An Old Dream Reignited

 Fifty years ago I dreamed of being a writer. I clung to that dream for two decades before coming to the abrupt realization that, truth be told, I was not ever going to be a writer.

Eleven years ago, I started writing my four blogs, because those stories were burning to be told, and through blogging I could publish them without having to be a commercial success. Basically, they are the autobiography of someone that nobody has heard of.

A couple of weeks ago, I listened to a book about self-discipline, and an unexpected by-product was the abrupt realization that, truth be told, maybe I could be a writer. I signed up for access to firstwriter.com, and Carmen gave me their Writers' Handbook for Christmas. The result: today I submitted a story to Please See Me magazine's writing contest. More submissions to more publishers to follow.

Stay tuned for updates! 

A Christmas Story

 I love this memory from 1976. I was a beat-up depressed person, back in Vero Beach after the Bicentennial craziness that nearly did me in, back working as a forklift driver at The Packers of Indian River grapefruit packing house. My best buddy Doug and I spent our lunch hours playing cards, so I knew he loved cards. I had (and still have) a deck of solid plastic playing cards that he admired, so I bought a deck for him. Also, he and his wife often took their canoe out to the waterways around the county, so when I saw an advertisement in the Miami Herald for a book about the "Canoe Trails of Florida," I bought one of those. 

On Christmas Eve I walked over to their house to drop off my neatly wrapped presents. Doug invited me in. His wife was on the couch with a map of Florida. "We want to go canoeing tomorrow, but we're having a hard time figuring out where to go," she said. I handed her the book. "I reckon you'd better open this now." 

They were delighted, of course. She took the book and began digging through it. "So, you want to stay a while and play some cards?" I did . Doug went looking in drawers and shelves all through the house. "Honey, where are the cards?" She didn't know. " Sorry, man, I can't find the cards. "

"I reckon you'd better open this now, " I said. 

The next day, my depression eased up. Merry Christmas.

The End Of An Era

 When I started writing blogs eleven years ago, the first one I created was this one. At the time I was unemployed in Albuquerque, applying for hundreds (yes hundreds!) of jobs and taking care of three mammals - two cats and one Reverend-in-training. One of those mammals was Remus Lupin, the subject of this posting. 

One evening in October of 2003, we were on our way to the house of a friend of a friend who had kittens to give away. We were completely immersed in the Harry Potter books at the time, so when we saw the big bright full moon overhead, we both immediately decided that our new boy kitten would be named after the werewolf, Remus John Lupin. At that time he was one of four cats living with us.

One favorite memory of the boy happened very soon after we brought him home. He disappeared for a whole day. We looked everywhere for him, to no avail. We supposed he must have gotten out somehow. That evening, we were sitting on the sectional sofa with our neighbor, telling her that the kitten was missing, when a tiny head appeared from behind and between two sofa cushions. Remus came crawling out of his little cave, blinking and meowing for his supper. 

Feeding the cats with Remus in the mix is how I earned the title of Cat Juggler. The only way for other cats to be able to eat is to put some food down for Remus in a room with a latching door, otherwise he will eat everybody's food before they have a chance. He grew rapidly to a 19 pounder, a formidable kitty. 

His favorite toys were rubber bands, which he would stretch and snap across the room and chase. In '05  Remus and I moved the first truckload from Orlando to Belmont, Massachusetts. I carried him into the totally empty apartment, set him down, and he ran over to the far corner. There was a rubber band there. He played with it for several minutes before he realized that he was in an unfamiliar place. Then he dashed to the bathroom and hid behind the tub for a couple of days.

In Massachusetts he began one annoying habit, the first of many. When I was bending over to scoop litter boxes or clean up a mess on the floor, he would jump up on my back, claws fully engaged. Ouch.

