and have a blow till the next rack wagon arrived.   We had great conversation, five or ten minutes at a time.  I’ve imagined trying to explain what I’m doing with those old farmers.  It would probably go like this.

“So David, my wife found out from your Mom that you’re going to get a new knee somehow. Mechanical deal.  Is that so?”

Farm women talked constantly and the men kept their mouths shut.  But if the men listened to their wives they could find out everything there was to know about the people around them.  I mean everything.  It was amazing how little privacy there was.  You think social media is bad.  Consider the party lines given to us by the phone company that we shared with four or five other families..  

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“How’s that work?  I mean just what are they doing to you?”

“Well, they make a slice down your knee, pull away the muscle and stuff to expose the joint, and then saw the top of your knee away from your thigh bone, they do the same thing on the bottom, from your shin bone, and then they put an artificial knee in the center of those bones, line them up good, pound it in to the ends of the bones and glue it.  They got the right sized knee already, from an x ray and a CAT scan.”

I can imagine how wide their eyes would be.  Stubbly beards.  Blue chambray shirts sweated through.  They would all be over a hundred years old today.

“Who’s doing it?”

“Orthopedic surgeon out Bloomington.”

“Young guy?”

“Yeah.”

 Eyes would roll.

“How many times you figure he’s done this kind of thing?”

“Plenty I think.  It’s about all he does.”

“Who makes that knee they’re putting in you?”

I’m sure they would feel better if the manufacturer was Allis Chalmers, or John Deere.  Craftsman or Snap On would work too.  They would be thinking of the joint as something like the knuckles we used on the speed jacks and power take offs.  I still do sort of.

“I have no idea.”

“I’d find out if I were you.”

There’d be a pause.  Reacting to their suspicion I’d tell them more.

“As I get it with these tests they find out the exact angle of the bones, then a computer gives them real precise measurements, maybe even something of a jig, so they cut the bones exactly right to accept the knee.  Pretty high tech.”

Their eyes would grow wider.

“What kind of saw they use?”

“Probably something like a small hand held power Skilsaw.  I didn’t ask.”

“And when it's all over this artificial knee is going to work like your God given knee?”

That’s what they say.”

“Is that right.”

Those farmers used that particular line "is that right" not as a question. Their voice didn’t rise at the end of the sentence.  They didn’t expect an answer.  You didn’t know exactly what they meant.  That’s what they intended.  They rarely expressed disbelief, giving you the benefit of the doubt.  But they doubted a lot of things without showing it.  

We would hear a tractor down the lane.  When we looked, a rack wagon stacked with bales would be making its way toward the barn.  We would pull on those yellow cotton work gloves and head back towards the haymow.

“Yeah well good luck with that knee deal David.  Let us know how it turns out.”

They would no more have their knee sawed out of their leg and replaced with a mechanical one than they would go to New York City on vacation.  To them it would have sounded crazy, risky, and expensive.  They wouldn’t have asked how much it cost because where I lived it was impolite to talk about money.  But there is no way in hell those men I worked with fifty years ago would have turned their body over to some doctor for anything as drastic as that. 

Times change.  Today we have developed faith in both the skills of our medical folks and the technology they use.  We’ll take outrageous measures to extend the useful life of these bodies we have.  I hope I’m right on this one. I’ll let you know.

Animal Stories

Yesterday a red fox trotted into our yard.  It was  sunny summer, but the air had a hint of fall.  The fox was enjoying the day.  He slowed to a walk then sat in a patch of sun.  He scratched for a while, stood and stretched, doing a downward facing fox, then laid out flat.  I was taking pictures of him through the patio door.  As I looked at him, he looked at me.

After a time he moseyed into my neighbor Bill’s yard and laid there, not far from the shack.  I opened the door quietly and slowly made my way toward him.  The fox watched as I neared,  not particularly concerned.  As I put my foot on the shack steps the fox stood, looked at me for a last time, and trotted into the ravine.  My fox encounter was over, as was his encounter with me.  Though I shouldn’t speak for the fox, I think it went pretty well for him.  As for me, something about it warmed my human heart.

You can’t make these things happen.  You can go to a zoo, but that’s a rather forced meeting wouldn’t you say?  Who says the giraffe wants to be anywhere near you?  He has no choice.  The fox however chose my yard, and I was there when he did.   It’s all chance.  But when it happens it’s meaningful, at least to me.

