Seeing the World in a New Way

Conveying the shape and feel of an I Care clinic is difficult because the process is experienced by lots of people.  There are so many points of view. 

Not everyone who contributes makes the trip.   We have student volunteers from Morris, Illinois and Paso Robles, California high schools that wash and clean random bulk glasses received from members and friends of I Care and the Lions Club, and then assess each one using a piece of equipment known as a lensometer.  Once the exact prescription is determined for each eye it is written on a label on a plastic bag into which the glasses are placed. 

Some of those high school volunteers are “Dreamers,” and others are first generation immigrants from Central America.  They have a purpose in helping I Care that goes beyond filling volunteer hours required by their school. 

Both those who donate glasses and those who assess them trust their efforts will be rewarded when the glasses they processed are taken out of a bag by an I Care volunteer at a clinic in Central America and given to a person who lacks the means to obtain their own.  We conduct these annual clinics to preserve that trust. 

Volunteers take bagged glasses, bifocal and single vision, minus prescriptions for the near sighted, plus for the far sighted, corrected for astigmatism, the whole range of corrective needs, and create a catalog of glasses that will be used at the clinic site.  Over the years, optometrists have determined the type and range of prescriptions that will likely be needed.   Glasses are sorted by type and then a wide assortment of prescriptions are placed in cardboard sleeves in ascending order from the weakest  to strongest prescriptions.  This becomes the stock from which the prescriptive needs of individuals are matched to available used glasses.

Up to 6,000 used glasses may make the trip in black canvas bags to a clinic site, carried by I Care volunteers who pay for their own travel, lodging, and meals while performing the tasks needed to conduct a clinic.  Those volunteers are the people our patients see, but they represent others who may never travel to a clinic yet are indispensable to its success.

The single biggest cause of poor vision in the world is caused not by glaucoma, or cataracts, or retinal disease, or other maladies of the eye.  The biggest cause of poor vision is the lack of corrective lenses.  That’s what we strive to provide, improved vision to those whose eye problems can be improved with glasses.

I Care certainly doesn’t create and plan these clinics from the United States in a vacuum.  Before anything happens, we need to make sure people in the community we intend to serve extend a formal invitation, provide local contacts, security, recruit local volunteers, and do the hard work of site selection and logistics. When we arrive in county we need help getting our equipment through customs, transportation, meals, and more details than any one of us fully understands.  We found the cooperation we needed and more in hard working members of a Rotary Club in San Miguel.  Without them the clinic would have never happened.  We can’t thank them enough. 

Twenty-seven volunteers from the USA, one from La Penita Mexico, and two from Mexico City traveled to El Salvador to join with our Salvadoran hosts in staging this four-day clinic.  They worked at six clinic stations.  Here they are briefly.

Registration-Our most fluent Spanish speakers converse with each patient to determine basic demographic and personal information and gather a self-report of visual difficulties.  They record that on an intake sheet that travels with the patient throughout the clinic. 

Nurses-Because high blood pressure and diabetes are so closely correlated with vision problems, and vital information for our optometrists, we refer likely candidates to a station where nurses take blood pressures and determine blood sugar levels.

Acuity-Volunteers stand by eye charts on a wall pointing at smaller and smaller descending lines of symbols.  Ten feet away volunteers with clipboards listen to their responses and record the extent of their success; 20-20, 20-40, sees fingers at three feet, whatever the outcome, for each eye.  They do this hour after hour, day after day, for each and every person entering the clinic.

Auto Refractors-Two volunteers operate the most expensive machines on the trip, portable auto refractors which measures the way each eye bends and receives light.  It gives eye doctors a powerful indicator of the type of prescription likely needed best improve their vision. 

Docs-We had six optometrists on our trip, plus two last year optometry students from University of Missouri St. Louis.  That’s an abundance of professional volunteer help.  For the first time in the organization’s history, we believe, all of our optometrists and students were women.  By working well together they made the clinic’s operation very smooth despite a high volume of patients.  Docs evaluate the health of each patient’s eyes, diagnose eye disease if present and provide consultation and referral if possible, and determine the prescription needed for glasses if any.  Not everyone needs glasses, but everybody deserves a good eye exam.  Many get the first of both in our clinics.

Dispensing-Two types of volunteers work in dispensing, pickers and fitters.  Pickers comb through the stock of glasses and select the closest match to the prescription the eye doctor has written.  Once located they pass the glasses on to fitters who put them on the patient, determine if the glasses work well for them, and then adjust them for a comfortable fit.  Not every script works every time.  The fitters are the end of the line.  They ensure the process works for those counting on it for improved vision.    

Together we served 1,707 patients in four days, an average of 427 a day.   That’s a lot.  But all my observations so far are from the perspective of the clinic volunteers.  What’s missing is the perspective of the Salvadorans we served.       

I can’t speak for them of course, but I work as a fitter with limited Spanish and was able to talk to a good many of those who received glasses.  I want to tell you the stories of two of them, in hopes of conveying the essence of I Care’s El Transito clinic.

On a hot afternoon in a noisy crowded clinic I introduced myself to Alma, a 9 year-old girl from a village near El Transito.  She came to the clinic on the first day, Sunday, all dressed up.  She was accompanied by her mother, who explained that Alma’s teacher suggested she see an eye doctor.  Alma was really shy.  Her mother explained she was not sure she wanted to come, and even more unsure about wearing glasses. 

I looked at the prescription the doctor had written, and the glasses the picker had chosen.  Alma required single vision minus glasses.  Those are designed for patients with myopia, which we know as near sightedness.  Her prescription was a -2.50 sphere.  Alma’s near vision was likely OK she but would struggle to see things far away.  Her teacher may have noticed that when she was trying to see chalk marks on a blackboard. 

That’s a moderate version of the kind of vision I have.  I got my first glasses at her age, also reluctantly.  But after realizing how well I could see with them I didn’t want to take them off. 

