Hello in There

I spent Monday, March 30th believing John Prine was dying from the virus, or had died and his  family had not yet released the news.  Catastrophic thinking, I know.  There’s a lot of that going around.  I got very emotional here in the shack.  Sometimes my emotions surprise me.  The first emotion was profound sorrow.  Very soon it turned to anger.  Here’s what I thought.

“If this pandemic takes John Prine from us before he has written all the songs he’s imagined, in that wonderfully creative brain of his, I don’t know what I’ll do.  If anyone deserves to keep living until he’s ready to go it’s him.  I’ll be damned if he is going to be stolen away by some random soulless infection.  We share something.  That’s why I’m sure he’s not ready to go.  Because I know I’m not ready.”


I first heard John Prine in 1973.  I was a first year English teacher in Ottawa living alone in an apartment above a garage.  I entertained myself and others by playing albums like the Yes Fragile, Edgar Winter’s They Only Come Out at Night,”and Led Zepplin IV very loudly on a turntable through giant speakers.  It was a way to avoid stacks of freshman essays on a table in the other room that needed to be read and graded.

Tom Fatten, a first-year music teacher who was leading a great jazz band at OHS, made a quick assessment of my musical situation and suggested I broaden my playlist.

“Hell McClure, you’re an English major.  I mean, head banging is fine, but turn the volume down and soak up some poetry with your music.  Listen to John Prine.  You are going to love his lyrics.”

I took his advice and bought his first album, simply named John Prine.  On the cover sat a twenty-four year old man with a moustache on a bale of straw.  Kris Kristofferson wrote a blurb for the back of the album cover.  Steve Goodman played guitar and sang harmony on a few tracks.

But it was the wit, insight, and tenderness of Prine’s lyrics that made that piece of vinyl a hit.  And in all fairness Leo LeBlanc, the pedal steel player, helped too.  I still have the album, along with his most recent album and several in between.

On the back of that first album, Kristofferson writes about meeting Prine for the first time.  Kristofferson had played a Chicago tour stop where he shared the billing with Steve Goodman.  After the show Goodman convinced Kristofferson he had to hear this new guy.  They ended up in Old Town.

It was late. Kristofferson and his band had to leave town early the next morning, but they made their way to a club that was closing, probably the Earl of Oldtown.  The owner, Earl Pionke, would have unlocked the door and most likely made them drinks.

The streets were empty.  Inside the bar the chairs were up on the tables.  Kristofferson said they pulled chairs down and were sitting in front of the stage, just a raised platform really in the center of the room on the south wall.  There was an awkward moment, while John unpacked his guitar, where everyone knew it was like “Okay kid, show us what you got.”   

John Prine stood there, looked down at his guitar, and just started singing.

Kristofferson wrote this about that night;  “…by the end of the first line we knew we were hearing something else.  It must’ve been like stumbling onto Dylan when he busted onto the Village scene. …One of those rare times when it all seems worth it….”

“He sang about a dozen songs and had to do a dozen more before it was over.  Unlike anything I’d heard before.  Sam Stone, Donald & Lydia.  The one about the Old Folks.  Twenty-four years old and writes like he’s two hundred and twenty.  I don’t know where he comes from, but I’ve got a good idea where he’s going.”  

Where he was going was the place Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson and Steve Goodman had already entered, music stardom. 

By the time I saw John Prine in concert he wasn’t playing many small clubs.  I saw him at a big venue on Navy Pier in the 80’s.  But he remained a humble guy, a plain talker with a wry sense of humor, writing simple songs that went straight to your heart. 

John grew up in Maywood and worked as a postal carrier out of high school.  He said walking his mail route was good for thinking up songs.  He was drafted into the army and luckily sent to Germany. When his tour was over, he came back to Chicago.   

My friends Ken Brown and Sharon Loudon lived in Chicago in the 70’s and were lucky enough to hear John Prine play live at the Earl of Old Town.  They sat at a table up close, probably in the same spot where Kris Kristofferson heard him.  Prine performed right in front of them, singing songs that were recorded on that first album.

The song about the old folks Kris Kristofferson mentions is Hello in There.  It’s a story put to music with a short cast of characters: an old man who narrates the tale and remains nameless, his wife Loretta, their kids John and Linda in Omaha, Joe (somewhere on the road), a deceased son Davy, and his friend Rudy. 