You can improve your odds of encountering wild animals by going into a wilderness.  I was just there.  I’d like to share an account of that experience with you.  Think of me as your roving reporter, and this an edition of animal stories.

Going north from Dryden Ontario, on Highway 105 to Red Lake (where the road more or less ends), the roadside is bordered by lakes and wetlands, trees and rocks.  Aside from the pavement and power lines few signs of human intrusion are seen for 130 miles.  Four American guys traveling that road, in one of those big plush four passenger pickup trucks, were bemoaning the lack of moose sightings. We were slowly scaling then descending gently rolling rock hills.  At the bottom of the dips there was invariably water. 

“Every time we pass one of those bays I expect to see a moose.  I always look, but I never see one,” the driver said.

“I know what you’re saying.  I do the same thing,” said the guy in the passenger seat.

We didn’t listen to the radio driving up.  It was like we were slowly decompressing.  The truck had a Wi-Fi hotspot, but soon we’d be completely cut off from all outside signals; phone, internet, radio, TV.  I was looking forward to it.  My smart phone would be reduced to simply a camera and a flashlight.

Not a town, not a person, very little traffic greeted us along the way.  It was quiet in the truck.  Then, just south of Ear Falls, one of the men in the back uttered a single word.

“Moose.”

The driver immediately slowed and we all looked toward the water.  Standing along the road, not twenty feet away, was a bull moose.  Big rack of antlers, long skinny legs, dripping wet and nearly black.  At first I thought he was a statue, and then his head moved.  He held his head high and his big eyes looked at the truck.  We glided past him.  He never took a step, and then we were gone.

Funny how a few moments can make such an impression, the image burned into your brain such that you  will never forget.

Our destination was Job Lake, one of the many lakes leased to outfitters in Northern Canada which are reachable only by float planes.  It’s a 30 minute flight from Red Lake.  When the plane lands on the lake, taxis to the dock, your gear is unloaded, and the plane takes off again-you and seven friends are the only people on the lake for the next seven days.  4 boats, 8 guys, a rustic cabin, and 8,800 acres of clean fresh water lake. 

  

We go there to fish, but long ago we found out it’s not just the fishing that brings us back.  It’s the quiet, the beauty, the seclusion, and the wildlife. 

Up from our dock is a rustic cabin with a deck, porch, kitchen, half bath, and a big room with a dining table and 8 bunks.  We always go the week before Labor Day.  The weather is usually good and the bugs absent, so we spend a lot of time on the deck.  When we do we have visitors.

The boldest are the Whiskey Jacks.  Also called Canadian Jays or Gray Jays or Camp Robbers, these birds will land right beside you and stare you down.  Nate was having a sandwich on the deck at lunch and thought a Whiskey Jack was going to go for a chunk of it while it was in hand.  They’re brassy, those Whiskey Jacks, and hungry.  Some took to feeding them, leaving bits of leftover pancakes, biscuits, what have you on the deck ledge until an unfortunate incident made us question the wisdom of our human intervention.  But no sad tales today.  Here’s a healthy and happy Whiskey Jack.

Always present it seemed and oblivious to any threat we might pose was a snowshoe rabbit.  Snowshoes look like a hare, and are dark in the summer.  I’d love to be there in the winter when their coat turns pure white.  They say they replace the pontoons on the planes with skis and land on the ice.  Damned cold though.  I track the weather out of Red Lake on my phone.  I don’t think you could cut wood fast enough to keep that summer cabin on stilts warm through a frigid North Ontario winter.  Here’s our friend the snowshoe rabbit, who made a daily appearance on the trail to the outhouse.

One of the most distinctive sounds each day are the cries of loons.  We saw them every day on the lake, some with babies, keeping their distance, fishing like we were, doing what loons do.  When they take off they slap the water with their wings before rising off the lake.

A few boats saw otters.  They keep their distance as well, their heads often appearing as bits of wood bobbing in the water until they suddenly disappear, only to pop up again further away.  I once saw an otter running the bank of a lake in the boundary waters.  They’re bigger than you think, sleek and shiny.