The pickers had found a nice pair of small glasses, plastic frames brown on the outside with pink on the inside.

“Alma, have you worn glasses before?”

I said that in Spanish knowing the answer but wanting to strike up a conversation.

“No.  Nunca.”

Nunca means never.  It’s the most frequent answer to that question every time, every year I make the trip.

“Well these glasses should help you see things much better at a distance.  I bet you can read well, is that right?  You see words in a book clearly?”

Alma just nodded.  Her mother answered for her, proudly. 

“Alma is a good reader.  She reads a lot.  Not a problem.”

“OK. Tell me what happens when you look through these.”

I unfolded the glasses and put them over her ears.  They settled down over her nose nicely.

“Ahora, mira aya.”  (Now look away.)

I pointed across the room.

Alma looked over the crowd at the people doing acuity.  I saw her gaze shift up to the pigeons sitting on a ledge above them.  I watched her closely.  A little smile broke out on her face as she gazed across the room.  

“Como es?  Claro?” (How is it?  Clear?)

I knew the answer from her smile, but I wanted her to tell me.

“Si.  Muy Claro.”  (Yes.  Very Clear.)

She turned to her Mom and gave her a bigger smile.  Her Mom looked relieved.

I went into a little rap I have memorized in Spanish about wearing the glasses every day, putting them on the first thing when you get up and taking them off only when you go to sleep.  I advised that she may not need them to read and if it was more comfortable to take them off while reading.

I cautioned both her and Mom that the lenses were plastic and easily scratched.  They should be cleaned with soap and water and wiped only with a soft cloth.   I gave her one of the donated microfiber lens cleaning cloths some nice donor furnished for us to distribute.  Her Mom put it in her purse.

Before they left, I asked her Mom if it was OK to give Alma a small gift.  I went to the table where we kept our adjusting tools and selected something for Alma from a box.

I held a Pez dispenser in front of her.  At its top was the head of a white rabbit.

“Mira Alma.  Es un conejo.” (Look Alma it’s a rabbit.)

I tipped the rabbits head back and a little Pez candy pushed forward.

“Y es un dulce tambien.”  (And it’s a candy too.)

She smiled bigger than before.

I’m pretty sure the I Care clinic worked well for Alma.  She was able to get her vision corrected early in her life, which will make a real difference in how she sees the world growing up.  With any luck she and her Mom will realize their importance and will find a way to get more glasses as she grows.  Myopia is not a condition that goes away.  But it is easily corrected.  Someone donated those glasses to I Care.  Others did the work needed to provide a good eye exam and make those glasses available to benefit Alma.  I was just lucky enough to see that benefit unfold firsthand.



We worry sometimes that our hosts do not take seriously the task of promoting a clinic in their community.  In this case the Rotary Club of San Miguel teamed up with the city of El Transito and simply broadcast over public media the dates and times of the clinic.  That approach has not always worked in the past.  This time it did.  It was our first time working with this Rotary club, our first time in El Salvador.  We should have trusted them to know their community.

The clinic was a madhouse.  Each day before we arrived, in order to keep waiting patients out of the sun, our hosts packed the place with waiting people.  It was very difficult to walk through the crowd.  We asked out hosts to create aisles through the rows of chairs so we, and patients crossing to the next station in the clinic, could make our way across the room.  The clinic was the biggest thing in town.  It attracted vendors.  They balanced their wares on their heads.

Inside the all concrete structure the steady hubbub of the crowd coupled with an amped up public address system and a woman with a microphone speaking into it with a shrill voice and it was damned hard to hear.  We leaned in closely to catch the responses of our patients.
  
I often asked the people who were receiving glasses from me how long they had waited.  Some reported being there over four hours.  You would never have known that.  They were calm.  Families brought their children and accompanied the elderly.

The locals managing the crowd were careful to give priority to the handicapped, the frail, and those in wheelchairs.  I was impressed with the patience and kindness they showed each other, and us.  I wanted to return it.  I think each I Care volunteer shared the desire to both reciprocate the welcome shown us by our hosts and reflect the kindness we felt from the people we served.

  
When the fitters were backed up dispensing glasses, when too many people crowded our waiting area, the pickers jumped in to help us.  My wife is a picker but doesn’t know as much Spanish as she would like.  One of the good young Salvadoran volunteers, Carolina Navarro, served as her translator.

She called out a woman’s name and an elderly woman was helped to the front by her grand daughter. She walked with a cane.  Colleen looked closer at her intake sheet and saw that she was 97.  Her name was Victoria.

“I would never have guessed her to be that old,” Colleen said later.  “She was so engaging.  And anxious to get those glasses.”

 “Have you ever worn glasses Victoria?”  Carolina translated Colleen’s words into Spanish.

“Nunca.”

“She never has,” Carolina explained.

“Well here you go.”

Colleen unfolded the temples of the bifocals and tried to put the glass on the old woman’s face, but she reached out quickly and put them on herself.

We make assumptions about the elderly.   Colleen assumed she needed and wanted the strong bifocals primarily for reading.

“Carolina, ask her how the letters look in this newspaper.”

Colleen handed the 97-year old Victoria a page of newsprint.  She brushed it aside and responded, cheerfully

“No sabe leer.”

“What did she say Carolina?”

“She says she can’t read.”

The old woman straightened up in the chair and looked slowly all around the clinic.  Smiling she looked back at Carolina and my wife.

“Ask her what she sees Carolina.”

“Que ves Victoria?”

“Te veo, y eres hermosa.”

“What did she say?”

“She said she sees you, and you’re beautiful.”

When my wife heard Victoria’s words through Carolina, big tears came to her eyes.  If you don’t catch the emotion wrapped up in bringing improved vision to those who have never experienced it, you miss the impact I Care has on people outside our borders.  Like Alma, the nine year-old girl we were able to help, Victoria had just received her first pair of glasses, and with them a new view of the world around her.
  
