To the Women I Love Who Turn Seventy This Year
You were girls, of course, before you were mothers,
in saddle shoes and crinoline, singing along with the radio.
But motherhood suited you.
Though we're all past thirty now,
you still call us babies: remember braiding our hair,
teaching us the alphabet,
how to eat our vegetables and love one another.
Between you, you've mothered every child in town,
every child you ever met.
1943 must've been
an especially good year
for baby girls.
Yet you have both lost so much:
your parents, your husbands,
your brothers and sisters and friends.
There is much and more to mourn.
And seventy year old bodies complain
more than you expected,
as young strong-armed mothers,
or teen-aged Minnesota girls
dreaming of Minnesota boys.
You both still plant your gardens,
and reap what you sow, richer
in flowers and friendships both.
As you begin your eighth decade, we are so glad
to have this time with you. We will share
your cold beer in the Minnesota summertime,
while you dance with your grandchildren
in these gardens full of love.
Showing posts with label nostalgia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nostalgia. Show all posts
16 February 2013
04 February 2013
It is not the same.
This is a long post, months in the writing. Bear with me, y'all.
Back in December, Shaun was sick again.
A week and a day after Thanksgiving, I took the girl to school, and came home to my beloved in a literal pool of vomit on the sofa. I pushed a towel under him, handed him the bucket (which he already had beside him), and started making arrangements to miss work. It is not a good time for me to miss work: essentially the day before finals week for me, I had 8 conferences scheduled. But there was no other option.
By 10 am he agreed we needed to go to ER. I helped him into his chair, and helped him get dressed. We pulled into the ambulance bay at 11, and they wheeled him into the back. I sat in the waiting room and called Myra to pick V up from school. I hoped they would admit him, but if they didn't, V didn't need to see him this sick.
~~
When I was 12, my father had a massive stroke. I was in the seventh grade, and when Carol, our school secretary, stopped by the gym to tell me during laps in phy-ed that he was in the ICU, I felt the earth fall from beneath me. My childhood ended on January 10, 1986. The first time I saw him after the stroke was 2 days later. Riding the elevator up to Shaun's room, I kept thinking of that day, of walking down that cold hallway in St. Ansgar's, of turning the corner into his room and seeing him, my giant, my daddy, hemipeligic and in one of those awful hospital gowns.
This is not the same as that, I said to myself, over and over.
~~
As the elevator opened on his floor, I crumpled up the slip with his room number and shoved it in my pocket, and went straight to the Nurses' Desk. "I'm Shaun Languishing's wife," I said (except, you know, that's not our real last name), "and I need to see his nurse." After a few minutes, she ambled up to me, and smiled. I took a deep breath. "So, okay, I don't know if you know this, but his vomiting is not really viral or bacterial. It's mental and anxiety-driven, and you should stay on top of his Xanax or whatever he's allowed to have here. And I am available if you have questions, but his therapist is leaving on vacation tonight, so maybe you should do a psych consult, but I don't know how he'd respond to that. And also, I don't think he wants to see me, but I brought his CPAP machine and this NintendoDS and the new issue of Sports Illustrated that came today, in case he wants those. So can you bring these to him and tell him I'm here if he wants to see me?" (When Shaun's in the hospital, he tends to throw up at the sight of me.) Her smile had faded some at "viral or bacterial," but she took what I gave her and nodded. "I'll be in the waiting room," I said.
I'm sure I seemed like the craziest wife on earth, because he'd only been admitted an hour earlier, and for all his poor nurse knew he just had a bad case of the stomach flu. But to her credit, she listened carefully, and when she came to the waiting room to tell me that indeed, he did not want to see me right now, she answered all my questions patiently with no discernible eye rolling. His heart is fine; he's on a constant EKG-type monitor to make sure. His admitting diagnosis is dehydration. They have a script for Xanax three times a day, and they'll give it that often.
V was at Grandma's for the night. I had no where to be. In my family of origin, when someone's in the hospital, you go to them, hold their hand, watch lame cable tv alongside them. I sat in the waiting room and cried.
~~
After Dad's stroke, his brother and both sisters came straight to the hospital, from Hendrum and White Bear Lake and Arizona. They rented a spare room down the hall, and slept in shifts, so Mom could be home with us at night and Dad wouldn't be alone. My mom's brothers and sisters came too, and bought us ice cream from the vending machines downstairs, and asked us about school. I felt surrounded by love and completely terrified at the same time. In the first few days, a handsome doctor told us Dad would surely walk again, and would probably speak just fine after some rehabilitation. He's young, the doctor said, and very strong.
~~
After a lonely night with the dog & Big Bang Theory reruns, I stopped by the hospital mid-morning, and the nurse said Shaun would see me. I was so scared, but I missed him, and kissed his face when it was clear he wouldn't vomit at the sight of me. We talked about how he felt, how the nurses were treating him. He was still sick, hooked up to machines and an IV, feeling very weak, but I stayed for 45 minutes. I told him how lonesome I was, and he said V and I could come for awhile the next day, if we wanted to. This was huge progress over his last hospitalization, where he couldn't see us for days.
In the elevator on the way down, I thought, "See? This is not the same."
~~
A week after the stroke, maybe a little less, Dad fell asleep and the nurses couldn't wake him. At least, that's what they told Jess and me. After a day and a half, it was clear he was in a coma. "He's so young," the handsome doctor said, "his brain hasn't shrunk like an old person's, and there's no room in his skull for the swelling. We'll try to bring the swelling down, and then he should wake up." A day and a half later, he did. We were so glad to have him back, or the part of him, anyway, that the stroke had left behind.
He never walked on his own again, and he never spoke clear words beyond "yes" and "no." He lived for another fifteen years, though, and I was glad for almost every single day.
~~
V and I went to visit Shaun on Sunday. We bought him a silly smiling helium balloon in the gift shop, and the shop lady gave V a sucker and me a sample of hand lotion. We walked to the elevators hand in hand, and rode up with several nurses and doctors. V skipped up the hallway, and climbed up beside Shaun in bed, minding the tubes and wires. We talked about how much we missed each other, and how much fun V had at Grandma's, and when Daddy might get to come home. She looked out of the window of his 5th floor hospital room in awe. He put his arms around her and they watched a little Spongebob and laughed at the silly balloon.
When we left, I asked V what she was thinking of, and if anything worried her. She said "I get worried that you'll get too tired taking care of me by yourself." Oh, sweet girl. I promised her that if I got tired, I'd get Grandma or Auntie Jess to help, and we would be okay. Besides, Dad would come home in few days, and we'd all go back to normal.
It is not the same as it was when I was a girl. It is not the same.
Tuesday evening, after I talked to Shaun on the phone and we figured he'd be coming home on Wednesday, I was folding laundry and thinking of how relieved I was for him to come home. How good it would be to be back in our little family routine. How thankful I was that he was feeling better. How glad I am that his anxiety is not the same as my father's stroke.
Except it is.
Shaun's not paralyzed, and doesn't have aphasia. Hopefully V will never have to help him dress, and will never need to know how to fold up a wheelchair & slide it into the trunk of our car. But Shaun's anxiety, his profound, crippling anxiety, is a part of him, as much as that injured brain was a part of my dad. Shaun has learned to manage it better, in the last few years, and he continues to work to manage it, every day. But if I'm really honest? It will never go away. He will miss social engagements that I really want him not to miss. He may lose jobs because of it. I will need to clean up his vomit again. Sometimes, V and I will have to go to the hospital to see him, incapacitated. Sometimes we will be lonesome for him because this illness keeps him from being the kind of father and husband he wants to be.
It was a awful realization. For thirteen years I've been telling myself it's not that bad. For thirteen years I thought if we just went to more therapy, if we just got him on better medications....but in the end, his diagnosis is as permanent as a stroke. He may recover, in bits and pieces. But it is a part of him, and so a part of us. It had been two years since the last breakdown, and almost 6 years since the last hospitalization. It's chronic, but not usually acute. But it is the same.
In a strange way, after it really sank in, I felt better. It sucks. I wish it weren't true. But pretending isn't going to make it go away. I will gather my mom and sister closer to me, and his family, too, and our dear friends, and together they will help me, and V, and Shaun. I will try, for all of us, to be glad for every single day.
Back in December, Shaun was sick again.
A week and a day after Thanksgiving, I took the girl to school, and came home to my beloved in a literal pool of vomit on the sofa. I pushed a towel under him, handed him the bucket (which he already had beside him), and started making arrangements to miss work. It is not a good time for me to miss work: essentially the day before finals week for me, I had 8 conferences scheduled. But there was no other option.
By 10 am he agreed we needed to go to ER. I helped him into his chair, and helped him get dressed. We pulled into the ambulance bay at 11, and they wheeled him into the back. I sat in the waiting room and called Myra to pick V up from school. I hoped they would admit him, but if they didn't, V didn't need to see him this sick.
~~
When I was 12, my father had a massive stroke. I was in the seventh grade, and when Carol, our school secretary, stopped by the gym to tell me during laps in phy-ed that he was in the ICU, I felt the earth fall from beneath me. My childhood ended on January 10, 1986. The first time I saw him after the stroke was 2 days later. Riding the elevator up to Shaun's room, I kept thinking of that day, of walking down that cold hallway in St. Ansgar's, of turning the corner into his room and seeing him, my giant, my daddy, hemipeligic and in one of those awful hospital gowns.
This is not the same as that, I said to myself, over and over.