Grace is our first dog. We've always had cats. When we were married, we each brought a cat to the relationship. By the time Grace came into the mix we had parented eight cats over twenty-six years. In 2012 we had the two we still have, Remus and Lucia. Remus was the boss of the household. That all changed when Princess Grace entered, and what an entrance it was! Remus could hear us coming up the stairs from the basement/garage, so he was at the door when it opened. Grace saw him and lunged at him. He took off across the counters, the dinner table and over to the sideboard, where the beautiful Southwestern bowl, an ordination gift from the Albuquerque congregation, went flying through the air and crashed on the ceramic tile floor. Welcome home, Grace! They get along fine now, but Remus has been avenging his fall from power with vomit and turds all over the house ever since.

So Remus traveled with us from Orlando to Belmont, to Watertown, MA, to Albuquerque, to Meadville, PA, to two addresses in Nashville and now to Jacksonville, where he is seventeen years old, 9 pounds of skin and bones and crying a lot. Saturday, Sepotember 12th will be his death day at the vet's office. He is one major pain in the ass, and he will be missed.

What's Shakin'?

Is there anyone out there in my vast readership who doesn't know about my tremors? In elementary school I got low grades in penmanship. During my high school years I began my second longest career as a graphic artist, back in the days of ink and xacto knives. During those thirteen years I struggled with the tremors, and learned to master them as necessary to complete the line I was drawing at the time, lifting my hand from the drawing when I felt a surge of shakes coming on. My daily concentration helped keep them in check (mostly) but they were always lurking.

When I moved to Orlando in '87, I found a new expression of my artistic prime directive building scenery, exhibits and displays for twenty five years. The shakes were a lesser challenge in this larger format, but still a challenge when I was up on a ladder, a scaffold or a snorkel lift trying to install a three inch screw in a piece of scenery, or assemble a bolt, two washers and a nut in a tight space. My relaxation of strict daily control made them stronger, and as the years have passed, the tremors have gotten gradually worse. In 2006 I earned the nickname "shakes," given to me by my co-worker Nick. (Otherwise it could have been a mattname from my co-worker Matt.)

After that most excellent career, I worked for three years mixing, selling and delivering paint for Sherwin Williams. By then, it took two hands to write legibly, so any phone orders I took were horribly scrawled. Even I couldn't read some of them. 

I have come to rely on the keyboard for written communication. The tiny virtual keyboard on my phone is very difficult to manage, but at least the result is legible. For long sessions, the big keyboard on my laptop is my preferred technology. Even so, I hit wrong keys or two keys at a time quite often. Luckily, the fixing is easy. But touch typing is not, nor has it ever been an option.

Nowadays I take seven prescriptions daily, and two of them have been prescribed specifically to deal with tremors. And yet, they still control my destiny. Just for a fun building project, I recently ordered a wooden model, a marble run with gears and levers and such. I also wanted to see if I could actually do it. Twice now, I have progressed to step 15, only to have some of the already assembled pieces wiggle apart while attempting to do step 16, sending me back to step eight. Very frustrating. 

There is some hope on the horizon. I'm getting set up to see Jacksonville's go-to neurology guy for tremors. I hope he can do something. Someday I want to finish that marble run.

Unmasked

I suppose I should have seen it coming. Since we are hearing Confessions here, I must confess that I almost never try to figure out who dunnit or what is fixin' to happen unless there is a compelling reason to do so. I just know that the answers will reveal themselves in due time, and attempting to guess is just impatience on my part. Some might opine that such patience is a liability. I must confess that sometimes it is.

Therefore, although it should have come as no surprise when I first encountered this new wrinkle in an old pet peeve, I must confess that it surprised me. The peeve to which I refer is the great American tradition of throwing trash on the ground anywhere one happens to be. I was taught not to do this, but sometimes I feel as if I'm the only one. We might even be a majority, but the trash-flinging contingent certainly makes up for it. Anyone who walks as much as I do cannot fail to notice. It's everywhere.

So now, in the grip of a deadly pandemic, with masks being worn by many in public places, discarded masks have joined the food wrappers, bottles, cans and other miscellaneous trash littering the roadsides and parking lots of this great land of ours. I should have seen it coming.