Bald Eagles are quite a show on Job Lake.  Perched in the trees that ring the shore, the eagles are always on the watch at day’s end when we clean fish.  Our daily trip across the lake, to make sure bears are not attracted to the fish guts, lends itself to this close up view.  The other birds, mostly gulls and vultures,  scatter when this guy is hungry.  Among birds he’s king of the lake.

But the dominant animals, and the main attraction, are the fish.  A natural hatchery, the lake system in Northern Ontario maintains a nice balance of perch, walleyed pike, and northern pike primarily.  There are lakes where bass are plentiful, as well as lake trout and muskie, but you can’t prove it by our experience on Job Lake.  We catch an occasional perch, northern pike by mistake, but we fish for walleye.  We use light tackle, colorful jigs fished very near the bottom tipped with live bait, from boats drifting with the wind.  Occasionally we troll, but when we do the motor runs and breaks the silence.  My attraction to jigging for walleye is the quiet of it, the concentration.  Present the bait, imagine the fish below you, watch for the rod tip to twitch, wait for a tug on the line.  It’s a wonderful way to spend a day.  

When you do get a northern pike on the line it’s a rush.  Northern, who grow bigger than walleye, fight harder.  Serious northern fishermen use high test line and steel leaders with big spoons and other artificial lures.   Steel leaders, tied on the very end of the line before the lure are used to keep the fish from cutting the line with its teeth when they hit.  Stronger line is employed to keep the fish on when hooked.  Northern are the giants of the lake.  My friend Nathan caught a thirty seven incher (37”), the biggest northern of the week.  Not an easy task to land a northern that big on a walleye set up, but Nate’s a good fisherman.

There are ruler decals in the boats to measure fish.  We buy Canadian conservation licenses, which have strict limits on how many fish of what size can be kept, and which must be released.  There is a daily limit per fisherman of four walleye between 15 and 18 ½ .  One fish exceeding 18 ½ can be kept as part of that number.  The reasoning is this.  The little walleye deserve to grow, and the big ones are important to breed the next generation.  But you can keep, and eat, members of the biggest group, the top of the bell curve, those of average age and size, the most plentiful fish in the lake.

We follow those rules closely, and kept few if any fish over 18 ½ inches.  We want Northern Ontario’s fishery to be as healthy as possible.  In fact, on days we ate fish we found that four fish per boat was too many.  That would give us 16 walleye, 32 filets, which was more than we could eat.  So we cut back to three per boat.  Plenty for us.  No need to be greedy.

Truth is, we caught lots more fish than our limit.  It’s the catching not the eating, the experience not the trophy.  Like the moment I had with the red fox when I came home, it’s the encounter with those beautiful wild fish that makes the trip.  One more fish story and I’ll let you go.

I was fishing with Gary that morning and it was a little slow.  A cloudy day with a little chop, waves on the lake, chilly, spitting rain once in a while.  That’s usually perfect for walleye.  But our spots weren’t panning out. 

“You want to go to the wall?” Gary said.

“Yeah, I love the wall.  Let’s head there.”

We brought our lines in and set off for a trip across the lake.  The wall is sort of the entrance to the southern part of Job Lake.  It’s a tall rock island.  On one side is a sheer wall of stacked red and gray granite, some green with lichens.  You can see where over time rock has sheared off and fallen in the lake.  Blocks of granite are strewn by the shore and underwater.  Pine trees cling to cracks in the rocks.

The water is deep right up to those rocks.  To be that close to land yet in such deep water is unusual.  The catching is not always good, but it’s so beautiful I love to fish there anyway.  I scan the intricate rock wall and imagine the millions of years it took to form.  I imagine fish among the boulders way below me.  I space out and get lost in thought.  Sometimes that’s a great place to be. 

Gary judged the wind and set us up on a drift that he hoped would sweep us relatively near the shore across the wall.  He knew from the depth finder we were in deep water, sometimes thirty feet.  The drift took us in a little, maybe too close.  We would have to go out and reset the drift.  I put my pole down to get something out of my tackle box.  The tip of my rod leaned outside the boat.

“I think you’re getting a bite,” Gary said.

I looked up.  Sure enough, the end of my rod was bending then letting up.  I picked up my pole and felt the line twitch.  I let it go for a few seconds more, felt another twitch and pulled up quickly, setting the hook.  It felt solid. My drag began to whine.  After a time I began to reel it up. 