~~
As the elevator opened on his floor, I crumpled up the slip with his room number and shoved it in my pocket, and went straight to the Nurses' Desk. "I'm Shaun Languishing's wife," I said (except, you know, that's not our real last name), "and I need to see his nurse." After a few minutes, she ambled up to me, and smiled. I took a deep breath. "So, okay, I don't know if you know this, but his vomiting is not really viral or bacterial. It's mental and anxiety-driven, and you should stay on top of his Xanax or whatever he's allowed to have here. And I am available if you have questions, but his therapist is leaving on vacation tonight, so maybe you should do a psych consult, but I don't know how he'd respond to that. And also, I don't think he wants to see me, but I brought his CPAP machine and this NintendoDS and the new issue of Sports Illustrated that came today, in case he wants those. So can you bring these to him and tell him I'm here if he wants to see me?" (When Shaun's in the hospital, he tends to throw up at the sight of me.) Her smile had faded some at "viral or bacterial," but she took what I gave her and nodded. "I'll be in the waiting room," I said.
I'm sure I seemed like the craziest wife on earth, because he'd only been admitted an hour earlier, and for all his poor nurse knew he just had a bad case of the stomach flu. But to her credit, she listened carefully, and when she came to the waiting room to tell me that indeed, he did not want to see me right now, she answered all my questions patiently with no discernible eye rolling. His heart is fine; he's on a constant EKG-type monitor to make sure. His admitting diagnosis is dehydration. They have a script for Xanax three times a day, and they'll give it that often.
V was at Grandma's for the night. I had no where to be. In my family of origin, when someone's in the hospital, you go to them, hold their hand, watch lame cable tv alongside them. I sat in the waiting room and cried.
~~
After Dad's stroke, his brother and both sisters came straight to the hospital, from Hendrum and White Bear Lake and Arizona. They rented a spare room down the hall, and slept in shifts, so Mom could be home with us at night and Dad wouldn't be alone. My mom's brothers and sisters came too, and bought us ice cream from the vending machines downstairs, and asked us about school. I felt surrounded by love and completely terrified at the same time. In the first few days, a handsome doctor told us Dad would surely walk again, and would probably speak just fine after some rehabilitation. He's young, the doctor said, and very strong.
~~
After a lonely night with the dog & Big Bang Theory reruns, I stopped by the hospital mid-morning, and the nurse said Shaun would see me. I was so scared, but I missed him, and kissed his face when it was clear he wouldn't vomit at the sight of me. We talked about how he felt, how the nurses were treating him. He was still sick, hooked up to machines and an IV, feeling very weak, but I stayed for 45 minutes. I told him how lonesome I was, and he said V and I could come for awhile the next day, if we wanted to. This was huge progress over his last hospitalization, where he couldn't see us for days.
In the elevator on the way down, I thought, "See? This is not the same."
~~
A week after the stroke, maybe a little less, Dad fell asleep and the nurses couldn't wake him. At least, that's what they told Jess and me. After a day and a half, it was clear he was in a coma. "He's so young," the handsome doctor said, "his brain hasn't shrunk like an old person's, and there's no room in his skull for the swelling. We'll try to bring the swelling down, and then he should wake up." A day and a half later, he did. We were so glad to have him back, or the part of him, anyway, that the stroke had left behind.
He never walked on his own again, and he never spoke clear words beyond "yes" and "no." He lived for another fifteen years, though, and I was glad for almost every single day.
~~
V and I went to visit Shaun on Sunday. We bought him a silly smiling helium balloon in the gift shop, and the shop lady gave V a sucker and me a sample of hand lotion. We walked to the elevators hand in hand, and rode up with several nurses and doctors. V skipped up the hallway, and climbed up beside Shaun in bed, minding the tubes and wires. We talked about how much we missed each other, and how much fun V had at Grandma's, and when Daddy might get to come home. She looked out of the window of his 5th floor hospital room in awe. He put his arms around her and they watched a little Spongebob and laughed at the silly balloon.
When we left, I asked V what she was thinking of, and if anything worried her. She said "I get worried that you'll get too tired taking care of me by yourself." Oh, sweet girl. I promised her that if I got tired, I'd get Grandma or Auntie Jess to help, and we would be okay. Besides, Dad would come home in few days, and we'd all go back to normal.
It is not the same as it was when I was a girl. It is not the same.
Tuesday evening, after I talked to Shaun on the phone and we figured he'd be coming home on Wednesday, I was folding laundry and thinking of how relieved I was for him to come home. How good it would be to be back in our little family routine. How thankful I was that he was feeling better. How glad I am that his anxiety is not the same as my father's stroke.
Except it is.
Shaun's not paralyzed, and doesn't have aphasia. Hopefully V will never have to help him dress, and will never need to know how to fold up a wheelchair & slide it into the trunk of our car. But Shaun's anxiety, his profound, crippling anxiety, is a part of him, as much as that injured brain was a part of my dad. Shaun has learned to manage it better, in the last few years, and he continues to work to manage it, every day. But if I'm really honest? It will never go away. He will miss social engagements that I really want him not to miss. He may lose jobs because of it. I will need to clean up his vomit again. Sometimes, V and I will have to go to the hospital to see him, incapacitated. Sometimes we will be lonesome for him because this illness keeps him from being the kind of father and husband he wants to be.
It was a awful realization. For thirteen years I've been telling myself it's not that bad. For thirteen years I thought if we just went to more therapy, if we just got him on better medications....but in the end, his diagnosis is as permanent as a stroke. He may recover, in bits and pieces. But it is a part of him, and so a part of us. It had been two years since the last breakdown, and almost 6 years since the last hospitalization. It's chronic, but not usually acute. But it is the same.
In a strange way, after it really sank in, I felt better. It sucks. I wish it weren't true. But pretending isn't going to make it go away. I will gather my mom and sister closer to me, and his family, too, and our dear friends, and together they will help me, and V, and Shaun. I will try, for all of us, to be glad for every single day.
04 November 2012
Drinking the kool-aid.
Our trusty old Verizon Vortex cell phone had finally worn out its battery: it couldn't stay charged long enough for me talk to anyone for more than ten minutes. Luckily, we were almost 3 months past our renewal date, so I wandered in to our neighborhood Verizon store to see what they would give me for free.
snuggled up with sky
in the backseat of the Scion xb
We were, for many years, a Apple family. My first desktop was a Mac (before the iMac), and I loved it long past its prime. When my work started issuing laptops, I came to speak Microsoft, grudgingly. Now that we rely on the work laptop for all of our computing needs, I guess we no longer qualify as an Apple family.
Dewey's slides, labeled in his handwriting.
But my sister, she's got an iPad and an iPod and probably some other lowercase i's I'm forgetting. V and I both enjoy the Karstens' family electronics. Besides, free iPhone! I've never had an iPhone, but I'm hep. I know what the kids are into these days.Yes, it's an iPhone 4, which is already outdated twice over, I hear. But man, I like it a lot. It's no slower than the Vortex (though it doesn't have Lightning Fast 4G!), and the app possibilities are fascinating, and I only allow myself to look at the free ones. Aaah! So many choices! It's intuitive and beautiful and I'm preaching to the choir, I know, because the whole world is aware of this. But it feels like home. Is that strange, that a certain technology should feel like home? Well it does. I'm so excited.
The photos above are from the iPhone's camera, through the Instagram program, which is a cool little social media thing that lets you apply a variety of finishes to the pictures you've just taken. You should follow me there, if you're on it. I'm jenlanguishes. I'll follow you too, once I figure out how.
How do you feel about your cell phone, folks? Do you have iTechnology? Do you not? Wherefore art thou, gentle readers?
25 July 2012
Death, be not proud
with apologies to John Donne, et al.
So part of my mean reds, by no means all, but a good portion, has to be related to the fact that today marks the tenth anniversary of the death of my father. Ten years. More than a quarter of my life now, without him. It takes my breath away to even think of it. I...ach. I could blither on, but I decided months ago that I wanted to reprint an article from the paper version of Languishing (Winter 2004, Issue 1, Volume 8) today. I wrote it just a month or so after he died, and I print it here mostly unaltered.
Mighty and dreadful indeed.
Death Be Not Proud
One woman's story of losing her daddy.
Wednesday, 24 July 2002: 7:30am: Mom called this morning. Seems dad's chest pains from last night didn't go away, so I'm heading over to Hillsboro. I talked to Jess, told her not to come. I know she feels so far away in the Cities, but this is just chest pains. She'll be home this weekend, and can see him then.
8:30am: Dad looks gaunt, almost skeletal. He always looks this way, though, in his hospital gown, when he's had a ride in the ambulance. How many times have we been here? Since I was twelve, after those first 6 months of rehab after the stroke, I've seen him like this....half a dozen times? A dozen? Too many, but it's not like any of us chose this life. It just is. I smooth his hair; what I feel towards my father, what I have felt for almost 17 years, is very much typical father-daughter love. But also motherly, because he needs care. I clip his fingernails, clean out his ears when they're dirty. I cut up his steak for him. Rustle my fingers through his beard when I try to convince him to trim it. But he is always my father. He wheels his chair out with me to the parking lot, checks my tires, makes sure the headlights work, makes me use my seat belt. He is comforting, familiar, strong. He tells me everything will work out, that I can do what I am afraid to do, that he loves me.