Mama B - My Other Mother

 Michael J. Buinickas and I became friends in Boy Scouts in 1966, but I did not become a Buinickas until the summer of '68. I walked into their house on Maple Ridge Lane, and was immediately offered food and a choice of beverages, and made comfortable in Mama B's home. Mr. B was my Scout Master and drill sergeant, but Jessica was my mom away from home. Margaret became my big sister, Michael was my older brother, Bill and Barbara my younger siblings. I actually felt more at home there than I did at home.

That same summer, my parents moved me to Florida, far away from everyone and everything I had ever known. During the summers of '69, 70 and '71 I basically showed up on the Buinickas doorstep and was welcomed in, staying for days or weeks before I'd have to return to school in Florida. I had a bed, a place at the table and chores to do including the dreaded "water under the house" detail.

I knew that this home away from home was the handiwork of Jessica Buinickas, and that she had schooled her children in the fine art of hospitality. I have never experienced the like anywhere else in the fifty-odd years since.

Bill's eulogy for his brother in 1997 emphasized that Michael had always been the one who kept the far-flung family together, and I'm sorry to admit that after his passing, I fell away. One very brief visit in 2000 was the last time I saw any of the nuclear family of which I have had the joy and honor to feel a part. Twenty years later, I am back in Florida mourning the passing of Jessica Buinickas from afar.

When Margaret joined Facebook, she friended me, so I still feel connected to my other family, especially now that my biological parents and brother are gone.

And now, I reckon that Marge is matriarch, her mother's shoes thrust upon her. Don't worry, Marge, Jess's family is and has always been your family, and we'll love you through this. 

New Ways

Once again I am entering uncharted territory here. I am trying to keep these blogs fairly current, but nothing has been pressing my creative buttons of late. There are a few things that might be blogworthy. I'll leave that judgment to you-uns (that's Pittsburghian for "y'all") to decide.

Shopping. Who'da thunk such a mundane thing as buying groceries would become a hazardous activity? So now, every source of groceries has some form of contact-free delivery - some even free contact-free delivery. The only one we've tried is BJ's, shopped and delivered by InstaCart. It's sort of like an online game. We select the items we want and put them in our cart, then pay for them. At some point we get a notification that someone, and we are told their name, is shopping. If we watch the app, one by one items go from the cart list to the shopped list. Sometimes an item is out of stock, and an alternate is suggested. We can approve the replacement or have that item refunded. Then the shopper is at the checkout, and it's too late to add or change anything. Then the shopper is on the way. And when the notification comes that she/he is almost here, we open the door and there the vehicle is, rounding the last turn into the parking lot. Groceries are unloaded onto the porch, and we bring them in for disinfecting and putting away. It's easier than the old way!

I told mt neighbor the other day that if this goes on much longer, I'm going to have to invest in a comb. The last time I can remember having hair long enough to comb was in the previous century - the previous millennium even. But it's the beard that gets "wooly-bully" and makes me crazy. Cutting my own hair, with my benign essential tremors, is a very risky project, but I did set my clippers on 2 and chopped back my wooly-bully beard last week. More exciting than that, however, was that Carmen, emboldened by my action and driven insane by her own hair growth, set my clippers on 13 and chopped hers back. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Worst of all, though is the plight of our poor abused bassador. Her favorite activity during our walks is being loved on by nearly everyone we meet. Her plaintive cries as I pull her away are heartbreaking for everyone involved.

Other than that, life goes on pretty much as usual.

Plague

As I was washing my hands (again) this morning, I was musing (again) about this pandemic, and thinking about what I have read over the years concerning the centuries long bubonic / pneumonic plagues in Europe and the "civilized" world. Those people had no clue what caused it, how it transmitted, or how to avoid being infected. Hygiene was probably not even a word yet, and certainly not practiced by anybody. Fear was rampant, and anyone who offered an explanation or a plan of action, however ludicrous it might sound to us in this century, was given credence.