And in many ways, we Americans who made the trip to El Salvador opened our eyes to a new world too.

A Trip to the Sea

I’ve been unable to write a blog post lately.  Making sense of life these days is difficult.  Every time I think I know what I want to say, my assessment of what we are collectively experiencing changes and my assumptions get thrown out the window.  So, I’ve decided to just write about things that come to mind.  Maybe you can figure it out. 

Weeks before our departure date of February 29, the leader of our eye care mission to El Salvador, an eye doctor who values collaboration, while doing advance planning with a few volunteers, mentioned this near the end of a long list of items.

“OK, Coronavirus.  One of our volunteers brought it up in an e mail.  Do you think there is anything we need to do in connection with that?”

I was quick to answer.

“What could we do?  I mean what would we change now about the way we run the clinic that could make a difference?   I think we’ll be home long before whatever happens with that has any effect on anything.”

“I agree.  I just wanted to bring it up.  It’s a concern for at least one of us.”

When we landed in the San Salvador airport all the staff were wearing protective face masks.  When we left nine days later, we were afraid they would be taking our temperatures before allowing us on the plane back to Miami.

We operated a four-day clinic in the town of El Transito, a working-class community of 35,000 people forty-five minutes by bus from the large metropolitan center of San Miguel.  El Transito served as a hub for people living in small villages around it.

The third day was the toughest.  We worked late and served more people than we anticipated.  It was hot.  We worked in a concrete parking garage.  We had a roof over our heads, but it was an open-air structure with no air conditioning.  Temperatures topped 100 degrees in the afternoon.  By the time we served our last patient we were worn out.    

Though many of us wanted to simply go back to our hotel, our hosts, members of a good San Miguel rotary club, insisted we take a detour to a beach.  As we slowly wound through hilly country roads the light began to fade.  Some of us dozed off.

The bus stopped at a small resort.  We got off the bus, all thirty-one of us, and were directed through a group of buildings towards a place where the sky opened.  As we neared the beach, we could hear the waves.

When we reached the sand and began taking off our shoes the sun was nearly touching the horizon over the Pacific Ocean.  We waded into the surf as the clouds, the sky below the clouds, the cresting waves, and the water washing around our legs turned orange.  It was the perfect end to the day.

The resort staff put citronella candles on the sand between our tables and served us drinks and dinner under tents near the beach.  The night sky turned black and the air around us cooled.

An eye doctor from Mexico City, refreshed and reflecting on what just occurred, asked this question.

“When you saw the sea for the first time, how did you feel?”

I responded right away.  I’d thought about that very moment just an hour earlier, when I felt the waves rushing back towards the ocean pulling sand from under my bare feet.

“I was seventeen years old and the farthest away I’d ever been from the Illinois farm I grew up on was Fort Leonard Wood Missouri.  The day after I graduated high school three of us farm kids drove to Florida without stopping in a Chevy Impala Super Sport.  We drove straight to St. Pete’s Beach, changed into swimming suits in the car, and walked into the Gulf of Mexico.  The ocean was the biggest thing I had ever seen.  I thought my whole life was in front of me.”

“Yeah, OK.”  She said slowly, not satisfied with my answer, “But how did you FEEL?”

I thought for just a moment and then I remembered.

“I felt free.  I felt absolutely and totally free.”

I don’t feel that way now.

photo by Lynn Zwica

A Chance Encounter on the Way to Quesadillas

I see him sometimes on his bike, and knew he was big, but I didn’t know he’d grown taller than me until I stood next to him in the store.  I still live in the town where I was a counselor and he has never left.  Funny we run into each other so little. 

He immediately began talking, telling me a story of something that happened to him, like he did when he was a boy and I a young man. 

A school counselor asked if I could help him.  He was suddenly failing, but the counselor was worried about much more than that.  His parents were alarmed, unsure, but let me see him.

He was guarded, hedged his words, looked away.  I saw him every week, sometimes twice.  I’d see him alone.  He liked to ride bikes on the canal.  We rode slowly beside each other and talked.  When others rode by, he was quiet till they passed.

I included him in a group with three other kids I was seeing.  At first, he didn’t mix well, staying close and talking mostly to me.  I let individual kids pick where we were going next.  When his turn came this tall, friendless boy picked a place near a strip mine, sandstone canyons outside the state park, hard to get to, that the other boys loved.  It was a good day for him.  He became part of the group.

He shared secrets with me.  I suggested he let me help him tell his parents, but he was afraid, so I waited.  He finally did allow me to help him reveal those secrets to his sister, married and out of the house, who also promised not to tell.  That helped.  He was surprised and relieved she wasn’t angry.

Time passed.  I suggested we all meet, that both his sister and I help him tell his parents the secrets.  He wanted to think that over.  We let him.  Finally, he agreed.

His sister did most of the talking.  All of them, including their mother, watched the Dad carefully.  It was as if the things he admitted were not secrets to the mother.  The father looked down and nodded.  We couldn’t tell what he thought.  It was tense.

Then he looked up at his son and told him it was all right.  Oxygen flooded back into the room.  I soon begged off, saying I had an appointment.  Mom started dinner.

The boy didn’t need me as much after that, but he didn’t know it.  I saw him less but included him in the group for months.  The group began to see each other without me.  I faded out of their lives and into the lives of others.

As years went by, I heard from the sister most often.  Life was not easy for her brother, but he made it.  Their father passed away, and then their mother.  They sold the family home and with the money her brother, with his sister’s guidance, bought a small house he could afford to maintain.  He talks often with his sister still. 

Forty years later the boy, now a middle-aged man, was telling me, an old man, of a brush with death experience between him on a bike and a woman in a car.  He was excited and included all the details.  I was holding a bag of tortillas and slab of chihuahua cheese.  He didn’t seem to notice.  I could hear the boy in his voice, the boy I once knew, scared, but able to trust.  Loved by a family.  Grown into a man.  Living his life.