In this little hospital room with uncomfortable chairs and a television mounted on the wall, I talk to Jess again. Should she come? I ask Dad. No, he says, shaking his head emphatically, as if to say, Don't be silly. The nurse is in the room with us, and after a few minutes, he starts coughing, waving his hand at her, raising his voice. She doesn't understand him, and I'm still on the phone with Jess. "He's going to throw up" I snap at the nurse, frustrated that she doesn't comprehend our secret code of gestures and inflection. Jess says, "I'm on my way" just before I hang up on her, because the black bile is seeping through Dad's beard onto his faded gown. The nurse apologizes, and I do, too, because she couldn't know that this time "Deelo...deelo!" meant "I need an emesis basin."
9am: The doctor comes in. Mom is really worried, but I'm not. Jesus, he survived a massive stroke, the amputation of both legs: some little heart palpitation's not going to kill him. The doctor is short, shorter than me, and other than that he reminds me of my cousin Chad, with olive skin, dark, thinning hair, and a laid-back way. His news is not good. There's been a heart attack, of significant size, it seems. Dad's asleep now, because the nurse gave him medicine to help with his nausea. We stand over him, talk around him. Mom strokes his bald head. I ask what we should do. I get frustrated, because I feel like the doctor and we are speaking two different languages. "It's up to you," he says. Yeah, we know that. What should we do?? "Well, he has a DNR order..." Yeah, we know that too. What does this mean. How bad is it? WILL HE DIE? "We don't know yet. We could find out the extent of the damage, but he'd have to go to Fargo for that." He's sleeping now. I don't think he wants to go to Fargo. I don't know. So if we don't find out the extent of the damage.... what happens? We know strokes, we know gallstones, we know prostate and cancer and bladder infections and amputations, but we don't know heart attacks. "He could recover. The next 24 hours will be important." I'm glad Jessica is on her way. I call her cell and tell her so, and tell her that Dad's comfortable now, snoring lightly. She's scared, but our Aunt Shirley, Dad's sister, is with her. I'm glad of that too. They just left the city, and it's almost 10 am.
12 noon: Brenda, our friend and the wife of our pastor in Hendrum, stops by. She's an RN, and looks at Dad carefully. I show her his vitals, which I've been recording in my journal. Blood pressure: 90/40; pulse 120; temp 99.2; oxygen 84%. She talks to Dad, although he's not really awake at all. Tells him she's here, says a prayer with us. The Lord's Prayer hurts my chest when I say it. "Our father, who art in heaven." Brenda does a healing ceremony, instead of communion, and it involves anointing with oil. It feels too much like last rites and Mom and I both cry.
Dad's kidneys aren't working much. He's been in the hospital since 7:30, and he's made no urine. This is very bad, Brenda tells us. Her seriousness scares me. She takes mom out for lunch, and I sit with Dad, tell him about work, Shaun, our dog, our house. I tell him I love him over and over and over again. I know he knows: it just helps to say it. Beverly, Dad's other sister, who lives in California, calls. She wants to know how he is, and I tell her, as he sleeps. Dad and Bev were so close as children, practically twins. As she's about to hang up, he opens his eyes, and I say, wait, here he is. I hold the phone to his ear, and though he's groggy, I tell him it's his sister Bev. He hears her voice, and responds. He knows it's her: I don't know what she says to him, but he says "yeah," a few times, tells her he's okay, I think. I take the phone and tell her he knew it was her, and she says she knows. She's looking into flights to Fargo.
2pm: The doctor stops by again. The kidney thing has him worried. Why aren't they working, we ask. His blood pressure is so low, they're not getting enough blood. His heart has been damaged, so it's pumping where it can. Will that get better? Maybe. Let's inject him with some saline, and some medicine to make him urinate, and see if that helps. Okay. C'mon kidneys. Mom is really quiet. I don't see why everyone has to be so solemn. It's been bad before.
3pm: Jess and Shirley arrive. They stopped in Moorhead and picked up Shaun. Dad wakes up and knows Jess, certainly, and she kisses him and cries and cries. He's hardly awake at all any more, from the medication or the effort his heart is making to pump what little it can. Mom, Jess, and I talk with Dad, who won't wake up, about how we won't resuscitate. No breathing tubes, no surgeries. If the kidneys work, they work. If not, we'll have to let him go. Dad agreed to this years ago, but we tell each other again that this is what he wants, what we all know should happen, if it has to.
The doctor comes back, and as the saline and medication have not jump-started the kidneys, he recommends we bring family in. This is the first time I'm really startled. He says "If there's family thinking of coming, you should tell them to come. Now." We use Shirley's cell phone to call relatives. I call three of mom's siblings: Bev, John, and Sharon. "This might be it, the doctor says," I tell three people, and for some reason it gets harder every time. I can't call any one else after that. Jessica calls the others, and we let Shirley call Dad's side of the family. We are very, very tired.
6pm: We go eat supper in shifts. Shirley and I and Shaun go first, to the Wagon Wheel Restaurant in Hillsboro. It feels like a VFW hall, kind of, with industrial tables and chairs. I eat fried shrimp, and the three of us talk, and sort of look at each other, surprised, kind of, by what seems about to happen. i feel like my eyes are wide open, insistently watching, waiting. Shaun feels helpless, afraid for us, and doesn't know how to help. When we get back to the hospital, Uncle Harry, Dad's older brother, is there. They have been fighting with each other for about 10 years, or maybe 15. It feels like forever, but we're glad he's there. Even Dad, I think, knows how much Harry loves him this summer night.
7pm-on: Through the evening, we have lots of company; Pastor Tim comes, and Shaun's dad, and Carla and Darrell and Janice, friends of our family. Lots of people, it seems, and we are all grateful. Most everyone is gone by 11pm, when the nursing shift changes. Our night RN must've been in the military, I think. She is all business, and her gruffness worries me a little, because Jess and I will push back if we need to, but we're not exactly strong right now. Instead, she insists on just a few things. "He must be kept comfortable. Tell your mother to get some sleep. I'll let you know if it gets close to time." Now I know there's no going back. This nurse makes no pretense of recovery, and it is just the waiting. Because the hospital is nearly empty, we get the room next to Dad's, and mom goes to sleep for a few hours. She's been up, by our count, nearly 40 hours straight. Aunt Shirley dozes in the lounge, and Jess and I stay with Dad.
The next few hours will remain forever some of the most memorable of my life. Sitting with my father and my sister, knowing that time is so literally almost out, I feel desperate to stay awake, to soak in every second we have left together. Jess and I cry, even sob, at times. Finally, we decide to make the best of it. First we talk about our favorite memories with Dad. She remembers things I'd forgotten, and vice versa, So we tell him we love him, and why, and tell him what he's taught us, and what we'll remember. At some point, we shift, and talk about the future. Jess tells him what she hopes to name her children, and I do the same. "We promise to tell them about you, Daddy. We promise to take care of each other, and of Mom." We recognize out loud that if we'd been a TV movie, we'd have changed the channel by now.
2:30am: After taking Dad's pulse, Army nurse says we should wake Mom, so we do. But Dad has no intention of dying yet, so we sprawl around his room...in hospital chairs, across the foot of his bed, on the floor, and take turns dozing. When morning comes, he is still with us, and we joke, wearily, about his stubbornness. Sometime in the morning, Brenda comes again. She tells us an amazing story about letting go, about the path toward death as a journey, and we all cry. Brenda, Mom, and Jess go out for lunch, and Shirley goes to pick up Bev at the airport.
While they are gone, Dad's breathing gets more sporadic. He has a kind of apnea, it seems, and stops breathing for a second or two or ten...and then breathes again. Brenda told us this would happen, And that it would indicate the end was coming closer. She said it would get worse until finally the space between breaths was greater and greater...and eventually, he would just stop.
2pm: Mom and Jess come back from lunch, and walk in with Uncle Harry. Harry says, "I'll go," and we tell him he has to say good-bye. So he does. "We'll see you, Dewey," he says, shaking Dad's hand. It is one of the saddest moments I've ever seen.
Jess has to run to the bathroom, just down the hall. Mom and I sit, listen to Dad breathe, then stop. Breathe, then stop. When Jess gets back, Mom has to go. While she's gone, Jess and I watch Dad wince twice to draw breath: it really seems to hurt him. Finally, mom gets back. She sits with Dad's good hand, on his left. I sit on his right, and Jess sits on the foot of his bed. We tell him we love him, that he can go...and he does. He just...stops.
Again, if it were a TV movie, it would be too ridiculous. But that's how it happened, how we got to say good-bye, and be with him. How we watched him die. I don't have a moral to this story, and I'm not telling you this for pity, or to make you sad. It feels good, somehow to share it. It was a gift he gave us, being able to be with him. He was a good man. I miss him.
So part of my mean reds, by no means all, but a good portion, has to be related to the fact that today marks the tenth anniversary of the death of my father. Ten years. More than a quarter of my life now, without him. It takes my breath away to even think of it. I...ach. I could blither on, but I decided months ago that I wanted to reprint an article from the paper version of Languishing (Winter 2004, Issue 1, Volume 8) today. I wrote it just a month or so after he died, and I print it here mostly unaltered.
Mighty and dreadful indeed.
Death Be Not Proud
One woman's story of losing her daddy.
Wednesday, 24 July 2002: 7:30am: Mom called this morning. Seems dad's chest pains from last night didn't go away, so I'm heading over to Hillsboro. I talked to Jess, told her not to come. I know she feels so far away in the Cities, but this is just chest pains. She'll be home this weekend, and can see him then.