“I may need the net,” I told Gary.

Usually we just bring the walleye up to the side of the boat, grab the jig in their mouth, and lift them into the boat.  You can do that with an average fish.  This felt bigger.

It didn’t fight a lot.  I continued to reel it in and then we saw him near the surface.  When the fish saw the boat it headed back down where it came from.

“Whoa,” Gary said.

I didn’t want to horse the fish into the boat.  My line was six pound test.  The fish would tire out, Gary would net it, and then we could see what we had.  I worried my line could snag on the rocks.  I kept my rod tip up and continued to work the fish slowly.  Finally we saw it again.  The fish broke the surface and rolled on its side.

Gary got the net under that big fish and scooped it into the boat like he was shoveling snow.  He put it at my feet.  It thumped the bottom of the boat hard as it flopped. 

“Jesus, what is it?”

“It’s a walleye.”

“I thought it was a catfish.  Look at its head.”

It had a huge head.  Something about that fish immediately made me think of it as female.  I felt as if I had caught the big Mom of all the smaller walleye I had caught up till then.  It made me want to get her back in the lake safely, and as quickly as I could.

I opened her mouth.  Rather than being hooked through the lip the barb of the jig hook was buried in the top of her upper mouth.  No blood, it’s all bone and gristle there, so I dug in my tackle box and got out the needle nose pliers.  It wasn’t stuck as bad as I thought.  I grabbed the shaft of the hook, gave it a turn and a pull, and she was free.

“Wow Gary.  Let’s get a picture.  I want to get her back in the water.”

“Well you have to measure it.”

She was hard to hold.  I got a good grip on her tail, the other hand under her head, and put her against the side of the boat where the inches were laid out.  Twenty seven inches (27”).  Biggest walleye I’d ever caught. 

“Hold her up Dave.  Let’s get this done.”

As I held her and Gary took the picture I could feel the warmth of her.  Her body was warmer than the air.  She was alive and strong.  As soon as Gary snapped the photo I lowered her into the water and held her for a moment.  Then I let her go.  With one big flip of her tail she dove out of sight, safely back in her element.

And there you go.  Of all the moments I’ve had with wild animals that was one of the best. She was a beautiful fish.

On the drive home we rounded a curve and a small black bear was in our lane, taking its time crossing the road.  Rick slowed, honked his horn, and the bear looked over its shoulder at us as if annoyed.  Finally it turned and disappeared into the woods.

An hour later, in broad daylight, another shape crossed the road in front of us. 

“Is that a coyote?” I said.

“That’s a cat.  And not a bobcat either.  Look at that tail.”  Bob said.

It was a cougar, also called a mountain lion.  Bob cats and lynx have short tails.  This tail was long and fluffy.  It was a first for all of us, seeing that big cat.

Here’s the refreshing thing about our trip.  The only politics we encountered in the wilderness were the ideas, the frustrations, and the observations we brought with us.  They faded.  Soon we were asking what day it was, what was next for dinner, what we thought the weather might be, and where best to fish next.  We lived in the moment for the most part, and anticipated the next, as those animals we encountered did.  Fish swim and eat for the most part.  Animals simply live their lives.  Life is simple.  And it can be for us if we let it.

Don’t get me wrong, you need to vote in November.  But you also need to escape the craziness of modern life when you can.  It will you do you good I guarantee.

Bushwhacked Again

Once again I was bushwhacked by our health care system and, while not exactly held against my will, told by a nice ER doc (everyone is nice of course) I would more or less be a fool to leave. 

“Of course it’s up to you, but the smart thing, and what I would do if I were you, is agree to be admitted,  and let us run some tests so we can find out exactly what’s going on.”

He said that while my wife was in the room, and so I squelched my overwhelming desire to find my pants, retrieve my pocketknife, cut the damned bar coded bracelet off my wrist, along with the IV tube and the wires taped to my chest, and beat a path down those wide hospital hallways to the nearest exit.

The day started innocently enough.  I had an appointment an hour and a half from home for run of mill pre-surgery tests and an orientation to total knee replacement.  I figured two hours tops and I’d be on my way home, have an hour or so to work in the shack, then settle in to watch a Cubs game. 

