That Was the Week That Was (Health Update)

 Some of you are old enough to remember the TV show That Was the Week That Was, a comedy idea we borrowed/stole from England and that ran here from Nov. 1963 to May 1965 on NBC (link to some audio).  (We’ve stolen some good ones from the Mother Country—think: The Office.)

Well, I just had quite a week. Though it was definitely not comedic, it nonetheless deserves the same title. I’ve been dreading it every time I open my old-fashioned bound calendar—that’s right: I have not gone digital in that respect.

Monday at 3 was a follow-up appointment with a University Hospitals (UH) neurologist, going over some of my recent test results, tests designed to figure out why I’m so unsteady on my feet. She had referred me to a specialist at UH Main Campus on University Circle in Cleveland.

Tuesday at 10:30–up to Seidman Cancer Center in Chagrin Highlands, where I met with my oncologist and went over my recent test results. All my numbers remain steady and good, but we did talk a bit about what’s next after this current med stops working (as it will).

We have just one more medication to try before only chemo remains. And then ... you know ... you know ...

Thursday at 1:30 I had a virtual meeting with the UH neurologist (Main Campus), and he said the recent battery of tests (including a spinal tap—that was fun) indicated that I do not have either Parkinson’s or M.S., but it’s likely I do have something in the Parkinson’s “family.” Final judgment on that when I get another brain M.R.I. in a few months. The only good news about that is they they do have some things to help with my symptoms.

This morning (8 a.m.) I had laser surgery on both eyes (my sight has been blurring) at Northeast Ohio Eye Surgeons in Kent. I had cataract surgery a couple years ago (elsewhere)—and this is sort of a cleaning up of the problems that have remained—or that have arrived since the surgery.

I could not have done much of this without Joyce’s help. She drove me everywhere (I no longer, with my eyes and balance feel safe driving; I miss it a lot). All I can do now, in the passenger’s seat, is man-splain! She sat with me, talked with me, encouraged me, and, today when we came home from the eye surgery, we made maple-pecan scones!

But now ... the week-that-was is over. And Dread steps aside for the nonce to be replaced by What’s Next?

I forget ...?

 

Forgetting is annoying—as I'm discovering more and more each day. Things are fleeing from my brain--abandoning ship. Memories, apparently, would rather drown than live in my head.

Things were not always so. I had quick recall, could play games like Trivial Pursuit very well. (BTW: I just had to look up the name of that game because I could not remember it!)

I remembered stories from boyhood, the names of elementary school teachers and friends, names of authors, of characters—even minor ones—in their books.

Last night, for example, Joyce and I were watching the 3rd episode of the Hemingway film. I taught Hemingway for years, have read about every biography, all of his books, have visited most of the major sites in his life (except in Cuba). So ... Joyce asked me who his fourth and final wife was. BLANK. A couple of minutes later I remembered her first name, Mary. I'm hoping her last name will drift back toward my boat before I have to hook it with Google. So far, it hasn't (it's 9:45 a.m. the next day).

I got it just now! Mary Welsh!

Okay, cheated/Googled it.

As some of you know, I've memorized about 230 poems and literary passages, but recently I've discovered to my chagrin, despite my continual practice, that they are joining those memories that are diving overboard.

I often can't remember the names of films, actors, directors, musicians, songs, etc.

I'm losing the  names of common objects--not permanently, but in quick conversation. "Joyce, would you hand me that ...?" I resort to pointing, and the word returns only after the time to use it has passed.

I sometimes look at my computer keyboard and can't remember the commands I've used routinely for decades.

Part of this, I know, is just normal aging, And part of it could be ... no, I don't want to think about it.

Awhile back, Joyce wrote about her mother's struggles with Alzheimer's—struggles that I often witnessed firsthand. (In a Tangled Wood, 1996.) Her mother went through the entire cycle—from Where are my keys? to Who are you? to What is food? It eventually killed her.

I don't think I'm on that path (I've had a number of brain scans, for other issues, and no one has told me that I've got worrisome markers or symptoms.)

So let’s eliminate that for the nonce.

But I have fashioned such locutions as this: Joyce, could you hand me that ... thingy ... over there. She’s excellent at reading my mind; after all, we’ve been together for over 51 years! So she knows the myriad meanings for thingy.

One culprit for this condition may be this: I’m on a cancer med that has made me dizzy 24/7. (I’m fine only when I’m lying down.) So perhaps this has affected my memory, as well. Who knows? I’m seeing my oncologist later this coming week at Seidman Cancer Center, and I think I’m going to elect to replace this drug with another one he’s suggested.

Yes, we’ll see if that helps. For Dr. (?) is very skilled, very intelligent, very compassionate. He, too, knows what a thingy is.

Squirrel Haven and Heaven

Joyce put up our bird feeders the other day, and it took a squirrel about a day to discover one (see pic). He has been spending much of his days now inside that feeder (where he was entirely when I took this pic through my study window), probably stunned that he has fallen into such great fortune—has won a seedy lottery.

As I said, I was watching through my study window when he discovered a squirrel’s version of Smaug's cave. It took him about 30 seconds to figure out how to get inside.