Finally, the tale ended.  I asked about the boys in our old group, his sister.  Our meeting was drawing to a close.

“Do you think I thanked you back then?”

“I think you probably did.”

“I bet I didn’t.”

“It’s all right.  I was glad to help.”

“Thank you.”

“Your sister did most of the work.  And you.  You were brave.  It was a lot to ask.”

“Still, I’m glad you were there.”

“Me too.”

“See you around.  Take care of yourself.”

“You too.”

I shifted the cheese to the hand holding the tortillas.  He extended his hand.  I squeezed it.  He looked right at me.  It had been forty years.  Neither of us forgot.      

Hot Toddy 2020

I was reminded of this old post by a reader today and updated it.  Some posts, and recipes, are timeless.

Last Monday my nose started to run.  It became annoying.  As the day went on, I started sneezing.  I used more and more Kleenex, and my nose got red and raw.  Could be allergies I thought.

That night I didn’t sleep well, and Tuesday  I woke with the start of a sore throat.  By afternoon that sore throat was beyond just starting.  It hurt.  I started to cough. 

Wednesday my head cold had migrated to my chest.  I felt wheezy.  I knew then I officially had the crud.  I get it every winter it seems.  I get cocky sometimes and think I’ve beaten it, but I never do.  If its only one cold a year,that’s a triumph.  It’s to be expected, but I never expect it.  I feel victimized, singled out, unfortunate.  Some might say I get whiny, someone close to me.  I don’t think that’s the case.  I get sick is what I get, and nothing is more important than getting over it.

There are theories about the crud.  Some say our mild winter, which has so far lacked a hard and prolonged freeze, failed to kill these bugs that attack us.  I for one think nothing kills these bugs, they live among us and attack us in winter when we are most vulnerable.  We miss the sun, we’re halfway between Christmas and St. Patrick’s Day, stuck somewhere between red and green, and life sucks.  February, aside from Valentine’s day, sucks.  We’re sick of winter, life sucks, we get colds.  It’s the human condition for those of us who insist on living in Illinois throughout the winter.

But I for one refuse to despair because I have the cure for these damned colds.  Before there was Mucinex, before Nyquil and Dayquil, before Theraflu, and yes even before Vicks VapoRub, was the hot toddy.  And I have the recipe.  The Hot Toddy is not only ingredients and preparation, its attitude.  Colds suck, but hot toddies help us fight back.  Ironically when your spirits are down, the spirit(s) found in  the hot toddy will pick you up. 

Hot toddies are the tried and true treatment of colds and maladies of all kinds.  Before there was shrink wrap, TV advertising, and a reliance on pills and drugs to cure all our ills, hot toddies were relieving symptoms of cold and flu all across America.  Ingredients for this amazing remedy were commonly found in all households, save for those of tea totallers who helped America careen off the rails and into Prohibition in the 1930’s.  Here’s all it takes to be on the road to recovery via hot toddy, in this order.

Water-not much.  A quarter inch, and certainly less than a half an inch, in the bottom of a small saucepan is plenty.  A small saucepan mind you.  Maybe that little one you cook your oatmeal in.

Lemon-whatever you have, but preferably the juice of half a fresh lemon. Don’t worry about the seeds, and when you’re done squeezing toss the peel in the pan.

Honey-plenty. If your honey comes packed inside a plastic squeezable bear give yourself the amount of honey between his eyes and his mouth.  If it’s in a jar start with two tablespoons.

Cinnamon-if you have cinnamon sticks, little rolled up pieces of bark, throw in two.  If not, put in less than a teaspoon of ground.  Try to incorporate it into the honey so it doesn’t float on top.

Whiskey, or one of its brown cousins-this is the heart and soul of the hot toddy and deserves special attention.  After much experimentation I find a Kentucky bourbon of fairly high proof works best.  I’ve used both scotch and rye, and Bushmill’s Irish which comes in a close second, but for my palate it’s hard to beat the  Midwest America good stuff.  You don’t need to use your best sippin’ bourbon for this drink.  A bottle of good all-purpose inexpensive hard stuff works just fine. I’m partial to Old Grand Dad 100 proof.

Whatever you choose, or whatever you have, keep it on the counter, readily available, for the duration of your cold.  You might consider keeping a bottle on hand dedicated just for this medicinal purpose.  You never know when a cold may strike.  I plan to replace the bottle of Old Grand Dad that helped me beat my cold, perhaps adding one more to be safe, on my very next trip to Herman’s Liquor Store.

The brown cousins, brandy, cognac, and dark rum, though inferior in my opinion, are suitable replacements.  White rum, which you might consider appropriate, ruins the presentation.  It’s not right.  Hot toddies are brown.  That’s the way it goes.

Prepare as follows-Add enough whiskey or other brown spirits to the mixture in your saucepan to fill it half to three quarters full.  If it’s over ¾ full, that’s OK.  Light the burner, adjust the flame to somewhere between full on and half lit, and stir your toddy.  Get those cinnamon sticks twirling around on the bottom, swish the honey with the lemon, let the whiskey mix with the water, and watch as bubbles begin to form around the edge of the pan.

Get your nose close to the toddy.  This is part of the cure.  Get that nice boozy smell way up in your head.  It will help clear you up.  Under no circumstances allow your toddy mix to boil.  Boiling reduces the alcohol content, and that won’t do. Now taste.

·       If the lemon tastes too sour, add more whiskey.

·       If it seems a little watery, add more whiskey.

·       If you find the honey has made it too sweet, add more whiskey.

Come to think of it, any hot toddy problem is best solved by adding more whiskey.  Do this as you heat the toddy, as adding cold whiskey at the end reduces the temperature of your toddy which will result in a tepid toddy, rather than a hot one. 