But I flunked my very first pre op test.  I knew I was in trouble when the nurse (or tech aide) looked at a monitor that was being fed impulses from wires stuck to my chest and asked

“Do you have a pace maker?”

They’re trained not to react to bed news but I didn’t think there was any way that question could be framed as a positive.  I don’t have a pacemaker.

Long story short the nice anesthesiologist who came in next consulted with someone else on her cell phone and asked if I would mind going to the Emergency Room where they had better equipment for what I needed.  And then the wheel chair appeared.

“A wheel chair?  Really?  I walked in here.  I feel fine.”

She had a lot of tact.

“Yeah it’s probably overkill but humor us.  Would you?  Let us give you a ride.”

And thus began a 28 hour stay in a hospital.  I left with a diagnosis, a new prescription, an appointment with a cardiologist, grudging permission to go on a fishing trip to Canada two days later as long as I pledged to be extremely careful, and a whole new health condition to research. 

The whole thing felt something like getting hit by a car, which I also experienced long ago.  But I survived.  Neither the car nor the hospital took me out.

And to prove there may always be a silver lining to every dark cloud the whole deal sparked a memory which led to a poem. 

Please know that I’m OK.  That test revealed a problem which turned out to be not nearly as big a deal as it initially seemed.  But boy, they play it up.  On the subject of risk management, be assured that the people in our highly competitive and supercharged American health care system have done their homework.  As a result they take practically no risk that I can tell. 

I am reminded that once admitted to a hospital, everything changes.  There are more blog posts that could be devoted to ‘Health Care 2018’ but for now, see what you think of this poem.

Judge not, lest ye be judged

Near the spot where the hospital he was born,

67years ago, once stood,    

its new corporate name containing but a scrap

of the legacy of that old institution,

the night shift nurse briefed the day shift nurse,

on his progress while both stood at the foot of his bed.

They invited him to participate,

but spoke of him in the third person

as “the patient.”

Before he went to sleep some 7 hours earlier,

The night nurse asked him familiar questions.

What is today?

 “Tuesday.  August 21^st  I think.”

Where are we right now?

“Either in Normal at the very edge of Bloomington

or vice versa.  Not quite sure.  Close to Franklin Avenue and Virginia though.”

In his twenties the patient,

For a short time an aide in a nursing home,

before the term Alzheimers was coined,

when his mother and others her age

attributed everything from forgetfulness

to serious loss of brain function among the elderly to

“hardening of the arteries”,

he taught “Reality Orientation Therapy”

a class for confused elderly residents.

He recalled the short time he spent each day,

talking to a select group of spaced out old people.

With the help of a  chart of simple facts,

he recited each statement slowly,

carefully pointing to lines written in very large print:

“Today is Monday.

You are in Ottawa Illinois.

The season is summer.

The next holiday is Labor Day.”

Then he would lead a ten minute discussion, often about the past,

trying to draw his students in,

Spark some memory, kindle some emotion, bring some light to their eyes.

When the discussion ended he would go back to those simple facts.

without displaying the chart.

"Frank, what season is this?"

"Marie.  Marie?  Over here Marie.

What is today?"

"Charlie, what holiday is coming up?"

He then recorded their answers,

so often wrong,

in a spiral notebook,

and class ended.

What the home did with that data he never knew.

But tracking the decline of the tired brains,

in the  gray heads of those innocent old people,

made him profoundly sad.

Back in the patient’s room the hand off continued.

Lying in bed, colored plastic bracelets on his wrists,

tethered to a IV pole by tubes dripping meds into a port

taped on the back of his hand,

tied down by electrodes stuck to his chest

connected to wires leading to a glowing clicking monitor,

the patient met the gaze of the night nurse who,

 smiling, spoke these words to the day nurse at his side.

“…the patient seems alert and neurologically intact.”

The day nurse looked at the patient and smiled also.  Too sweetly.

Stunned, for some reason,

to be left hanging there in the third person

and judged, like an idiot, for how he was

oriented to time and place,

grateful he supposed for landing on the correct side

of such a terribly important test,

he interjected loudly.

“THAT’S MY GOAL.  KEEPING THE OLD NEUROLOGY INTACT.”