Now I see and hear political and "religious" " leaders " blaming the coronavirus on whatever target group suits their agenda, or Satan, or Obama or anything or anyone. I am thankful that in this century, we have the option to listen to many different sources of information, including those whose only agenda is to get us through this as painlessly as possible.

I have a friend in Virginia, a microbiologist / belly dancer, who has been working over a hundred hours a week, trying to figure out how to combat this beast (by microbiology, not belly dancing) and a best friend / wife who works at a hospital, where all the latest information is put into practice. Those are the kind of sources I trust, not the finger pointing "news" channels or the creepy preachers bent on demonizing whatever or whoever they want us to perceive as enemies. Here in the twenty first century, we can choose between fear based and love based information. Choose love, my friends, choose love.

Going Viral

This post is unusual because I truly don't have a clue what I'm going to say. I just feel it's my duty to weigh in on the coronavirus situation, since pretty much everyone else on the planet has done so. My email trash file is littered with responses from grocery chains, pharmacy chains, restaurant chains, hardware chains, paint store chains, AAA, AARP, AT&T, the UUA and everybody else. Evidently it's the thing to do, so here goes.

First of all, wash your hands. That's number one on everyone's list. Wash 'em long and hard and frequently. Stay away from other humans. I have been doing that for many years. Of course, when I do encounter humans, it's on a city bus or the Skyway. And of course, when Carmen comes home after spending all day at the hospital, where they wash their hands hundreds of times a day.

Beyond the standard cautions about infection, there is also a positive side to the situation. Facebook has been richly peppered with ideas for things to do while stuck at home with your family or just yourself - and many of them have been very good ideas. For me, though, the upside is that this frantic, manic culture of ours is being forced to slow down or even come to a complete stop. We have an opportunity here to learn that life doesn't have to be run at a breakneck pace. I have no illusions about this, however. Every opportunity that has come along so far has been embraced by many and also exploited by many, and the pace picks up again as soon as enough people forget what it was all about. I can only expect the same this time. But I can hope.

One really nice thing for me is that Susan Werner, my favorite singer song writer, is doing free online concerts for her fans, due to cancellations of her upcoming in-person gigs. We saw her twice in Boston, but 2009 was the last time she came anywhere near where we have lived since then. Last Sunday evening was "All Request Night," and this coming Sunday she'll be doing all new stuff. I can't wait!

Anyhoo, y'all stay safe out there. I only have about six loyal readers, so losing of even one of y'all would be a huge loss. And don't forget to say a silent thank you to Vicki VanGundy for pushing me off the edge and making me swim in the pool of my four blogs again.

And wash your damn hands!

The Oak Leaf Hotel

I was really not aware of the phenomenon of homelessness until the late 80s. If there were homeless people in Odenton, Maryland in the 50s and 60s, I never encountered them. Vero Beach, Florida, same deal. It wasn't until 1988, when I began working for Image International doing huge corporate theme parties, that I came in contact with this class of humans. Al, the owner/CEO/Big Cheese employed a production manager, a truck driver, lighting guys, A/V guys, shop guys and a warehouse boss. All of the additional labor came from a temp agency.

We never knew what we were going to get temp-wise. Some were pretty sharp, ready and willing to "get some work did." Some were sullen and difficult. Some were barely upright and likely to be discovered sleeping somewhere - and at the Marriott World Center, that was frowned upon. Most were there to put in their time, do the work and get paid. Some we would request if they were available, and some we would send back with the delivery driver if they showed up. The one consistent trait was that none of them were around very long - maybe six months at the most. They would just disappear, and nobody knew anything about it unless maybe if they were arrested. And if Image hired one on, he would never last longer than a few days before he would disappear, never to be seen again.

I get why some folks say that homeless people are homeless because they want to be. From the viewpoint of the privileged it can appear that way. Speaking as one who has worked shoulder to shoulder with these guys, shared food and conversation with these guys, I can say that it's simply not that simple. For the most part, they are homeless because they have to be, because, for whatever reason - drugs, alcohol, brain damage, mental illness, PTSD (I worked with a LOT of Vietnam veterans) - they just do not have the wherewithal to be an upstanding citizen. The rigors of managing money, paying rent, showing up for work on time, keeping themselves clean and presentable are simply beyond their capacity. Most are really nice people who will never be accepted into society, so the homeless community is what they have.