8:30am: Dad looks gaunt, almost skeletal. He always looks this way, though, in his hospital gown, when he's had a ride in the ambulance. How many times have we been here? Since I was twelve, after those first 6 months of rehab after the stroke, I've seen him like this....half a dozen times? A dozen? Too many, but it's not like any of us chose this life. It just is. I smooth his hair; what I feel towards my father, what I have felt for almost 17 years, is very much typical father-daughter love. But also motherly, because he needs care. I clip his fingernails, clean out his ears when they're dirty. I cut up his steak for him. Rustle my fingers through his beard when I try to convince him to trim it. But he is always my father. He wheels his chair out with me to the parking lot, checks my tires, makes sure the headlights work, makes me use my seat belt. He is comforting, familiar, strong. He tells me everything will work out, that I can do what I am afraid to do, that he loves me.
In this little hospital room with uncomfortable chairs and a television mounted on the wall, I talk to Jess again. Should she come? I ask Dad. No, he says, shaking his head emphatically, as if to say, Don't be silly. The nurse is in the room with us, and after a few minutes, he starts coughing, waving his hand at her, raising his voice. She doesn't understand him, and I'm still on the phone with Jess. "He's going to throw up" I snap at the nurse, frustrated that she doesn't comprehend our secret code of gestures and inflection. Jess says, "I'm on my way" just before I hang up on her, because the black bile is seeping through Dad's beard onto his faded gown. The nurse apologizes, and I do, too, because she couldn't know that this time "Deelo...deelo!" meant "I need an emesis basin."
9am: The doctor comes in. Mom is really worried, but I'm not. Jesus, he survived a massive stroke, the amputation of both legs: some little heart palpitation's not going to kill him. The doctor is short, shorter than me, and other than that he reminds me of my cousin Chad, with olive skin, dark, thinning hair, and a laid-back way. His news is not good. There's been a heart attack, of significant size, it seems. Dad's asleep now, because the nurse gave him medicine to help with his nausea. We stand over him, talk around him. Mom strokes his bald head. I ask what we should do. I get frustrated, because I feel like the doctor and we are speaking two different languages. "It's up to you," he says. Yeah, we know that. What should we do?? "Well, he has a DNR order..." Yeah, we know that too. What does this mean. How bad is it? WILL HE DIE? "We don't know yet. We could find out the extent of the damage, but he'd have to go to Fargo for that." He's sleeping now. I don't think he wants to go to Fargo. I don't know. So if we don't find out the extent of the damage.... what happens? We know strokes, we know gallstones, we know prostate and cancer and bladder infections and amputations, but we don't know heart attacks. "He could recover. The next 24 hours will be important." I'm glad Jessica is on her way. I call her cell and tell her so, and tell her that Dad's comfortable now, snoring lightly. She's scared, but our Aunt Shirley, Dad's sister, is with her. I'm glad of that too. They just left the city, and it's almost 10 am.
12 noon: Brenda, our friend and the wife of our pastor in Hendrum, stops by. She's an RN, and looks at Dad carefully. I show her his vitals, which I've been recording in my journal. Blood pressure: 90/40; pulse 120; temp 99.2; oxygen 84%. She talks to Dad, although he's not really awake at all. Tells him she's here, says a prayer with us. The Lord's Prayer hurts my chest when I say it. "Our father, who art in heaven." Brenda does a healing ceremony, instead of communion, and it involves anointing with oil. It feels too much like last rites and Mom and I both cry.
Dad's kidneys aren't working much. He's been in the hospital since 7:30, and he's made no urine. This is very bad, Brenda tells us. Her seriousness scares me. She takes mom out for lunch, and I sit with Dad, tell him about work, Shaun, our dog, our house. I tell him I love him over and over and over again. I know he knows: it just helps to say it. Beverly, Dad's other sister, who lives in California, calls. She wants to know how he is, and I tell her, as he sleeps. Dad and Bev were so close as children, practically twins. As she's about to hang up, he opens his eyes, and I say, wait, here he is. I hold the phone to his ear, and though he's groggy, I tell him it's his sister Bev. He hears her voice, and responds. He knows it's her: I don't know what she says to him, but he says "yeah," a few times, tells her he's okay, I think. I take the phone and tell her he knew it was her, and she says she knows. She's looking into flights to Fargo.
2pm: The doctor stops by again. The kidney thing has him worried. Why aren't they working, we ask. His blood pressure is so low, they're not getting enough blood. His heart has been damaged, so it's pumping where it can. Will that get better? Maybe. Let's inject him with some saline, and some medicine to make him urinate, and see if that helps. Okay. C'mon kidneys. Mom is really quiet. I don't see why everyone has to be so solemn. It's been bad before.
3pm: Jess and Shirley arrive. They stopped in Moorhead and picked up Shaun. Dad wakes up and knows Jess, certainly, and she kisses him and cries and cries. He's hardly awake at all any more, from the medication or the effort his heart is making to pump what little it can. Mom, Jess, and I talk with Dad, who won't wake up, about how we won't resuscitate. No breathing tubes, no surgeries. If the kidneys work, they work. If not, we'll have to let him go. Dad agreed to this years ago, but we tell each other again that this is what he wants, what we all know should happen, if it has to.
The doctor comes back, and as the saline and medication have not jump-started the kidneys, he recommends we bring family in. This is the first time I'm really startled. He says "If there's family thinking of coming, you should tell them to come. Now." We use Shirley's cell phone to call relatives. I call three of mom's siblings: Bev, John, and Sharon. "This might be it, the doctor says," I tell three people, and for some reason it gets harder every time. I can't call any one else after that. Jessica calls the others, and we let Shirley call Dad's side of the family. We are very, very tired.
6pm: We go eat supper in shifts. Shirley and I and Shaun go first, to the Wagon Wheel Restaurant in Hillsboro. It feels like a VFW hall, kind of, with industrial tables and chairs. I eat fried shrimp, and the three of us talk, and sort of look at each other, surprised, kind of, by what seems about to happen. i feel like my eyes are wide open, insistently watching, waiting. Shaun feels helpless, afraid for us, and doesn't know how to help. When we get back to the hospital, Uncle Harry, Dad's older brother, is there. They have been fighting with each other for about 10 years, or maybe 15. It feels like forever, but we're glad he's there. Even Dad, I think, knows how much Harry loves him this summer night.
7pm-on: Through the evening, we have lots of company; Pastor Tim comes, and Shaun's dad, and Carla and Darrell and Janice, friends of our family. Lots of people, it seems, and we are all grateful. Most everyone is gone by 11pm, when the nursing shift changes. Our night RN must've been in the military, I think. She is all business, and her gruffness worries me a little, because Jess and I will push back if we need to, but we're not exactly strong right now. Instead, she insists on just a few things. "He must be kept comfortable. Tell your mother to get some sleep. I'll let you know if it gets close to time." Now I know there's no going back. This nurse makes no pretense of recovery, and it is just the waiting. Because the hospital is nearly empty, we get the room next to Dad's, and mom goes to sleep for a few hours. She's been up, by our count, nearly 40 hours straight. Aunt Shirley dozes in the lounge, and Jess and I stay with Dad.
The next few hours will remain forever some of the most memorable of my life. Sitting with my father and my sister, knowing that time is so literally almost out, I feel desperate to stay awake, to soak in every second we have left together. Jess and I cry, even sob, at times. Finally, we decide to make the best of it. First we talk about our favorite memories with Dad. She remembers things I'd forgotten, and vice versa, So we tell him we love him, and why, and tell him what he's taught us, and what we'll remember. At some point, we shift, and talk about the future. Jess tells him what she hopes to name her children, and I do the same. "We promise to tell them about you, Daddy. We promise to take care of each other, and of Mom." We recognize out loud that if we'd been a TV movie, we'd have changed the channel by now.
2:30am: After taking Dad's pulse, Army nurse says we should wake Mom, so we do. But Dad has no intention of dying yet, so we sprawl around his room...in hospital chairs, across the foot of his bed, on the floor, and take turns dozing. When morning comes, he is still with us, and we joke, wearily, about his stubbornness. Sometime in the morning, Brenda comes again. She tells us an amazing story about letting go, about the path toward death as a journey, and we all cry. Brenda, Mom, and Jess go out for lunch, and Shirley goes to pick up Bev at the airport.
While they are gone, Dad's breathing gets more sporadic. He has a kind of apnea, it seems, and stops breathing for a second or two or ten...and then breathes again. Brenda told us this would happen, And that it would indicate the end was coming closer. She said it would get worse until finally the space between breaths was greater and greater...and eventually, he would just stop.
2pm: Mom and Jess come back from lunch, and walk in with Uncle Harry. Harry says, "I'll go," and we tell him he has to say good-bye. So he does. "We'll see you, Dewey," he says, shaking Dad's hand. It is one of the saddest moments I've ever seen.
Jess has to run to the bathroom, just down the hall. Mom and I sit, listen to Dad breathe, then stop. Breathe, then stop. When Jess gets back, Mom has to go. While she's gone, Jess and I watch Dad wince twice to draw breath: it really seems to hurt him. Finally, mom gets back. She sits with Dad's good hand, on his left. I sit on his right, and Jess sits on the foot of his bed. We tell him we love him, that he can go...and he does. He just...stops.
Again, if it were a TV movie, it would be too ridiculous. But that's how it happened, how we got to say good-bye, and be with him. How we watched him die. I don't have a moral to this story, and I'm not telling you this for pity, or to make you sad. It feels good, somehow to share it. It was a gift he gave us, being able to be with him. He was a good man. I miss him.
26 June 2012
Ten years
Jess played "You are My Sunshine" on her guitar as my parents and I walked up the driveway into our backyard. Beth and Steve read for us, and Pastor Tim performed the ceremony. Afterwards, we all went out to dinner to Timberlodge Steakhouse, and Shaun and I stayed in a Honeymoon Suite at Expressway Inn that I'd won at the wedding expo in January. It was a fantastic day.