Before it boils, but after it steams, turn the heat under your toddy mix off and ladle a generous portion of your newly created home remedy into a porcelain coffee cup rather than a glass.  The cup will keep your toddy hot, and not using a glass will prevent your spouse or other family members from visually monitoring your toddy consumption as the day goes on.  Don’t be surprised if it alarms them.  If confronted the proper response to expressions of concern, from a spouse or other loved one regarding the amount of hot toddy you are consuming is this:

“Who has this cold? You or me?” 

I suggest keeping the saucepan on the stove and adding various ingredients as needed so that you maintain a continuous supply of hot toddy at all times during the day.  If there was a dosage recommendation for hot toddy like those that come with manufactured products it would be “take liberally, as needed, until desired results are achieved.”

I began the hot toddy treatment Tuesday afternoon, continued it throughout the day on Wednesday, and by Thursday felt 100% better.  Taking a hot shower and getting dressed Thursday added to my recovery.  Sometimes you have to just soldier on. 

And there you go.  Stay warm. Winter will soon be over.  But if a cold strikes know that there is a home remedy at your disposal that promises to relieve your symptoms in a most enjoyable way.  Try the hot toddy.  You’ll like it.     

Dave's Still Here

I haven’t put out a blog in a month.  Not so.

For a very long time, I’ve sat on a book of farm stories.   Some of them were written a long time ago, when I was travelling.  I digitized them, brought them together in one Microsoft folder, and eventually put them into a single file.  Going out on a creative limb, I named the file Farm Stories, whole thing.  I’ve never found a title.  I managed a table of contents though.

Ten years ago, I sent a few farm stories to people close to me, mostly family and a few close friends.  One was “Shelling Corn.”  Another was “Christmas on the Farm.”  To a very few I sent a story called “Trust.”  They urged me to write more stories like them.  My nephew said something that sparked my interest.

“When I read your stories,” he said, “I can hear your voice.”

 I wasn’t sure what that meant but it seemed positive. 

I added stories, rewrote some, put them in some vague order.  Three years ago, I sent them out to a wider audience, maybe a dozen Alpha readers, which included both friends and acquaintances.  Some were people from my childhood I’d found on Face Book and not talked to in many years.  In addition to them I shared the stories with people that had no connection to farming or my early days in Central Illinois.

I found my former English teacher, who accepted the assignment gladly and made individual comments on each story.  I felt a little like she was grading my paper.  One of the Alpha readers tried to categorize them into farm stories and family stories.  They read my stories and gave them real thought.  I was amazed in a way.

I have always had feedback on my blog, most of it immediate, but this was different.  They read over 90,000 of my words and communicated in a thoughtful and helpful way.  That’s a wonderful thing to do for a writer.  It helped me a lot.

But still I concentrated mainly on my blog.  The book was put on the digital shelf.  But as an old psalmist once wrote, “who knows from whence cometh our help?”  Sometimes assistance bubbles up from unexpected sources.

I made a friend at church who was new to town.  He lived most of his life in or near diverse and vital cities before relocating here.  To adapt to small town life, he tries to recreate some of the things he experienced in cities and misses.

He had been part of a group on the West Coast who met regularly and listened to each other’s poetry read aloud, either original or admired.  He pitched the idea to our church, Open Table in Ottawa, and they agreed to let it happen monthly in their space. 

From that monthly group of poetry enthusiasts a group of regulars formed.  The regulars, which included me, became so comfortable talking and listening to each other, that this conversation occurred.

“I enjoyed your last blog.”

“I’m glad you did.  What was it about?”

“You were talking to the Republican guy in the BBQ joint in Alabama.”

“Yeah.  That was a fun one to write.  I was afraid it was too long.  Too political.”

“No, it was good.  The dialogue worked well.”

“Thanks.”  

“How many blogs do you think you’ve written?”

“A lot.  I started writing them years before I retired, but those were about the agency.  I first sent the blog to board members, then donors, and later staff and referral sources.  It grew.  Started in the early 2000’s I’d say.  Used to do it weekly without fail.  In fact, that’s one of the reasons I retired.  The blog was all I wanted to do.”

“So more than ten years?”

“Oh yeah.  Probably.”

“That’s too bad.”

“Why do you say that?”

“When there is a lot of stuff to go through, a lot of material to consider, it bogs people down. Overwhelms them.  Rereading and grouping old pieces together is not like working on the same book draft every day.  Your thoughts jump around, unless you confine yourself to a narrow topic.  Do you have a fairly narrow focus to your blog?”

“No.  Not at all.  When people ask me what my blog is about I say, “Whatever I want.”

“But you might think about publishing anyway.  I think your voice is strong.”

“What do you mean "voice"?  I’ve heard that before and I don’t exactly know what it means. “

“Hard to explain, but its something like authenticity.  Believability.  Think of reading Mike Royko.  Were you around for Royko?”

“Sure I was.”

“You didn’t even have to look at the byline to know you were reading Royko.  It was the way he used words.  Made sentences.  It was like putting his handwritten signature on the page even though it was a standard commercial font.  It made you comfortable, like a pleasant voice does.”

“I see.”

There was a pause.

“I’ve never pulled out blog posts and tried to group them together in a coherent way, but I do have a collection of old farm stories.”

“Why farm stories?”

“I grew up on a farm.  Dairy farm.  On Route 9 between Bloomington and Pekin.  Went to a tiny school in a small town.  The first story is an early memory at age four and the last is me leaving the farm for college and not looking back.”

“Boyhood story then.  Takes place on a farm.”

“Yeah, I guess, if you put it that away.  But a collection of stories.  Not a book.”

“Would you share it with me?”

“It’s long.  Somewhere over 90,000 words”

“That’s all right.  I don’t care.”

“Sure.  I’ll send it.”

That’s how stuff happens.  You talk to someone. Listen.  Make a connection.  Offer an idea.  It’s simple really.

The person who agreed to read my stories was first accepted by a publisher in 2006.  Several books of poetry and two novels later, she knows what it takes to get published. 