One really touching moment during my six and a half years with Image happened when I took the bus from International Drive to downtown Orlando to meet up with Carmen after work. I was grungy and unkempt after a hard day's carpenting, and wearing my Image International T-shirt. When I got off the bus at the downtown terminal, there were several grungy and unkempt guys nearby. We didn't know each other at all, but they assumed I was one of them. "Hey, Brother, you all right? Need anything?" I assured them that I was fine, thanked them and went on my way, but I was humbled by the fact that these guys who had almost nothing to call their own, were happy to offer help to a fellow.

The title of this post is a quote from one of our temporary workers one lunch break. A frequent topic of conversation was "Where did you stay last night?" Beneath overpasses of I-4 were popular sleeping spots. Doorways and alleys were also high on the list. This one dude, who had slept in a cluster of trees, said "I had a room at the Oak Leaf Hotel." It doesn't get any better than that.

A Royal ... Flush

In November of 2018 we bought this condominium with three bedrooms and three full bathrooms. One bathroom is downstairs, geezer friendly, with an "ADA" toilet, a shower with a low step-in entry, and grab bars for security and easy ups and downs. We have a guest bedroom upstairs with its own bathroom attached. No geezer accommodations included. Bathroom three is upstairs, off of the room designated as the office. We keep a litter box in the tub, and only I go in there and only to clean the litter box. With one notable exception.

In October of 2019 we had friends from Nashville come stay with us for a few days. One fine morning, Carmen was accompanying them on an adventure - I don't have the vaguest recollection what or where - so bathrooms one and two were in use. Not to be too graphic, I needed to use one, and the only one was three. Now, I'm sure that we, and the Inspector, flushed that toilet to ascertain that it worked. I'm also fairly sure that it had not been "stress tested" by anyone since the previous owners, if then. The bottom line is, when I came down to the kitchen a few minutes later, I found that much of what I had done upstairs had also come down to the kitchen. It was not a joyful discovery.

I called our home warranty folks, and they arranged for a plumber to come. The plumbing company asked if I wanted a water damage remediation company to come, and I said yes. Meanwhile, I, a bottle of bleach and a roll of paper towels cleaned the cabinets, counter and floor. Not a joyful project.

The plumber ascertained that the wax ring under the toilet was at fault. He replaced it, and the plumbing part of the story was finished. Simultaneously, a guy from Dri-Maxx was there assessing the water damage situation. There was water behind one of the cabinets and the drywall - well, wet-wall. He told me about how my homeowner's insurance would pay for the lion's share of the drying and rebuilding process, and we signed an agreement.

Later that same day, two guys with implements of destruction and two drying fans came, tore out one cabinet (yay, only one cabinet!) the drywall behind it, and part of the soffit above it. They taped up a sheet of plastic with a zipper in the middle over the kitchen entrance, and turned on the fans. They left, but returned each morning for three days to check the drying progress. Oh, and they took the cabinet door with them to match for the rebuild.

Meanwhile, the first Dri-Maxx guy called. "Uh, well, your insurance carrier does NOT pay anything for drying and rebuilding. Sorry. We can still rebuild you for nine million dollars (maybe a slight exaggeration) or we can leave that to you." Thanks, but leave it to me. And bring my cabinet door back. He did.

So, the plastic and the fans were taken away, and we were left with a gaping hole between two upper cabinets. I began researching cabinets for sale, and discovered that pretty much every company was interested in designing us a whole new kitchen, not replacing one "box." Two local companies I called were willing to fix me up with a 21" X 42" X 12" upper cabinet box. One wanted three hundred bucks, and one said two hundred if I was willing to wait until they ordered another kitchen. Otherwise, the shipping would be another hundred. I went to Kitchen World, paid for my cabinet, and the waiting began.