We all look like babies to me, now.
Ten years ago today. It really doesn't seem like it's been a decade at all.
So much has changed for us, and our families. And marriage is hard, hard work sometimes. But this photo here, my favorite of them all, is still who we are. Two dorks who really love each other very much. He is my sunshine, indeed.
For more photos and nostalgia, see here, or here. Or come on over and look at our photo albums.
We all look like babies to me, now.
Then again, it feels like we've always been together. In a good way, I mean. I can't really remember life before.
For more photos and nostalgia, see here, or here. Or come on over and look at our photo albums.
23 May 2012
Our song (Today is the 23rd of May)
My dad loved Bill Cosby, the Smothers Brothers, and Allan Sherman records (and other racier ones that we weren't allowed to listen to, as you can imagine). Still, it was my little sister who noticed, circa 1978, that both of our birthdays are in this Allan Sherman song. Twice a year, one of us calls up the other and sings our birthday song. I like it.
Our song starts around 4:42. And the video is just a shot of the album cover and the vinyl, but I'm just lucky I found it online at all, peeps.
I'll probably post more later today. Until then,and/or if not, happy birthday to me, Jeff Kolness, Diane Nelson, Barney Selzler, and the rest of us May 23rders. I think I'll go find me some liverwurst.
Our song starts around 4:42. And the video is just a shot of the album cover and the vinyl, but I'm just lucky I found it online at all, peeps.
I'll probably post more later today. Until then,and/or if not, happy birthday to me, Jeff Kolness, Diane Nelson, Barney Selzler, and the rest of us May 23rders. I think I'll go find me some liverwurst.
15 May 2012
Wildlife photography
As a little girl, I was never squeamish around bugs. I rather liked them, actually. Potato bugs, though, were one of the banes of our existence, and the half-acre of potatoes my mother regularly planted were at risk, always, from these varmints. Our parents would pay us 1/2 a penny per bug, during peak season.
30 April 2012
You thought I wasn't gonna finish, didn't you?
Yodeling: I have a vague memory of my dad's cousin's ex-wife yodeling in a country-western style when I was about ten. Even before then, I loved the sound of yodeling. It may have started with this awesome Leroy Van Dyke song (which isn't really yodeling, but is so melodic), but we also listened to a lot of Hank Williams and Jimmie Rogers when I was growing up, and that vocal break has always been appealing to my tender ears. With the joy of the internet, YouTube will teach me how to yodel (with Bonnie) if I want, which I clearly do. I'm not quite sure what I'll do with the new, impressive talent I'm sure to develop, but karaoke night in Fargo is never gonna be the same. I sure hope Pepper has this song.
26 April 2012
Double-ewe: a down home collection
Wandering: I love the Tolkein quote, "Not all those who wander are lost," and when my work or home life gets too crazy, I dream of the woods by the Red River, where I used to wander for hours and hours as a kid. I followed deer trails all the way to where the Elm meets the Red, and then I'd turn around and come back. I should really ask Steve Harrington (who bought that land when I was a teenager) if I could wander there again this spring or summer.
Winnifred and Winnifred Turnipseed: My dad used to rent land from this lovely couple, named Winnifred and Winnifred Turnipseed. I know: if I hadn't met Mrs. Turnipseed myself when I was young, I wouldn't believe it either. I believe they used to farm in Traill County, and had retired and moved away and rented their land to us. Mr. Turnipseed died first (I never met him, that I recollect), leaving only one Winnifred Turnipseed. I remember that when I met her, her hair was short and white and she wore a Mickey Mouse watch, which I thought was very cool.
Wood ticks: What with all the wandering I did as a child, it should come as no surprise that I've encountered lots and lots of wood ticks. My two favorite wood tick stories: once, after picking lilacs that grew over by the railroad tracks near my hometown, I came home just covered in ticks. Well, not totally covered (ew!), but I counted until 27, and found many many more after that. My dad had fun setting them all on fire, though. Secondly, the very first time we took V to the lake, she was about six weeks old. She slept in a pack and play beside my bed, and when we woke up in the morning, I noticed a little something in her tiny, tiny ear. It was up on the top, under the crease. And since you've read this whole paragraph, I bed you already know what was there. An attached, insistent wood tick. On my precious, precious baby. I woke up my baby daddy, handed her off, and drove like a woman whose child was being devoured by a vampiric nuisance to the local drug store, where I bought a tweezers and three homemade caramels (mamas need a lot of candy, in the beginning). I removed the offending tick, considered mosquito netting for future visits, and spent the rest of the weekend on wood tick sparked adrenaline fumes.
Winnifred and Winnifred Turnipseed: My dad used to rent land from this lovely couple, named Winnifred and Winnifred Turnipseed. I know: if I hadn't met Mrs. Turnipseed myself when I was young, I wouldn't believe it either. I believe they used to farm in Traill County, and had retired and moved away and rented their land to us. Mr. Turnipseed died first (I never met him, that I recollect), leaving only one Winnifred Turnipseed. I remember that when I met her, her hair was short and white and she wore a Mickey Mouse watch, which I thought was very cool.
Wood ticks: What with all the wandering I did as a child, it should come as no surprise that I've encountered lots and lots of wood ticks. My two favorite wood tick stories: once, after picking lilacs that grew over by the railroad tracks near my hometown, I came home just covered in ticks. Well, not totally covered (ew!), but I counted until 27, and found many many more after that. My dad had fun setting them all on fire, though. Secondly, the very first time we took V to the lake, she was about six weeks old. She slept in a pack and play beside my bed, and when we woke up in the morning, I noticed a little something in her tiny, tiny ear. It was up on the top, under the crease. And since you've read this whole paragraph, I bed you already know what was there. An attached, insistent wood tick. On my precious, precious baby. I woke up my baby daddy, handed her off, and drove like a woman whose child was being devoured by a vampiric nuisance to the local drug store, where I bought a tweezers and three homemade caramels (mamas need a lot of candy, in the beginning). I removed the offending tick, considered mosquito netting for future visits, and spent the rest of the weekend on wood tick sparked adrenaline fumes.
25 April 2012
Why yes, her name is V
When Shaun and I first talked about having a baby, we agreed immediately on a name for a boy: Dewey David. In that one name, we honor both of our fathers, and there's really no argument to be had. But a girl's name? Without an obvious choice (Myra Mary or Mary Myra just didn't sing for us, and besides, they're both still alive, which makes it complicated), oh, we could not agree.
I love fancy/old fashioned names. Sylvia, Olivia, Sophia, Zuzu...Shaun liked none of them. Old lady names, he called them, or just too strange. Isabella, Carpathia, Ruth, Eliza, Beverly....no, no, no, no, no....Finally I asked what names he liked. Something simple, he said, like Jill. Or Ann.
Now, I have nothing against any Jills or Anns, but as a Jennifer, I know how it is to have a name that is completely unmemorable. No way was I going to name my daughter Jill or Ann.
These exhausting discussions all happened well into our marriage. Years earlier, on our second date, he had shot down the one girl's name I have loved the most. I had wanted, for many years, to name my firstborn daughter Ruby. Somehow Tenessa was there, and told him I wanted a girl named Ruby. He immediately responded, "Ruby's the name of my toilet."
This raised several questions for me, as you might imagine: "what kind of man names his toilet?" for starters.
Anyway, it turns out that his toilet really was named Ruby, but that's for some other post. My point is, Ruby was clearly not an option, though it's a lovely name.
One day, not long before we got pregnant, Shaun came home from work and said "What about a letter?" After my initial confusion, I saw he meant as a name. "You know, S. Epatha Merkerson is an actress on Law and Order. We could name our potential daughter a letter, couldn't we?" (I know now that his logic there was flawed, since her S. stands for Sharon. Harry S Truman, on the other hand, his S was just an S). So I said, "How about V? You've always loved that mini-series, right?" And so it was decided.
I mean, that part, anyway, for us. There was some weeping and gnashing of teeth by the grandparents-to-be, and we had to chose a middle name, but this, gentle readers, is how we decided to name our daughter V. We love her so.
I mean, that part, anyway, for us. There was some weeping and gnashing of teeth by the grandparents-to-be, and we had to chose a middle name, but this, gentle readers, is how we decided to name our daughter V. We love her so.
17 April 2012
My Oyster Story
I've been to New Orleans twice in my life, and hope to go again before I'm 40. So much of what I love is there: jazz, the Mississippi, mausoleums. The first time I went, I was 18, and my college jazz band took a bus trip to the Big Easy. I was lucky enough to have 3 fantastic roomates, none of whom I knew before the trip, and with none of whom I've maintained contact. Anyway, we decided that aside from the Bourbon Street debauchery we were enjoying, we wanted to also experience a little authentic New Orlean's cuisine. Mostly, we ate from the walk-up window at the Chinese grocery down the street, but one afternoon, between concerts, Aimee and Stacy and I went to a bona-fide sit down fancy open air restaurant and ordered oysters on the half shell and a half dozen shrimp.
The waiter sweetly told us how to eat the oysters, and how to first look for pearls (we had one, the size of a grain of sand). Luckily, I'd practiced sword swallowing already, so they were no big thing. The shrimp were served on a bed of ice, and Aimee and I were into our third shrimp apiece before I noticed they still had legs.