I don’t.  I’ve been silently trying to plot some course toward that goal ever since the first day I retired.  Silently is the key word in that sentence.  I read articles on writing and publishing.  Signed up for digital discussion groups with emerging authors.  It got me nowhere.  Why do we think we can do things on our own without real and tangible help from other people?  How often does that happen?

Read the dedication pages of books.  Honest authors thank a whole list of people.  It takes a village to raise a child and that same village is required, I think, to get one of its member’s written thoughts distributed to a wider public.  I’ve barely admitted publishing was a goal and talked to very few people about it.  It was like a hope I dared not mention lest it break into a thousand pieces.  Who knows why we think the way we do?

She told me she thought what I sent her was good.  She not only read it she began to edit it.  Together we rearranged the stories.  We cut stuff.  We thought some threads needed to be expanded, and some themes better developed.  We asked and answered questions of each other over email.

One of my  questions to her was this.  “Instead of a book of stories, do you think these might be chapters in a book?”

She responded right away. “I’ve been hoping you’d see them as chapters.  If you think that way, you will change your approach.  To me, your book is a memoir, a coming of age story of a boy who experiences the world through the people and animals on his family’s small farm, and the community around it.  Each chapter advances his learning, gets him closer to maturity, and prepares him for the day he leaves.  If you concentrate on it as a book, each chapter will advance that theme.”

I’m on my fifth draft.  Each draft requires less changes.  I’ve drafted an author blurb and a blurb about the book.  We’re getting closer.  The next big step is submission to publishers.

So that’s what I’ve been doing instead of blogging.  I’ll try to talk to you more often.

Fooling Around

I woke up early December 10^th to a dark twelve-degree morning.  Before my thoughts turned to the present, I remembered how bright the moon was during the night and recalled, ever so briefly, the tail end of a vivid, colorful dream.

Sadly, mundane thoughts of the new day chased my dream away and it is now lost forever.  What was more important than my dream?  My regret at not cutting firewood the day before when it was warm.

Cold dominated my thoughts.  I thought of where to find my chopper mittens, my cold weather hat (a Stormy Kromer), and a warmer scarf.  At the same time, I imagined keeping the cold chill of the shack off my coffee.   It’s one small room heated by a small wood stove.  Sunrise is a treat in the shack because it has an east facing glass wall overlooking a deep ravine.  I didn’t want to miss the show, but it was going to be damned cold during the first twenty minutes of my arrival. 

I put bread in the toaster, got apple butter from the fridge, and poured myself a glass of milk.    

I ground dark roast coffee beans, filled the basket of a small stovetop Bialetti coffee maker, put it on a burner, and lit the gas.  Espresso would soon begin brewing in that odd upside-down machine.  I looked for my thermos, but it was nowhere to be found.  Then I remembered.  I could see it plain as day sitting in the shack on my desk where I’d left it the day before.  I hate it when that happens.  It creates a rough spot in an otherwise smooth morning.

I found my coat and warm weather hat where I had left them and headed out the back door.  It’s a quick trip to the shack and back.  The stainless-steel thermos, right where I thought it would be, was freezing.  So was my hand holding it as I carried it back to the house.

The espresso would be piping hot.  Putting it in an ice-cold thermos would defeat the purpose, so I microwaved a big tumbler of water (hot water takes forever to make the trip from the basement water heater to our kitchen faucet). 

As the microwave whirred and did its mysterious thing to the water, the Bialetti began to burble. So that it would not boil and make the fresh brew bitter, I turned the burner off.  Next, I poured the now hot water from the tumbler into the thermos to warm it so it wouldn’t draw heat from the espresso.

I waited.  While I did, I had breakfast and worked on the Chicago Tribune crossword puzzle. 

Sometime after the answer to the clue for 50 across “The Good Earth mother” leapt magically into my brain (Olan), it dawned on me (pun intended) that I was playing a zero-sum game.  As my thermos was warming up, my espresso was cooling down.  Success sometimes seems impossible.

What was the optimum time to end those opposite dynamics of cooling and warming for the hottest possible coffee?  I wasn’t going to know with any certainty, and I damned well wasn’t going to waste more time thinking about it.

I found my Stormy Kromer hat on the opposite end of a shelf where my chopper mittens were hiding.  I found the wool scarf I pictured on a hanger in the closet where it I thought it would be.  I went back to the kitchen.  There I dumped the hot water from the thermos, poured in the espresso, and added two sugar cubes.  After putting on my newly assembled cold weather gear, I headed back through the cold, hot coffee in hand, to the shack and the coming dawn.

It was time to put an end to those mundane thoughts and get on with my day.  There’s only so much fooling around you should do before beginning to write.

Santa at the Lodi

I dropped into the Lodi Tap House in Utica on Saturday, the winter solstice, and grabbed a stool at the bar.  It was crowded.  Lodi’s used to be Duffy’s, a revered Irish bar and an institution among Illinois Valley drinkers and St. Paddy’s day revelers.  I’d gone to Duffy’s for 45 years, back when the standard order at the bar was a shot of Kesslers and Miller High Life.

When it was sold, and the new owners revealed plans to scrap the Irish deal and create a modern style brew pub ala Chicago, I thought I’d never again enjoy spending time in that old odd shaped building.  But Lodi brought in an unbelievably large selection of beer and ales on tap, 24 that night, and 90 more draft beers in cans and bottles.  The choices are dizzying.  That doesn’t even count the liquor and cocktails.  On top of that are award winning burgers.  It’s a whole new deal for downtown Utica.  I got used to it, though grudgingly.     

There were only two stools open and one had a shot and a beer sitting in front of it and some money.  That’s a local custom, leave your money on the bar and let the bartender take it as you drink.

There was a guy making his way down the bar, talking to everyone it seemed, before he eventually sat down next to me.   He looked familiar.