We're going to wait until he eats it all before we find a more bird-friendly location—a location that even the most Einsteinian of squirrels would fail to access.

It's hard to say whether we have more birds or squirrels in our yard (and an occasional feral cat on a bird hunt). Gray and black. I'm somewhat pleased that the black one (the evil one!) was the first to find the mother lode. Oh, how puzzled that squirrel will be when he discovers that lode is gone.

We’ve had some real adventures with squirrels in our marriage. Back in 80s a couple got into our attic, where they increased the squirrel population quite a bit before we got a guy to trap the parents and move them to a more remote location.

A few days later, a couple young ones, certainly hungry and befuddled, came crawling out and headed off for parts unknown.

Then in the 1990s (in a different house) we once again had to hire a guy to trap squirrels for us, take them far away, and seal their entry point.

Both trapping experiences left us free of scratching sounds in the attic, sounds loud enough to awaken both of us—infuriate both of us. And both experiences caused me to feel the rage that must animate murderers.

“Our” squirrels at our current house are very ... bold. We find walnuts in our mailbox, barely buried in our planters. We find their tracks in the snow on our front porch. And once a squirrel got into our trash, and I saw him gnawing on a corn cob out in our driveway. I must say I admired the thoroughness he employed with his gnawing: not a kernel remained when he’d finished.

They leave other evidence of their presence, as well.

But let’s not get into that ...

Trash

It’s Earth Day, so ...

I'm having a hard time remembering how we got rid of trash in my boyhood. There must have been trucks that chugged along the streets of Enid, Oklahoma, and Amarillo, Texas—but I have no clear memory of them. I do remember the metal trash cans that we put out at the curb, but I cannot see the vehicles that came to pick them up.

I remember, too, that a lot of people (Dyers included) burned some of it in metal barrels in the back yard. I can see Dad dropping it in; I can remember the warnings not to get too close, warnings that my older brother ignored and, with a bare belly, got too close one Texas day and still bears the scar on his belly.

People back then, of course, also burned fallen leaves out in the street in front of their houses—a practice I still witnessed in the fall of 1978 when we were living in Lake Forest, Illinois (both of us were teaching at Lake Forest College).

And then ... environmentalists showed us how damaging to the environment these practices were, and I remember when recycling became a Thing when I was still teaching at Harmon (Middle) School in the late 80s on into the mid-90s. The hero of this enterprise was my colleague Denny Reiser (math/science), who got the school to buy bins for discarded paper for each classroom, bins which he would transport in his truck to a recycling facility in Kent, about twelve miles away from the school.

Oh, I forgot. Back when we were first married (1969), Joyce and I bought at Sears an electric trash compacter. Ours looked like the one in the pic I just found on the web.

We pulled out the bottom section, which contained a sturdy bag—as well as a can that sprayed on the contents an odor-killer of some sort (which I'm sure was safe to inhale); then we would turn it on; there would follow a fierce crunching sound; it would stop automatically (I think). As the days passed on, the contents smelled more and more rancid. At the end of the week we would carry the bag out to the curb (it was heavy) where the truck would pick it up.

Now, of course, we have trash and recycle trucks that growl through the neighborhood each week, and we have separate barrels that contain items that can be recycled, items that cannot. But from what I’ve read I’ve learned that a lot of the "recyclables" are actually not.

Some of our neighbors do not recycle at all, and of course that allows us to feel morally superior—a wonderful feeling that has no basis in reality. None.

FYI: There’s a fine documentary, Trash Dance (2012), by Andrew Garrison—whom Joyce knows pretty well. On Amazon Prime and elsewhere. (Link to trailer.)

Snow Day?

Hudson, Ohio
21 April 2021
7 a.m.

 When I was growing up in Oklahoma and Texas, I never once enjoyed a school’s-off snow day. I had no idea what such a thing even was.

So when we moved to Hiram, Ohio, in August 1956, my grief at leaving my friends and routines back in Oklahoma was greatly relieved when I experienced my first snow day. I remember one week (1957? 1958?) when we had four days off in a single week ... heaven.

When I began my teaching career in 1966, I soon discovered I had that same heavenly feeling when a snow day was called. A huge sense of relief. I could sleep later, get caught up on work (mostly, paper grading), etc. 

So on a day like today—a day of overnight snow—I would have awakened (as a kid, as a teacher) to see this glorious sight you see in the pic at the top of the page.

But if you look closely at the pic, you'll see that the roads are clear. Yep, the snow coats the trees and lawns and plants but not the most crucial element in a potential snow day.

So grief would have immediately followed that discovery. Maybe even some ... bad words?

The birds and squirrels that inhabit (uh, dominate) our yard seem confused more than distraught this morning. Where did that white come from?

I was due this morning to go into the University Hospitals lab here in Hudson to get a blood draw for one of my regular tests, and so I was thrilled to see the snow, knowing I could postpone the poke a day.

But then I saw the roads, thought Aw, I'll go tomorrow anyway.

And down I went to make some Keurig coffee, to heat and eat one of the apricot-walnut scones that Joyce and I made yesterday, to slump into my "morning chair," catch up on email, FB, and read fifty pages of the book I'm about to finish.