"Uh, ladies? I think...I think these shrimp are not what we are accustomed to," I told my comrades. The tiny fork that came with our plate made sense, now, as did the immensely unpleasant crunchiness of these lovely shrimp. We discreetly spit out the bites in our mouths and commenced shelling our very fresh, very crispy shrimp, but not before we noticed our sweet waiter on the other side of the restaurant, pointing us out to the chef as, I can only assume, those hot, mildly stupid Minnesota girls.
The oysters, though, were delicious.
The waiter sweetly told us how to eat the oysters, and how to first look for pearls (we had one, the size of a grain of sand). Luckily, I'd practiced sword swallowing already, so they were no big thing. The shrimp were served on a bed of ice, and Aimee and I were into our third shrimp apiece before I noticed they still had legs.
"Uh, ladies? I think...I think these shrimp are not what we are accustomed to," I told my comrades. The tiny fork that came with our plate made sense, now, as did the immensely unpleasant crunchiness of these lovely shrimp. We discreetly spit out the bites in our mouths and commenced shelling our very fresh, very crispy shrimp, but not before we noticed our sweet waiter on the other side of the restaurant, pointing us out to the chef as, I can only assume, those hot, mildly stupid Minnesota girls.
The oysters, though, were delicious.
12 April 2012
Kickety kick ball
April. 5th grade. It must've been raining, because my class was playing a heated game of kickball in the gym. Mr. Timmer was our teacher, and I was the catcher. William Wainwright, my nemesis, was on third base, and after a decent kick from his teammate, he came toward me with determination. Though I had the ball, and was standing on the base, he put his shoulder down and knocked me up in the air. I came down on my left wrist, and broke both bones in my arm. Ow. That's what...28 years ago now? My mom was teaching at the time, but couldn't very well leave her classroom, so she had her sister Beverly take me to the doctor in Halstad. My arm had quickly swelled up to twice its normal size, and as we waited to see Doc Brown, he decided to spend 45 minutes visiting with an octogenarian in the next room. Aunt Bev and I learned all about Mrs. Alfredson's ferns while we waited.
When the doctor finally saw the x-ray his nurse had taken, he quickly decided it was beyond his expertise: with both bones broken, one badly, I had to go to St. Ansgar's in Moorhead. There I was put under general anesthesia, my arm was set, and I woke up to crabby nun nurses taking my blood pressure in the middle of the night. When they came to pick me up from the hospital, my parents took me out to Nine Dragons, our favorite Chinese restaurant, which I couldn't really enjoy because I was still queasy from the anesthetic.
But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was, with an 8 week cast, I turned eleven at the end of May and could not ride my brand new blue ten speed bike until mid-June.
It was, at least up until then, one of the great tragedies of my life.
When the doctor finally saw the x-ray his nurse had taken, he quickly decided it was beyond his expertise: with both bones broken, one badly, I had to go to St. Ansgar's in Moorhead. There I was put under general anesthesia, my arm was set, and I woke up to crabby nun nurses taking my blood pressure in the middle of the night. When they came to pick me up from the hospital, my parents took me out to Nine Dragons, our favorite Chinese restaurant, which I couldn't really enjoy because I was still queasy from the anesthetic.
But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part was, with an 8 week cast, I turned eleven at the end of May and could not ride my brand new blue ten speed bike until mid-June.
It was, at least up until then, one of the great tragedies of my life.
11 April 2012
Jalopy, Jennifer, Janitrix
Oh, J, you silly letter. So many names, so few other words....
Jalopy: One of several words I don't know how to pronounce very well. I've long been better at book learnin' than speaking, and though I read a lot of Archie comics, and Jughead and the gang were always driving around in a jalopy, I never learned how to pronounce it. Artisan/artesian are two others, as is epitome. Seriously, epitome? How'm I supposed to to know that's four syllables?
Jennifer: I never minded being named Jennifer, really, though it was the #1 girls name in America for ever in the 1970s. In college (and I may have already told you this story, and if so, I'm sorry), there was a popular drinking game on campus called Jennifer. In Morris, we only had one phone per dorm floor (oh! the humanity! my students are certain they would've died in such a circumstance), so the game was to call any floor and ask for Jennifer. If she answered, you got to drink. If they said "Which one?" you got to drink twice. Spooner top had 4 Jennifers, so we were a very popular floor, phone-wise.
Janitrix: the female version of janitor. Did you even know there was a female version? It turns out there are lots of fun words like that: aviatrix, proprietrix, legislatrix. Any noun that ends in -tor, really, can be made feminine by -trix. If I ever have to apply for a new job (heaven forbid), I think I may just have to write Instructrix on my résumé. Or Educatrix. I never knew teaching could sound so sexy!
Jalopy: One of several words I don't know how to pronounce very well. I've long been better at book learnin' than speaking, and though I read a lot of Archie comics, and Jughead and the gang were always driving around in a jalopy, I never learned how to pronounce it. Artisan/artesian are two others, as is epitome. Seriously, epitome? How'm I supposed to to know that's four syllables?
Jennifer: I never minded being named Jennifer, really, though it was the #1 girls name in America for ever in the 1970s. In college (and I may have already told you this story, and if so, I'm sorry), there was a popular drinking game on campus called Jennifer. In Morris, we only had one phone per dorm floor (oh! the humanity! my students are certain they would've died in such a circumstance), so the game was to call any floor and ask for Jennifer. If she answered, you got to drink. If they said "Which one?" you got to drink twice. Spooner top had 4 Jennifers, so we were a very popular floor, phone-wise.
Janitrix: the female version of janitor. Did you even know there was a female version? It turns out there are lots of fun words like that: aviatrix, proprietrix, legislatrix. Any noun that ends in -tor, really, can be made feminine by -trix. If I ever have to apply for a new job (heaven forbid), I think I may just have to write Instructrix on my résumé. Or Educatrix. I never knew teaching could sound so sexy!
10 April 2012
Iceberg, straight ahead!
Regular Languishing readers know that my childhood was full of small-town-ness, and personally I've always been drawn to cemeteries, for some reason. On more than one occassion, Shaun has referred to my childhood as "Little Ghoul on the Prairie."
A large part of that comes, certainly, from my father. He loved country death songs, and sang several heart-breaking melodies to us regularly in the car, on the way to or from home, on trips. By the age of seven, I was obsessed with world records and circus freaks, and by 8, I'd read A Night to Remember by Walter Lord, about the sinking of the Titanic, three times. I traced the names of the survivors, the recovered, and lost at sea long before James Cameron thought of making his fancy movie.
Today is 100 years since Titanic first set sail. In four days, it will be 100 years to the day of the sinking of the Titanic. Imagine a centurian anniversary for something you were fascinated with as a child: it's kind of a big deal, right? I mean, I wanted to name my firstborn child Carpathia, for crying out loud. The sinking of the Titanic was very much like that generation's September 11: it changed the way people thought about ocean travel, it caused widespread spiritual crisis, and was used for all sorts of political purposes by the people in, or struggling to gain, power in our country.
What interested me most about the disaster, thirty years ago and today, were the class distinctions that defined so much of the ship, and the survivors, and so much of American society, one hundred years ago. And today. Cameron's love story was never very compelling to me. But the microcosm that was the Titanic, and the ways in which our world still plays by those rules, keeps me interested in that mighty ship, and mightier ice berg, and history in general.
And that's all I have to say about that.
A large part of that comes, certainly, from my father. He loved country death songs, and sang several heart-breaking melodies to us regularly in the car, on the way to or from home, on trips. By the age of seven, I was obsessed with world records and circus freaks, and by 8, I'd read A Night to Remember by Walter Lord, about the sinking of the Titanic, three times. I traced the names of the survivors, the recovered, and lost at sea long before James Cameron thought of making his fancy movie.
Today is 100 years since Titanic first set sail. In four days, it will be 100 years to the day of the sinking of the Titanic. Imagine a centurian anniversary for something you were fascinated with as a child: it's kind of a big deal, right? I mean, I wanted to name my firstborn child Carpathia, for crying out loud. The sinking of the Titanic was very much like that generation's September 11: it changed the way people thought about ocean travel, it caused widespread spiritual crisis, and was used for all sorts of political purposes by the people in, or struggling to gain, power in our country.
What interested me most about the disaster, thirty years ago and today, were the class distinctions that defined so much of the ship, and the survivors, and so much of American society, one hundred years ago. And today. Cameron's love story was never very compelling to me. But the microcosm that was the Titanic, and the ways in which our world still plays by those rules, keeps me interested in that mighty ship, and mightier ice berg, and history in general.
And that's all I have to say about that.
09 April 2012
Hula, Hendrum, haiku
(Still managing to keep up with the A to Z blogging challenge. Much love to all my commenters, who make this conversation seem so much less one-sided!)
Hula: I've never been to Hawaii, or actually seen hula performed live. But I like the sound of the word, and how it invokes the very motion it describes. The Hawaiian language sounds tropical and lovely to me, too, even "mele kalikimaka." Tenessa and I (and Dan and Shaun) threw a Hawaiian themed party, once, in which we draped our whole apartment in various Hawaiian fabrics, played catchy ukulele music, and allowed Shaun to wear a coconut bra. It was a mostly beautiful thing. I still have approximately 17 yards of Hawaiian fabric to utilize for other projects. Suggestions are welcome.