Prine tells the story in three stanzas with a chorus that repeats twice.  212 words is all.  His spare acoustic guitar accompanies the lyrics, along with an organ and electric guitar on the studio version.  But that night in the empty bar it would have been just he and his acoustic guitar, unamplified, playing and singing quietly to a few people.

He sets the scene and then adds lines that stab listeners with an awareness of the emotion the narrator carries in his heart.  We feel what he feels.  Here’s how Prine, though the narrator, sums up grief and resignation over the death of his son.  One fact, two short phrases. 

We lost Davy in the Korean War,

And I still don’t know what for,

Don’t matter anymore.

The old couple’s relationship with their surviving children is captured in eight words.

              A life of their own left us alone

To help us understand their life together, the old man reveals this about he and his wife.

              Me and Loretta, we don’t talk much more

              She sits and stares through the back door screen

              And all the news just repeats itself

              Like some forgotten dream that we’ve both seen

He considers calling up his friend Rudy but doesn’t, fearing this exchange:

              But what could I say if he asks “What’s new?”

              “Nothing, what’s with you?  Nothing much to do.”

The chorus compares the effect aging has on people versus the world around them. 

Ya know that old trees just grow stronger

And old rivers grow wilder ev’ry day

But old people just grow lonesome

Waiting for someone to say, “Hello in There, hello.”

The song ends with a plea.  It’s John Prine speaking directly to us.  At least it feels that way. 

              So if you’re walkin down the street sometime

              And see some hollow ancient eyes

              Please don’t just pass ‘em by and stare

              As if you didn’t care, say “Hello in There, hello. “

Not many young singer songwriters wrote songs about the crippling loneliness of old people in 1971.  The late sixties and early seventies were all about youth, drugs, sex, and rock and roll.  But John Prine thought of other things and got his listeners to think of them too. 

I’ve had people tell me that they cry every time they hear that song.  I don’t cry anymore, but 47 years later I now know something of what that old man felt.  For John Prine to imagine those feelings and express them so well as a young man in his early twenties reveals his gift.  You can hear it by clicking this link.

Hello in There

But the song that spoke to me most directly on that album was Far From Me.  Unlike Hello in There told through a narrator, Far From Me is a first person narrative. 

Like most of Prine’s songs, it’s simple.  A guy picks up his girlfriend at a diner and has a realization.  The way he describes that moment made me his fan forever.

Here are the complete lyrics.  Nothing I write can improve on the these 282 words.

As the café was closing on a warm summer night

And Cathy was cleaning the spoons

The radio played

The hit parade

And I hummed along with the tune.

She asked me to change the station

Said the song just drove her insane

But it weren’t just the music playing

It was me she was trying to blame.

(Chorus)

And the sky is dark and still now

On the hill where the angels sing

Ain’t it funny how an old broken bottle

Looks just like a diamond ring

But its far, far from me

Well I leaned on my left leg

In the parking lot dirt

And Cathy was closing the lights

A June bug flew

From the warmth he once knew

And I wished for once I weren’t right

Why we used to laugh together

And we’d dance to any old song

Well ya know, she still laughs with me

But she waits just a second too long

(Repeat Chorus)

Well I started the engine

And I gave it some gas

And Cathy was closing her purse

Well, we hadn’t gone far

In my beat up old car

And I was prepared for the worst

“Will you still see me tomorrow?”

“No, I got too much to do.”

Well a question ain’t really a question

If you know the answer too.

(Repeat Chorus)

Far From Me (Live)

I was twenty-two and alone in my apartment above the garage the first time I heard Far from Me.  My mind raced back to a spring night five years earlier.  I was in the driver’s seat of a ‘63 Ford Galaxie when I realized the person I loved, sitting next to me, no longer loved me. 

Everyone has had their heart broken right?  I think so.  But few talk about it.  Fewer yet sort out what happened, write it down, and share it so others can relive and perhaps understand their own experience. And of those that do, none have done it better than John Prine.

I don’t remember the words that girl spoke when I first knew, in my beat up old car, she no longer loved me.  But when I heard John Prine sing the lyrics of Far From Me, I felt the pain wash over me like it had just happened.

I was convinced John Prine not only knew how I felt but felt exactly the same thing.  I knew because in Far From Me he put what I felt into words. His ability to express both my joy and despair through his songs makes me feel very close to him.  It makes no sense really, but I’m afraid when he goes, some part of me will go with him.   When it does it will truly be a time for tears.

And now that time is here-April 8, 2020.  Thank you, John Prine, for all you gave me.

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.