An Old Guy's Snow Day!

Noon: The sun is out; the snow is fleeing fast; the squirrels and birds are now starting to recognize their world (our lawn and trees or—from their point-of-view—their lawn and trees).

Do You Need to Read?

I'm reading this 2020 novel that bears on the cover a very positive blurb by Kate Atkinson, who's now one of my favorite writers. (The book’s a gift from some long-time friends here in town.)

Anyway, it's about a retirement home in England where a group of the residents have formed what they call "The Thursday Murder Club"--because that's what they do on Thursdays: meet and talk about murder cases--open cases.

But then a killing happens involving someone whom they know (a crass developer), and so they dive in. Very clever so far (I'm about 1/3 of the way through).

This morning I chortled at this exchange between a young woman cop (whom the TMC has coaxed into helping with the case) and an odd man she's about to sleep with--yes, "sleep with" in that way.

Part of their pre-coital conversation at a restaurant:

"At one point Donna had asked him who his favorite author was. For her an acceptable answer would be Harlan Coben, Kurt Vonnegut, or any woman. Gregor had sagely replied that he 'didn't believe in books' and that 'you only learn in this life through having experiences, and keeping your mind open'" (124).

Of course, our author, Richard Osman, is just having some fun here--and showing that this couple is, well, doomed. One's a reader; the other one, not.

But the exchange provoked in me a little bit of thinking (about all I'm capable of these days).

The dichotomy--to read or not to read?--is silly (as the author well knows). In my life, the mentors and colleagues and students and friends and other folks whom I admire are those who do both; one activity supplements and complements the other.

As I'm now (sadly) learning, you do what you can physically--until you can't. You go places, you do things--you try to do as much as you can until Time says, "You’re done."

But you can't do everything, experience everything, go everywhere, and so you read about the things you don't know, visit on the page the places you didn't visit, read about the lives of people whose lives have been very different from your own: culture, race, religion, and so many other categories.

And you try like hell not to be offended and "cancel" those people, etc. who aren't like you or yours.

That's what bothers me about teachers now often having to give "trigger warnings"--warnings to students that they could encounter in a novel you've assigned something that they might find "offensive." Lord, I'm glad I did not have to endure that as a student. For one of the wonderful things about reading is that it's virtually certain that you will read things that will make you uncomfortable.

Good. That's the way it's supposed to be. That’s the way I want it to be. That’s how you learn.

Otherwise, you'll find your reading confined to Dr. Seuss.

Ooops, bad example!

The Trees on Our Streets--and in Our Minds

Joyce just finished reading Richard Powers' novel The Overstory, a powerfully wonderful novel about people and trees and "civilization." You can't really read that book without thinking of the trees on your street, in your neighborhood, etc.

We have all sorts of trees around us--from weeping cherries to evergreens, to magnolias, to oaks and maples. And many more.

Our bedroom is upstairs in the front of the house, facing the street, so I can lie in bed and, employing the streetlights, watch the seasons slowly advance as I lie there.

I like all the seasons (from the comfort of our home--if not outside). I watch the leaves slowly appear, flourish, change color, fall to the ground. And for much of the year, of course, the branches are bare.

Doesn't matter. My mind plays games with the configuration of nothingness. I see shapes where there are none, really—nothing but branches and, sometimes, leaves. For several years I've been able to see a capital A, reminding me of The Scarlet Letter and poor Hester Prynne. I think the A I see looks exactly like the one on the cover of the paperback copy I taught in English III for ten years at Western Reserve Academy.

A few years ago, I was positive I saw--when the trees were leaved--my own face, beard and all. (And, thankfully, not white.)

Last year, among the bare branches, I saw the face of Davy Crockett, coonskin cap and all.

We humans are programmed to see faces and pictures in the trees, especially faces--a survival adaptation, I believe.* Any splash on any wall or window can evoke anyone from Shakespeare to Han Solo to Bilbo Baggins. Any cloud can show us a cat, a dog, a shark, Wonder Woman.

It amuses me to think that some playful dryad arranges things just for me, to entertain me a little before she hands me over to Morpheus.

But, of course, it’s my own playful mind creating images where there are none.

A few years ago I was reading the complete poems of A. E. Housman, a poet I’d really come to admire. Back in Hiram High School, senior year, our teacher had asked us to memorize Housman’s “When I Was One and Twenty” (link to poem). I didn’t do too well, but, subsequently, I’ve memorized it—got it down cold.

Anyway, when I came across “Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now” in the Housman volume, I knew I had to memorize it, as well.

And so I did.

And it, like Powers’ novel, continues ruffling in my mind, ruffling like, well, like leaves in a breeze.

*Some people have the inability to recognize faces, a condition called prosopagnosia. Link to info about it.

** A Shropshire Lad  2: Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

BY A. E. HOUSMAN (1859-1936)

 Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough,

And stands about the woodland ride

Wearing white for Eastertide.

 

Now, of my threescore years and ten,

Twenty will not come again,

And take from seventy springs a score,

It only leaves me fifty more.

 

And since to look at things in bloom

Fifty springs are little room,

About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.