Hendrum: My hometown, a little blip on the map of the Red River Valley. Hendrum is so much a part of who I am, crafted so much of my childhood, and provided so much to me while I was growing up, that I barely know where to begin. Both of my parents were born in this town of just over 300, in homes right across the street from one another. My maternal grandfather ran Johnson's Fairway, a small, three-aisle grocery store, for over 40 years there; my paternal great-grandfathers helped build the city, moving large buildings across the river with 16 horses, and building shelters at the city park and houses within the city limits. As V gets older, I find myself longing, in some ways, for her to have more of the childhood I had: freedom to roam from yard to yard, knowing all our neighbors, to hear the churchbells and know that it is supper time. There are deep constraints, too, in a town this small with roots so deep: when over half the town remembers her great-grandparents, people she never knew, sometimes a sort of stagnation can set in. In her kindergarten classroom, she has people of all colors, all backgrounds, from Christian to Muslim to Atheist. In Hendrum, diversity amounts to people whose names don't end with "-son." Bake a pie, eat a pie, I guess.
Haiku:
Little poem, precise
simmering words exploding
from my heart to yours.
Hula: I've never been to Hawaii, or actually seen hula performed live. But I like the sound of the word, and how it invokes the very motion it describes. The Hawaiian language sounds tropical and lovely to me, too, even "mele kalikimaka." Tenessa and I (and Dan and Shaun) threw a Hawaiian themed party, once, in which we draped our whole apartment in various Hawaiian fabrics, played catchy ukulele music, and allowed Shaun to wear a coconut bra. It was a mostly beautiful thing. I still have approximately 17 yards of Hawaiian fabric to utilize for other projects. Suggestions are welcome.
Hendrum: My hometown, a little blip on the map of the Red River Valley. Hendrum is so much a part of who I am, crafted so much of my childhood, and provided so much to me while I was growing up, that I barely know where to begin. Both of my parents were born in this town of just over 300, in homes right across the street from one another. My maternal grandfather ran Johnson's Fairway, a small, three-aisle grocery store, for over 40 years there; my paternal great-grandfathers helped build the city, moving large buildings across the river with 16 horses, and building shelters at the city park and houses within the city limits. As V gets older, I find myself longing, in some ways, for her to have more of the childhood I had: freedom to roam from yard to yard, knowing all our neighbors, to hear the churchbells and know that it is supper time. There are deep constraints, too, in a town this small with roots so deep: when over half the town remembers her great-grandparents, people she never knew, sometimes a sort of stagnation can set in. In her kindergarten classroom, she has people of all colors, all backgrounds, from Christian to Muslim to Atheist. In Hendrum, diversity amounts to people whose names don't end with "-son." Bake a pie, eat a pie, I guess.
Haiku:
Little poem, precise
simmering words exploding
from my heart to yours.
05 April 2012
EEE
Eagles: I so often wonder how we would view eagles if Ben Franklin had gotten his way with installing turkeys as our national bird. I don't think we'd eat them (an eagducken doesn't sound so good), but I don't think they'd be so revered, either. I like to see eagles in the wild, but I also love hawks and herons and flamingos. (Damn. I need to do this A to Z challenge all about birds, obviously). And turkeys, too, come to think of it. And unlike turkeys, eagles mostly eat carrion: we condemn vultures for this, but in the beloved eagle, we just pretend they only eat fresh fish and defend freedom in their spare time. (Apparently I have eagle angst. Hm).
Easter: He is risen indeed. Well, not yet, because it's Maundy Thursday, but pretty soon...I really loved the drama of this holiday in our little Lutheran church. On Good Friday, we strip the alter bare, in acknowledgement of the solemnity of the crucifixion, and we sing sad, mournful songs. On Sunday, the white cloths come out (which I think my family donated after my Grandpa Art died), and the festivities begin. I no longer worship with this or any congregation, but the many years I did left several moving memories behind, and this is one of them. Easter also meant the annual cousins' Easter Egg Hunt, in which the girl cousin and boy cousin who found the most eggs each won a prize. I was at a clear advantage, as I was the eldest of the second round of girl cousins, and Dawn, Jess, Kristen, and Logan never really had much of a chance. There is something thrilling about a search for colorful hardboiled eggs when 10 other kids you've known your whole life are trying to beat you to them. In related news, at least once a year (usually around now) Shaun and I try to watch Jesus Christ Superstar, because we both love it so.
Ether: Did you know that the use of ether as an anaesthetic during childbirth first came into popularity with Queen Victoria, who was knocked out with it in 1853 for the birth of her 8th child, and recommended it? Of course this led to the medicalization of childbirth, and, well, I can't get into all of that here. But the idea of a queen setting such a trend is ... unsettling to me.
May your eagles, Easters, and ether all be administered in appropriate ways, gentle readers. And may the eggs in your basket always outnumber your cousins'.
Easter: He is risen indeed. Well, not yet, because it's Maundy Thursday, but pretty soon...I really loved the drama of this holiday in our little Lutheran church. On Good Friday, we strip the alter bare, in acknowledgement of the solemnity of the crucifixion, and we sing sad, mournful songs. On Sunday, the white cloths come out (which I think my family donated after my Grandpa Art died), and the festivities begin. I no longer worship with this or any congregation, but the many years I did left several moving memories behind, and this is one of them. Easter also meant the annual cousins' Easter Egg Hunt, in which the girl cousin and boy cousin who found the most eggs each won a prize. I was at a clear advantage, as I was the eldest of the second round of girl cousins, and Dawn, Jess, Kristen, and Logan never really had much of a chance. There is something thrilling about a search for colorful hardboiled eggs when 10 other kids you've known your whole life are trying to beat you to them. In related news, at least once a year (usually around now) Shaun and I try to watch Jesus Christ Superstar, because we both love it so.
Ether: Did you know that the use of ether as an anaesthetic during childbirth first came into popularity with Queen Victoria, who was knocked out with it in 1853 for the birth of her 8th child, and recommended it? Of course this led to the medicalization of childbirth, and, well, I can't get into all of that here. But the idea of a queen setting such a trend is ... unsettling to me.
May your eagles, Easters, and ether all be administered in appropriate ways, gentle readers. And may the eggs in your basket always outnumber your cousins'.
03 April 2012
C is for cookie!
I wonder how many other people participating in the A to Z blogging challenge will choose cookie? It's certainly an obvious choice...yet I like the idea of writing about baked goods while getting a solid Sesame Street song stuck in my readers' heads.
A run down of my favorite cookies of all time.
Jumbos: often called chocolate jumbos, or Grandma's jumbos, these rolled out chocolate molasses cookies were my Grandma Beulah's trademark. She cut them with the doughnut cutter, and made a boiled frosting (called, surprisingly, Grandma's Frosting) with cream, and sugar to spread on top. My cousins and I would seriously eat these until we were sick: they epitomize Johnson family Christmas in so many ways. My mom and sister and I try to make these at least once a year, but they are sooo labor intensive, and sooo addicting, that it's getting to be harder and harder. It's so much easier to make a simple powdered sugar and milk frosting for white cookies. But I swear the work it takes to make them is a huge part of why the jumbos taste so awesome.
Chocolate chip: Yeah, that's right. In a cliche post topic I pick the cliched American Cookie. We go all out here at Languishing. I like the recipe on the back of the Toll House package (remember that episode of Friends where Phoebe and Monica are trying to recreate Phoebe's grandmother's chocolate chip cookies? And Phoebe keeps saying "It's French. Some fancy French name!" And finally they figure out she's been pronouncing "toll house" with a French accent? Good times). My junior year of college, I lived in a house called the Dollhouse (which doesn't really rhyme with Toll house, strangely), just across the street from campus, and my sister would come visit from the dorms and we would make batches and batches of cookies. She taught me to take them out of the oven early to make sure they were soft, and we watched TV while we waiting for those 9-11 minutes to pass. One of my fondest memories of that house.
Sugar: Oh, sugar. Like jumbos, these have to be rolled out to be really awesome, and I rarely have the counter space. But when I do, I love to make big old sugar cookies, usually in the shape of hearts, get them just browned the edges, and then frost them 'til I'm dizzy. I used to have this great old recipe for sugar cookie frosting that used alum and raw eggs, but I haven't made it since I used older (still edible! I swear!) eggs one time and the frosting ended up tasting like earthworms. Such a waste of a good batch of cookies. Jess and Mom and I like to frost sugar cookies with our kids at Christmas time, and let the kids run the sprinkle application. Everyone goes home happy.
I hope you've enjoyed my stroll through Cookie Memory Lane. What's your favorite cookie recipe?
A run down of my favorite cookies of all time.
Jumbos: often called chocolate jumbos, or Grandma's jumbos, these rolled out chocolate molasses cookies were my Grandma Beulah's trademark. She cut them with the doughnut cutter, and made a boiled frosting (called, surprisingly, Grandma's Frosting) with cream, and sugar to spread on top. My cousins and I would seriously eat these until we were sick: they epitomize Johnson family Christmas in so many ways. My mom and sister and I try to make these at least once a year, but they are sooo labor intensive, and sooo addicting, that it's getting to be harder and harder. It's so much easier to make a simple powdered sugar and milk frosting for white cookies. But I swear the work it takes to make them is a huge part of why the jumbos taste so awesome.
Chocolate chip: Yeah, that's right. In a cliche post topic I pick the cliched American Cookie. We go all out here at Languishing. I like the recipe on the back of the Toll House package (remember that episode of Friends where Phoebe and Monica are trying to recreate Phoebe's grandmother's chocolate chip cookies? And Phoebe keeps saying "It's French. Some fancy French name!" And finally they figure out she's been pronouncing "toll house" with a French accent? Good times). My junior year of college, I lived in a house called the Dollhouse (which doesn't really rhyme with Toll house, strangely), just across the street from campus, and my sister would come visit from the dorms and we would make batches and batches of cookies. She taught me to take them out of the oven early to make sure they were soft, and we watched TV while we waiting for those 9-11 minutes to pass. One of my fondest memories of that house.