While thinking to himself, screaming to himself actually,

“Get me the hell out of here.”

Sara Dady for Congress in the 16th

If you are Republican with strong party loyalty, feel free to skip this post.  I’ve had a few readers ask to be taken off the e mail list following my posts on immigration, and have been unfriended on Face Book due to my politics.  I get it, and I’m more than glad to stop filling your inbox with material you don’t want to read.  I hesitate to write about politics these days because it’s getting harder and harder to have productive conversation.  Emotions run high.  It’s the times we live in.  But I can’t help it.  Dave in the Shack is about what I think and feel, and I can’t avoid this. 

My U.S. Representative in the House, the incumbent, is Republican Adam Kinzinger from Illinois’ 16^th District.  His opponent, challenging him for that seat in Washington, is Democrat Sara Dady.  I’m supporting Sara in the midterm election November 6.  I have her sign in my front yard.

 

The truth is, we had four very viable democratic candidates willing to challenge Adam Kinzinger in the March primary, a welcome change to years when no candidate or only a token candidate was on the ballot.  Sara Dady, an attorney from Rockford, built a law practice from her living room 10 years ago to be the biggest immigration firm outside the Chicago Metro area. 

I’ve invested more time, read more, and argued more about politics since the 2016 presidential election than any other time in my life since the Vietnam War and Watergate.  At times I feel overwhelmed.  But rather than pull back and keep quiet, the easy route believe me, I am determined to do something.  Put my money where  my mouth is so to speak.

The best way to counter the dangerous and alarming politics employed by this administration and stabilize the country is for Democrats to take control of one of the chambers of congress.  The best opportunity is the House of Representatives.  How do you involve yourself in that effort?  I think you work to effect change where you live.  I pledged that I would not only personally contribute to Sara Dady’s campaign but to seek other donors and raise $2,000 to help her take Adam’s Kinzinger’s seat in congress.  Here’s where I am with that.

I persuaded two donors to jointly provide a $1,000 matching fund for small donors who want to have an impact on their country and its policies.  Those donors will match your contribution dollar for dollar until their $1,000 runs out.  Maybe you’ve never given money to a political candidate.  Maybe you questions what difference you can make.  Let me address that.

Adam Kinzinger, according to recent reports in The Times, has spent about $1.4 Million in his re-election campaign and has roughly that much more left in his campaign fund.  He has received $866,574, or 35% of his funds from political action committees in 2017 and 2018 with Verizon, Ameren, AT&T, Caterpillar, and Comcast among his top contributors.  Small donors, giving less than $200, make up less than 2% of his re-election committee’s receipts.

Sara Dady has received no money from political action committees.  She has raised $213,587 and spent $206, 872.  Donations of less than $200 make up 32% of her dollars. 

Giving to political campaigns is different than giving to charity.  When you support a person for public office, especially one challenging the incumbent, you invest not only in hopes they win but in promoting issues which you feel are important.  Political campaigns test the viability of ideas.  When done well they make us think.  They move us forward.  They challenge the status quo.

Sara Dady shares my issues.  She believes the best way to solve the opioid crisis is to offer and fund more treatment through expanded Medicaid coverage.  Until we do that we spin our wheels.  Adam Kinzinger voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act over and over and it still has not been replaced with a coherent plan.  We remain stuck in a fragmented employer based health system that costs too much and shuts people out.  Medicaid for All, in one form or another, is the direction in which we need to move.

Sara Dady wants to expand educational opportunities for people of all ages at all levels, and find a way to allow current students to refinance crushing college debt at an affordable rate.  She supports an increased federal minimum wage to close the economic disparity that continues to grow.

And who better to be on a congressional work group to design and implement comprehensive immigration reform than a practicing immigration attorney?  Sara Dady advocates reform that includes a real worker visa program tied to actual labor market demand and increases due process in immigration proceedings of all kinds.

For a more complete look at Sara’s stand on the issues go to https://www.saradadyforcongress.com 

That’s what I want my representative in Congress, the person we elect to represent our interests, to work towards.  And so I’m helping her campaign by giving her money, by writing this piece, by continuing to help her get her message out.  I’m hoping you’ll join me.