Under a flat wool tweed cap, he had white hair and a big beard to match.  He was wearing blue jeans, a green flannel shirt, and a black vest.  He stared forward, the way guys in bars do, looking at himself in the wide bar length mirror, scanning the bottles, and the blackboard that explained the day’s line up of draft beer and ale.  He wasn’t paying much attention to me, but something about him nagged me.  I know I’d seen him before.

“Sorry to bother you but you look familiar.”

He spoke without turning his head.

“Do you think you can keep your voice down McClure?  Not draw attention to us?  It’s Santa Claus.  I’m out of uniform and taking a break.”

“Santa Claus!”  I tried to whisper but admit I was still a bit loud.  “What are you doing?  Undercover Santa?"  

“You’re doing exactly what I don’t want you to do.  Don’t call me Santa.  Just look ahead and be cool.  I don’t want to draw attention. Let me buy you a shot.  What’ll you have?”

“Bushmill’s Irish whiskey.  Black Bush if they have it.”

“Good choice.”

He ordered us both one.  I toned down my voice, looked at him in the mirror, where he was looking back at me and raised my glass.

“Merry Christmas Nick.”

He winked at me.

“I can call you Nick, right?”

“That works just fine.  Merry Christmas to you too Dave.”

And so, in the hubbub of Christmas week on the shortest day of the year in an old bar made new in a small town along the Illinois River, Nick and I had a quiet conversation.

“It seems like we run into each other every year, but this time I thought I was going to miss you. What brings you back here Nick?  You must get requests for personal appearances from all over the world.  You end up in Utica.”

“I get lots of requests.  And I try to spread them around.  But I’m kind of hooked into this country around Starved Rock.  I like it.  Seems authentic somehow.”

“Even when we take nice old Irish bars and make them into sparkly clean brew pubs?”

“You asking if I’m upset with the change?  McClure, every year it seems like you forget how old I am.  You act like you’re talking to someone your own age.  I was invented you know, a long time ago.  An idea made flesh, infused with magical power, and immortalized.  At least it appears so.  I mean you never know how long ideas are going to live, or the people that hold those ideas for that matter.  Still I’m in for a long run I think.”

“So now you’re going to tell me about the old days?”

Yes, I am.  I think you could stand a little perspective.”

He took a sip of his double IPA, a Pipeworks Ninja vs. Unicorn in a flashy can. 

“A damn nice ale this one.  Hoppy but not overdone.  Nice finish.”

“You were about to go back in time Nick.”

“So I was.  You forget that I was flying over here when there were still indigenous people camped along the river, the Illini and the Kickapoo tribes.  I hadn’t been coming to America for more than, I don’t know, 175 years when Illinois was the frontier.”

I delivered toys here to Irishmen’s kids living in shanties when they were digging the Illinois Michigan canal that’s a stone’s throw outside the door.  Those boys were making their own whiskey back then, and let me tell you, I wasn’t sneaking into their joints for a taste of it, not when you could get perfectly fine whiskey on the north shore of Ireland.  Bushmills began distilling whiskey in 1608 for god’s sake.

After the canal was dug coal miners showed up, first for the easy pickings, shallow veins of coal just below the surface, then coal companies began dropping shafts and sending miners underground in Streator, Cherry, Ladd, Toluca.  Italians, Frenchmen, people from all over Europe came here.”

“Do you have a point here Nick?”  

“The shanty towns became proper towns and they built sturdy old buildings like this one.  And you’re moaning because a bar changes its name?  Gets rid of the mannequin dressed up as an Irishman in a coffin by the front door?  Adopts a new menu?  Come on McClure.  Get a grip.”

Santa Claus has a way of giving you the long view.

“OK, I admit it.  I forget how much we’ve changed, and how steady that change must seem if you’re…how old are you again?”

“My beginnings have always been somewhat disputed, and record keeping being what it was back then it’s hard to be accurate, but everyone’s best guess is I’m 1,749 years old.  When you get that old it a year or ten more or less doesn’t matter much.”

“Yeah.  I have a disadvantage talking the past with you being only 68. But what about the present?  And even more important what about the future?”

“The future has been hard to deal with because it always seemed beyond our control.  But we’re developing facts, and models to put them in that predict things we don’t like.  I live at the North Pole.  I’m terribly worried about the environment.  You can’t believe the ice we’re losing up there or the changes that are happening.  And damned if we aren’t going backwards in doing what it will take to slow that down and stop it.  It’s terribly discouraging.”

“I’m with you there, Nick.  Facts don’t seem to matter.  It’s all about the money.”

“It’s been about the money for a long time McClure.  As I recall your generation was going to change that.  If I was 68, knowing most of my life was behind me, I’d feel I was running out of time to make a difference.  When you were young there was much more hope, I think.  In fact, I had real hope for you kids of the 60’s.  You gave us the promise of change.

But for all that good energy you’re snookered now.  It’s as if the world takes one step forward and two steps back, never really advancing, stuck in its old ways.  I know people your age tried hard.  But you’re not the first generation to fall short of expectations.  Try not to take it personally. 

“Wow Santa, that’s not exactly a song of good cheer.  Can I buy you another Bushmills?”        

“I thought you’d never ask.” 

The shots came. Filled to the brim with clear amber goodness, they bore good tidings of the season.  We clicked our glasses and knocked them back.

“So, this secret Santa bit, like Undercover Boss, is that new?” 

“I’ve been doing it for quite a while.  At least a thousand years.  I feel the need to talk to adults.

I exist largely in a world of kids who steadfastly believe in me.  If you could only look into their eyes as they look into Santa’s eyes, you’d feel their trust and belief.   I tell you, it’s a moment.  If everyone could experience that they might appreciate how people depend on each other to make the future bright.  We’re obligated to be very careful with that future.

But, kids become adults and their ideals fade with age.  They come to see Santa as little more than a prop for a picture.  They forget that ideas beyond themselves help create a world where people are free to live and love and flourish.  And when they do the world becomes simply about them, and they never seem to achieve real happiness. 