Sugar: Oh, sugar. Like jumbos, these have to be rolled out to be really awesome, and I rarely have the counter space. But when I do, I love to make big old sugar cookies, usually in the shape of hearts, get them just browned the edges, and then frost them 'til I'm dizzy. I used to have this great old recipe for sugar cookie frosting that used alum and raw eggs, but I haven't made it since I used older (still edible! I swear!) eggs one time and the frosting ended up tasting like earthworms. Such a waste of a good batch of cookies. Jess and Mom and I like to frost sugar cookies with our kids at Christmas time, and let the kids run the sprinkle application. Everyone goes home happy.
I hope you've enjoyed my stroll through Cookie Memory Lane. What's your favorite cookie recipe?
20 March 2012
Collector of Treasures
First, Shaun has a job. He's almost 2 weeks into a full-time night shift position at a local truck stop/gas station, and we're so grateful for the work, and we're busy getting used to a whole new schedule. It's really, really, really a relief, and I thought you'd all want to know. So now, on with the post.
When I taught World Literature in Crookston, we studied a short story by Bessie Head, "The Collector of Treasures." It's a marvelous story with love, romance, friendship, violence, imprisonment, indictment of patriarchal society....everything you want in a good story. The main character collects treasures in her heart, all the kindnesses shown to her in her life. It's a striking image, and one I try to emulate. Especially when the shit seems most dismal, those treasures really help.
And I've been blessed by many treasures lately. So many of you have emailed kind messages of support to me or to $haun, or patiently listened to my sad stories, or even kept us in your thoughts over the last few months. I treasure all of those. Two colleagues at work gave me a fantastic altered journal and two cold Cokes to cheer me up before break (it worked!). And one day, several weeks ago, a package appeared in the mail. It was shortly after this post appeared, but all I could think was "What on earth did I order? We can't afford to spend any money!" But I hadn't: it was a present, from Tom, one of my first bestest friends (and high school sweetheart).
Thank you all for the treasures you've sent, in thought or electronic or paper or carbonated or vinyl form, over these dark months. They've lightened my heart so, so much.
Y'all are the best there's ever been.
28 February 2012
Naked Face (with an obscene gesture warning)
The truth is, all three of my long-term romantic relationships were with brown-haired men with red beards. I dated Tom, off and on, for over 8 years (there's a post about him coming up soon, too). We started dating when I was 14 and he was 15, so I didn't know he had a red beard at the time, but by the end, he'd been bearded for a good while. A year later, when I brought Matt home to Hendrum for the first time, Sam at the gas station said "Is that Tom in the car with you??" Um, awkward...No, Sam. That's my new boyfriend who just happens to look like Tom.
It turns out the third time's the charm.
Shaun and I first met because of Dan & Tenessa. Dan and Shaun worked together at WDAY, a local newstation, and I was in D & T's apartment one day (they lived just above me) and saw a photo of this handsome young man with dark hair and a red beard. "He's cute," I said.Tenessa's cupid sensor lit up and they told me about this Shaun Ganyo fellow. I liked him long before we met.
He had a beard when we started dating. During the 2 1/2 years before we got married, he sometimes went down to a goatee, and shaved it off totally just once. I prefer the beard. My favorite look of his is above, with short hair and a ridiculously long beard. People tend to come up to him and ask stupid questions about it, when it's that long. It makes me happy.
Mostly, he has a beard because he's lazy. Shaving takes work, apparently. But every now and again, he gets his monstrous beard trimmed, or I trim it. Above is Christmas this year. I think we trimmed it because the weekend before we'd gone to his parents' house, and his mom really, really likes it when his beard isn't too crazy.
But he hasn't gotten a job yet. And he read something online that said bearded men are less likely to be chosen in a job search when cleanshaven men are also applying. So I gave in and said he could shave it. Last night, with V's help, he cut off the well-groomed red and gray whiskers. In trying to get a picture of him cleanshaven, though, he refused to let me see him unless he was flipping the camera off. So my apologies, gentle readers, for the delicate among you.
But here he is. Would you hire this guy? Would you marry him?
It turns out the third time's the charm.
Shaun and I first met because of Dan & Tenessa. Dan and Shaun worked together at WDAY, a local newstation, and I was in D & T's apartment one day (they lived just above me) and saw a photo of this handsome young man with dark hair and a red beard. "He's cute," I said.Tenessa's cupid sensor lit up and they told me about this Shaun Ganyo fellow. I liked him long before we met.
One of the first things we talked about when he got fired was him shaving his beard. He hasn't shaved it off in over ten years; V's never seen him without it, and we've established I have a clear preference. And he's still lazy. I talked him into keeping the beard, but cutting it way back, to a reasonable length. Above is a couple of weeks ago, out at the lake. Well-groomed, non-ZZTop-ish.
But he hasn't gotten a job yet. And he read something online that said bearded men are less likely to be chosen in a job search when cleanshaven men are also applying. So I gave in and said he could shave it. Last night, with V's help, he cut off the well-groomed red and gray whiskers. In trying to get a picture of him cleanshaven, though, he refused to let me see him unless he was flipping the camera off. So my apologies, gentle readers, for the delicate among you.
But here he is. Would you hire this guy? Would you marry him?
Here's hoping it unlocks all kinds of employment opportunities. V just calls him "Naked Faced Daddy" now, but if we can call him employed, it will all have been worth it. Besides, it'll grow back right quick, once he's securely working and they like him too much to let him go.
Just like me.
06 February 2012
I Told You Once, You Son of a Bitch...
As a little girl, my music influences were...eclectic. We had church music, of course. And then the record player at home...my dad was 43 when I was born, and his musical tastes were a whole generation behind my friends' parents. Which was awesome, really. We listened to a lot of Burl Ives, some Hank Williams, Sr.; The Louvin Brothers; Patsy Cline and other old coutry groups. Once a month or so, in music class, we got to bring a record from home and we'd all listen to each others' favorite songs. I don't even remember the music other kids brought, but I loved listening to Country Death Ballads with all my classmates. (Now that I've typed that sentence, I'm not sure why child services never showed up at our house).
The other music I listened to was "new" country, on the radio at our babysitter's. She had a transistor on top of her fridge, and the only thing better than a country death ballad was a little "Rhinestone Cowboy," Eddie Rabbit, or any Crystal Gayle. The edgiest song on country radio in the late 70s/early 80s was, at least in my experience, "The Devil Went Down to Georgia." Oh, I loved that song. Though Johnny was a little overconfident when he dismissed the devil, I wanted to own the record more than anything in the world.
I didn't even realize, then, that one could purchase new record albums. I thought you either listened to your dad's records, or lucked out a garage sale. (We were simple people). The day I saw the album, in a milk crate jn a driveway in North Moorhead, I almost wet my pants. It was probably 1981 or 82, and there was hardly any wear on cover. It was, as I recall, marked 50 cents.
The other music I listened to was "new" country, on the radio at our babysitter's. She had a transistor on top of her fridge, and the only thing better than a country death ballad was a little "Rhinestone Cowboy," Eddie Rabbit, or any Crystal Gayle. The edgiest song on country radio in the late 70s/early 80s was, at least in my experience, "The Devil Went Down to Georgia." Oh, I loved that song. Though Johnny was a little overconfident when he dismissed the devil, I wanted to own the record more than anything in the world.
I didn't even realize, then, that one could purchase new record albums. I thought you either listened to your dad's records, or lucked out a garage sale. (We were simple people). The day I saw the album, in a milk crate jn a driveway in North Moorhead, I almost wet my pants. It was probably 1981 or 82, and there was hardly any wear on cover. It was, as I recall, marked 50 cents.
My dad didn't even argue or tease me, make me think I wasn't going to get this. He knew how much I loved this song. We brought it home, and I bounced in the backseat all 28 miles. I stared at the cover, I read the titles of every other song...I slid the record out just to look at how long my song would play. It was my first record just for me, that I had picked out. Oh, music class, I was going to impress everyone next month!
We had to unload the car, and take out the dog, and finally, after Mom had started supper, Dad put the record on the player. The familiar fiddle music, the talk-song lyrics....I was dancing in the living room. I was so happy I even let my sister dance, too. And then came the best line of the song..."I told you once, you son of gun..." only he didn't say "gun." This was not the radio version Charlie Daniels, the G-rated, FCC approved Charlie Daniels. As my dad reached for the power switch, I started making my case. "I know what that word means, dad, and I will never, ever, ever say it. I'll sing 'gun' really loud every time it's on. I swear." But it was too late. He slid the record back into the barely worn sleeve, and took it down to the basement, where there were the best hiding places. For months I begged for that record, and though Dad was sympathetic, he would not be moved. When I'd given up begging, I tried to find it myself when my parents weren't home. I spent hours in that damn basement.
In 1986, after Dad's stroke, I knew I was running out of time. Aphasia or no aphasia, I was going to have that record. After he moved home from the rehab hospital, I asked him where he'd hidden it. He grinned at me.
"Is it in the basement?" I asked. He shrugged his shoulders. "Is it in the garage?" Still grinning, still shrugging. "Did you forget where you hid it?"
"Ah, nope." He couldn't say much, but he could say that.
"You're still not gonna tell me, are you?"
"Ah, no. No, no, no." And he grinned.
I've learned many more curse words since then, but I still haven't found that record. Wherever he put it kept it safe from my tender ears. I reckon he's still proud of himself for that.
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