I don’t have one of those fancy kick starter buttons to click on.  I’m doing this the old fashioned way.  Send a check to me made out to Sara Dady for Congress.  You don’t use checks much anymore but you’ll find some lying around your house.  They’re made of paper and you fill them out with a pen.  They require your signature.  Send them to me and I’ll see they are delivered to Sara Dady on Saturday August 26^th at a fund raiser along the river here in Ottawa where she will be present. 

                                                            Dave McClure

                                                            2110 Caton Road

                                                                                                    Ottawa, Illinois 61350

If you live in town and would like to save the price of a stamp you can put it in the big mailbox opposite that address.  It’s Cubby blue. Please don’t give me cash.  Your cancelled check is your receipt.  Your gift will also be acknowledged by the Sara Dady campaign.

Getting to $1,000 can be done lots of ways.  Ten $100 donors.  Twenty $50 voters.  Fifty $20 voters.  Some combination of all of them.  It will make you feel good to do something tangible to affect the politics of our country.

And if you can’t contribute, by all means vote.  If all registered Democrats simply went to the polls on November 6 we would elect Sara Dady in Illinois 16^th Congressional district.  Urge people to vote.  If you or someone you know are not registered to vote you can do so very easily.  You can vote early.  But you simply must be a part of the political process to change the shape and the substance of politics in this country. 

By being part of the process you can take matters into your own hands.  Vote for a candidate that shares your values.  And if you can support that candidate with your dollars.  I think it is up to us to get this done.

Thanks for reading all the way to the end.

Mario y Humberto

Mario Espinosa, who works for YSB, was recently honored for his work with migrants and immigrants to our area by the Illinois Coalition for Immigration and Refugee Rights and the Illinois Association of Agencies and Community Organization for Migrant Advocacy.  I was at YSB when Mario was hired, at the urging of Sara Escatel who developed YSB’s Hispanic Services Program.

We sought funding and created a program that advocated for immigrant families because of YSB’s  mission to help children and families succeed.  That mission said nothing about anyone’s citizenship status.  We wanted to make sure all kids got into school and received health care, that their parents felt safe to go to teacher conferences, received good advice on legal matters, and were not taken advantage of.  Mario Espinosa, Sara Escatel, Alice Berogan and others made sure all those things happened.

I wish I knew how long Mario has worked with immigrants to our area, but it’s early and I don’t want to wake anyone up with a phone call.  Suffice to say he’s made it his life work.

Eight years ago I wrote the following article about a migrant worker, Humberto Casarrubias Sanchez, who died in the fields in our area.  I wanted to give him a name and shed light on the plight of migrant workers.  But it occurred to me when reading the Face Book post about Mario yesterday that this piece also sheds light on the compassion and determination of Mario Espinosa.  I hope you remember them both.

Mario Espinoza called me on one of those terribly hot days in July when it looked like everyone fled the streets and was holed up in air conditioning wherever they could find it.  He was out of breath and excited.  Mario is pretty easy to read, even over the phone.  Something was going on.  Mario works in Mendota and is one of YSB’s two community workers fluent in Spanish who specialize in helping immigrant families.  In our area that population is mostly Mexican. 

“There’s a migrant worker missing off one of the detasseling crews up by Tampico.”

Tampico is a farm town in Whiteside County.

“They think he collapsed in the field due to the heat.  They’ve organized a search and I want to help.”

“Do you know this guy Mario?”

“I just talked to him and his brother two days ago at the Riviera.”

The Riviera Motel is actually not the Riviera anymore, it’s just what we still call it.  It’s a run-down hotel at the failed commercial interchange of Route 89 and Interstate 80 north of Spring Valley.  It’s used in the summer to house migrant workers, lots to a room. 

“What’s his name Mario?”

“Humberto.  Humberto Casarrubias Sanchez.” 

“Go ahead and help in the search Mario but be careful out there.  It’s too damn hot.  You could get sick yourself.”

“I’ll be careful.  I’m taking some of my kids with me.”

“And Mario, let me know how this turns out.”

It was July 19^th.  Humberto was working for Manter Labor McNeil, the equivalent of a temp agency for migrant workers.  Seed corn companies who need migrant labor to create strains of hybrid corn stopped hiring such persons themselves a while ago.  They rely on small employment agencies.  Somewhere in the mix would be a foreman or recruiter who speaks fluent Spanish and knows how to create word of mouth in Mexico so he gets the workers the seed corn companies need to arrive in Illinois when they are needed.