The condo two doors down has been undergoing extensive renovations. A scrap of drywall appeared on their back patio one day, I measured it and found that it was just a little too big to be a perfect replacement for the piece torn out by the Dri-guys. I asked if I could have it, and soon had patched part of the gaping hole. Carmen taped a piece of plastic over the soffit hole, and for months that was the best our kitchen looked.

Monday, February 10th, 2020, Linda at Kitchen World called to say that the cabinet was in! we picked it up on Tuesday. Yesterday I installed it. Four months later, the saga finally ended. And I haven't had the courage to flush toilet number three again.

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

My mental health professional assigned homework: "Update your blogs!" so here I am.

This all started, probably in the late sixties, with Jimi Hendrix and Cream. Then in the seventies I worked in loud environments for a few years. In the eighties I was sound man for a ridiculously loud rock band for a while, and then I started working in wood shops with power tools, air compressors, forklifts and vacuum systems roaring all around me. By the turn of the millennium, my high frequency hearing was toast.

In 2010 I got my first hearing aids. They were very uncomfortable and made all noises louder than they needed to be. Turning them on or off involved opening or closing the little tiny battery compartment, a very difficult task with my tremors and arthritis. They were very expensive, so I was hesitant to wear them to work, to walk outdoors unless the weather was perfect (wind made a horrible sound!) or to get sweaty. In short, I rarely wore them. And yet they crapped out in a couple of years. Not a good experience.

Since then there has been steadily increasing lobbying going on to improve my hearing once again. I, of course, hesitated - dug in my heels, you might say - and deferred  any action until a couple of months ago. At that time I received yet another mailing from Miracle Ear, this time with a Free Gift for anyone who comes for a hearing test and consultation. As my co-worker Steve said decades ago, "If it's for free it's for me!" So I went. With Carmen's last words ringing in my ears, "Don't sign anything!" I set out for the bus ride to my appointment with Gary.

Gary put me in the sound proof booth with the headphones and the Jeopardy button and did the testing I've had so many times before - press the button when you hear a tone. Then he drew the graph of my hearing frequencies - good on the low frequencies and off the scale bad on the highs. He pulled out a pair of hearing aids and synced them with his computer, programming my needs into them. Then he put them on me and in me, and suddenly I could hear a whole world of sound I couldn't remember ever hearing before. He took me outside into the parking lot, just fifty feet away from busy San Jose Boulevard, and talked to me in a normal speaking voice. I understood every word. He walked away ten feet and talked. I understood. He went another ten feet. Still I understood him in spite of all the traffic noise. I was duly impressed. We went back inside and he took them off. The world collapsed back to the limited hearing of my unaugmented ears. I nearly cried. But I didn't sign anything. I asked how long the "special price" of only $5700 was good for. Three days. I took my free gift home along with a new appreciation for how far hearing aid technology has come in ten years.

After I recovered from that experience, I went to the AARP website to see what they might recommend. There was an ad for "hear.com" touting affordable hearing aids. How can you go wrong with AARP? So I called them. They set me up an appointment with Randy at Ear To Hear on Hartley Road, also easily accessible by bus. They also set me up for financing, with a 45 day risk-free trial period. Great. I went to see Randy on the day after Christmas. He did another hearing test and drew another graph - I can draw it in my sleep now - and put a pair of Signa hearing aids on me and in me. It was better, but not as good as Miracle Ear by far. He said he was starting me off slowly and would bump up the volume over the next three weeks. I wore them home and walking the dog and working around the house. In three weeks he had stepped up the volume to where it is now, and I'm happy with them. There are no batteries to juggle, and putting them on and off the induction charger turns them off and on. they are comfortable enough that I forget I'm wearing them. And they are only $3500

Next week we are going to an appointment with Costco Hearing Aid Center. Theirs are less expensive than Ear To Hear. We'll see if they make me as happy as my 45 day risk-free trial.