“Nick, give us a little more credit, will you?  The game not’s over till it’s over.” 

“Who do you think you are?  Yogi Berra?  People get lazy and fall back on stereotypes.  Tell me McClure, what are the three words most associated with my identity?”

“HO HO HO?”

“You got it.  HO HO freakin’ HO.  Always jolly.  Big belly, happy a lark, everything goodness and light.  Everyone thinks they know exactly who I am, what I think, as if I’m not allowed to change.  I get sick of it.”

He went on.

“Don’t get me wrong McClure, and for god sakes don’t be spreading this around.  I mean it is good for mythical characters to have a clear understandable message.  And the branding has certainly worked.  But if we don’t keep thinking about how we get better, uncover the flaws in our beliefs, we’re in trouble.  We can improve the world a lot, but we don’t seem to be.  I still have a big job to do.  I have things to say.”

“And what is that exactly, Nick?”

“Well, what prompted this side trip today was an encounter I had with a four-year old yesterday. I do a question and answer deal for kids I visit to satisfy their curiosity about Christmas.  Invite them to ask about where I live, the reindeer, the elves, Christmas eve, whatever.  You never know what they’ll ask.

So, this little four-year old girl puts her hand up and says;

‘My mom says you’re not real.’”

“Wow Nick.  How did you respond?”

“I put my hands on my chest and said ‘Gee, I feel real.  I took hold of my nose and said, ‘My nose feels real.’  I pulled my beard and said, ‘It hurts when I pull my beard.’  I didn’t want to contradict her mother, but at the same time I couldn’t just let the idea of Santa die right there in that classroom in front of everybody.

So, I decided to get out and talk to adults, the kids I used to have on my lap years ago, to see what is on their mind.”

“What are you seeing?”

“I see people losing hope.  Busy people, worn down, looking at the future like it’s a black hole.  But then again, I run on to others, like you, who seem to be doing okay.  You and people like you need to be positive.  Young people still look to older ones among them, even boomers, to show them how to enjoy life and make things better for those around them.”

“Well, it helps talking to you Nick.  You’re a pretty hopeful guy.”

“Yeah, well if it was just the kids, I’d be fine.  But the adults…”

Nick shook his head.

“Can I tell you something confidentially?  We’ve known each other for a while.  You can keep a secret right?”

I didn’t say yes but I didn’t say no. Nick kept talking.

“Adults are pissing me off.  Politicians are lying and covering up the truth.  People are so at odds they can’t even talk to one another.  Intelligent people, so self-centered and caught up in what’s only good for them they can’t see how clinging to the past is bad for others and horrible for the planet.”

“Nick come on.”

“I know.  You’ve talked me out of these funks before.  I will admit I’m more hopeful this year after visiting families in their homes.  I believe in the power of families to show kids the way towards a good future.  Families, if they just will, can teach young people kindness and compassion, and to think of others instead of themselves.  But it is still hard to ignore the problems.”

Why is it so hard to come together around truth?  It’s as if we’ve lost the ability to recognize what’s right.  And you Americans are, sadly in the lead on that.  As a country, you’re not looking good Dave.”

“How’s that?”

“You’re so divided.  Polarized, which is something I know about from where I live.   You are letting politics blind you to each other as people.  I feel sorry for Americans.  I used to celebrate people coming together at Christmas, around their family tables, in their churches on Christmas eve.  I even believed I might have had some hand in that.  But now I hear of people dreading those gatherings because they loathe encountering people who oppose their views.  You’ve nearly stopped talking.”

He went on.

“The world looked up to your country for so long.  Your country is a big player, but other countries see you now as just another government out for itself.  Turning its back on the world.  I really wish you Americans would get it together.”

The sun was getting lower in the sky and the light was fading in the Lodi Tap Room. 

“How is it I keep running into you Nick?  Surely you can’t come to the Illinois Valley every year.”

“Well, you go where you’re invited you know?  I have no choice but to leave it to the surrogates mainly, but I get disgusted with them.  So many of them have the wrong values.  Do it for the money, charge for the pictures, that kind of thing.  But I have no control. 

The way I started coming here, not long ago, was a guy called me, also disgusted with the amateurs.  He said he’d been reaching out to the usual suspects with red suits in his community and finding guys with body odor, bad breath.  He even had one come to an event drunk.  He damn near pleaded with me to make a personal appearance.  I started with a group in Streator if I remember right.”

“Nick, you’re scaring me pal.  That was ME!  I was the director of the YSB, and we kept getting crappy stand in Santas.  I wrote you myself, soon after we had email and I found your address.  You don’t remember?  You know there is testing for those kind of memory lapses these days.”

“Don’t give me any crap about my memory McClure.  You’d be in worse shape than me if you had to run an international organization that staged an annual world-wide event operating out of a headquarters in the wilderness with one man, a sleigh, nine flying reindeer and a bunch of elves to staff the whole outfit.”

He chuckled.

“So, it was you huh?  Well, I’m glad you brought me here all those years ago.  I sort of distrust any area where you can go days and days without seeing anyone wearing bib overalls or having dirt on their hands.  That’s what I mean by being authentic.  You have a big mix of people here.  Could be more diverse you know, but a good bunch all the same.  I’m not sure about that woman telling her little girl Santa wasn’t real, but I like the area.

“I sure hope I see you again Nick.”

“I have a feeling you will.  If you take care of yourself that is.  You won’t live forever you know.” 

He put his finger beside his nose, hopped off his bar stool, gave me a big smile and said

“But I will.”

His Ho Ho Ho boomed across the room.  After laying down a nice tip for the bartender, he was out the door.

I followed Santa out the door, watched him get into an old green Buick, and head south out of town.  I waited to see if he could get that Lucerne with the big six-cylinder engine to fly, but he didn’t. I watched his tail-lights turn left onto Dee Bennett Road.

I’ll close as Nick likes to.

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.”