Humberto and his brother arrived in our area July 3^rd from the small village of Mazatepec, Morelos.  Humberto was 36 years old.  His wife, Maria Isabel Basilia and three daughters age 16, 12, and 9 last heard from him July 11 on a cell phone call.  He told them he would be working in Tampico, which he thought was funny.  Tampico is a town in Tamaulipas, Mexico.  He had to come to Illinois to get a job in Tampico. 

Humberto and his brother were working under HD-1 agricultural work visas that migrants are given to do work in our area.  Mendota, Dixon, and Sterling are used to migrant workers. 

They have been coming to Mendota for the sweet corn pack for years.  They come earlier too to rogue (removing weeds and volunteer corn plants among the seed corn plots) and detassel (taking the tassels which produce pollen off selected rows of corn, leaving the silks to receive pollen from bull rows next to them so that cross pollination occurs).  Try as they might the seed corn industry has not found an effective way to automate this process.  It is work no one else wants to do, especially in a heat index of 110 degrees, which were the conditions July 19^th when Humberto disappeared.

American teen agers used to do it all but that supply of workers is drying up.  My sisters dietasseled in the fifties and sixties.  My son did it in the early 2000’s.  Seed corn companies used to hire teachers and coaches to recruit local teen agers, form crews, and get the job done in a critically short time period.  When the tassels have to come off, there is little time to spare.  It’s changed now.  More and more the seed corn industry, at arm’s length through contracted temp agencies, relies on migrant labor.

That’s how Humberto found himself traveling from south of Mexico City to a Whiteside County cornfield working for nine bucks an hour, staying in a rundown hotel for cheap rent, earning money to support his family.  On July 19^th his co-workers saw him leave his row to go for water, a shovel in his hand and an orange cap on his head.  That was the last time they ever saw him.  Mario called me the next day. 

 “We didn’t find him.  We walked the whole field and he wasn’t there.  They’re going back today.”

“Mario what are the chances he got fed up, got a ride in to town, and is on a monumental bender?”

“He’s not that kind of guy Dave.  He knows no English.  It’s his first trip to the U.S..  He’s kind of scared here.  His brother can’t imagine he would leave the group.  Something’s happened.  The company won’t pull the work crew off the detasseling to help in the search.  We’re appealing for more people to search.”

The community responded.  150 to 200 emergency workers from throughout the area spent four 4 days searching roughly six square miles of land along Illinois’ Route 40, from Gaulrapp Road to State Route 172, looking for Sanchez.  Farm equipment, ATVs, a helicopter, bloodhounds and cadaver dogs were used, all to no avail.  Volunteers also walked the field in which he last was seen. Whiteside County Sheriff Kelly Wilhelmi explained 

“Everybody lined up on the end of the field. There are male and female rows. What we did was have one person go down the middle of female rows. They were searching four rows at a time.”

Eventually they called the search off and declared Humberto a missing person.  Mario was distressed.

“Now people are saying maybe he’s slipped away to violate his visa and stay.  He’s not that kind of man.  He wanted to go home.  He was just here to make money and help his family.  I know he’s out there.  His money, his papers, pictures of his family are still at the hotel.  He wouldn’t do this to his brother.  It’s not right.”

On Tuesday farmers harvesting seed corn in a field in the search area found the body of a man who was determined to be Humberto Casarrubias Sanchez.  Next to the body was a shovel and an orange cap.  It now appears he had been there all the time.  He may have been disoriented by heat stroke, wandered into the next field, laid down to rest and died.  We may never know.

Migrant labor, and individual laborers like Humberto from rural Mexico, makes the American seed corn industry possible.  That same labor source grows and harvests the vegetables we eat, busses and washes the dishes in our restaurants, maintains our shrubs and gardens, and does all types of jobs that Americans like you and I shun.  Like digging the Illinois Michigan canal.  Like building the railroads.  I want you to remember not just that a migrant worker died, whom Mario Espinosa came to know and tried to find in an Illinois cornfield, but that he has a name.  

Humberto Casarubbias Sanchez

1975-2010

May he rest in peace.