My Excuse

I often write of the beauty of the area in which I live. We still have space and woods and wildlife here, starry night skies unspoiled by city lights, relative peace and quiet. There is, however, a down side to "the North Country," and that is that we have very limited medical care.

There are several small hospitals that compete with each other rather than cooperate, and in their somewhat desperate efforts to survive, they struggle to attract competent medical personnel. In fact, these hospitals throw welcoming arms around some doctors who probably couldn't and shouldn't make a living in their chosen profession. Amidst the boneheads are a few dedicated and excellent doc's, but you have to know who's who.

The closest hospital recently expanded and now boasts bigger offices for it's staff and new operating suites. Paying for this depends in part on billing patients for surgeries performed, and so it was that one local orthopedic doc lost his hospital privileges: he wasn't doing enough surgery... A "new" orthopedic surgeon has replaced him.

I travel more than three hours (one way) to Burlington, Vermont, when I need medical care. Over the years that has saved me three organs and two unnecessary surgeries. A teaching hospital with plenty of patients doesn't have to ferret out patients to cut up. In most instances I feel that I've gotten excellent care there.

The down side of being 125 miles and a ferry-boat ride away from your doctor is the risk taken making the trip. A blizzard stopped me earlier this week, and there have been other times when it is no exageration to say I endangered my life driving to get there or back. Add to that the cost of a hotel if circumstances require more than a one-day stay.

On Halloween I did something to my back. For weeks I babied it and hoped for some healing, but by Thanksgiving it had only worsened. In addition, Husband hurt his back and was barely able to sit upright enough to drive. I gritted my teeth and somehow got myself to Burlington, had an x-ray and was referred to physical therapy (near home). That might have done it, but as I lowered myself into the bathtub for a soak, I sprained my hip. By now it was Christmas season, and doctors everywhere were on vacation.

Until early January I doctored by phone as best I could, convincing the on-call doc that she should prescribe the maximum pain meds and muscle-relaxants. My son-in-law drove me - lying flat in the back of his Subaru - to a chiropractor who eased the hip problem somewhat, but at times I sobbed in pain. Husband and I ate our meals lying on the living room floor, cooking as little as possible, me getting where I had to on crutches.

Eventually, time and rest improved things. I could walk again (albeit carefully), my doc returned from her Christmas holiday, and I made an appointment for last Tuesday. I was pretty certain I could manage the drive, but then the blizzard struck and the trip was off.

So to end this whine, Wednesday I was able to drive myself to Vermont. I stayed overnight in a motel, saw the doctor yesterday morning, then drove home. I'll be having an MRI close to home, and then will see what that shows. My toe is still numb, but the muscle spasms have stopped and I am comfortable (finally) sitting here at the computer.

If there's a point to all of this it is that I am feeling very far from inspired and creative right now. Even Wizards get the blues.

I hope to get out soon and take some photos. We're buried in beautiful snow right now, and I'm frustrated with being housebound. I did snap one on my way to Vermont: an Amish field of corn shocks (see below). Not a great photo (I took it from the car window), but a nice taste of our North Country winter.

Thanks to all of you who have stopped by and commented on my
(s)assy Christmas card. Your comments brightened my days, and I wish you all the best in the coming year. I'll be back. I'm just not sure how soon.




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Happy holidays to you and yours from Wiz and Mr. Wiz. 'Hope to see you all soon!

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This is an old picture and an old wish. There is not absolute peace in the woods or in Nature, but the violence there is born of need: need for food for sustenance in order to live and mate to continue the species. In these quiet woods, the fisher kills the porcupine, the coyote kills the rabbit, the muskrat who dislocates his jaw starves to death and becomes food for the scavengers. All of this is part of Nature's plan.

May humans realize that we are no different than all of Nature's other children. Our basic needs are for enough food to eat and a place of shelter from the elements. We could live in peace without oil, money or power if we chose to value wisdom and peaceful survival over greed and war.

Imagine all the people, living life in peace.
You may say I'm a dreamer,
But I'm not the only one...

Join me in the hope for peace on earth.
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The Great American...... -.Off .

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For the past couple of weeks, our little local food co-op has been having a run-in with Corporate America. I could tell the tale, but perhaps you'd like to click on this link to hear what the NATIONAL NEWS COVERAGE has to say.

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I couldn't help weighing in, nor can I resist sharing my thoughts with you, dear readers. What follows is a copy of my letter to the heads of General Mills and Pillsbury:

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Dear Mr. Sanger and Ms. Chugg:

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Regarding the recent unauthorized use of your Bake-Off trademark by the Potsdam (N.Y.) Community Co-op and the subsequent threat made against them by your legal department, I say a resounding GOOD FOR YOU!!!

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Just because these country rubes want to have a baking contest to raise money for a local food pantry does not give them the privilege of using your time-honored and esteemed trademarked phrase. Corporate America must stand tall, General Mills must protect itself, and I am happy to know that your legal team is on the ball and ready to throw all of their expertise in the way of this shameful usurpation of your brilliant trademark.

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Even more disgraceful than these simple folks trying to make a few dollars to help the needy (obviously at General Mills' expense) is the fact that even though your attorneys have succeeded in intimidating the Co-op into changing the name of their annual charity bake-off to a Baking Contest, they have not been able to control the sentiments of the many residents of northern New York who have taken to calling the event The General Mills Fuck-Off! Have they no shame?

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I am buoyed by my belief that the noble cause shall win in the end. General Mills must stop the Co-op's use of your sacred, patented phrase. Failure to do so will cause a domino effect: first the Co-op; next, the local 4-H Clubs will be Baking-Off; and then - heaven forbid - the local Humane Society will be doing it. From there, your sales will slump, your profit margin narrow, and your stock will begin to tumble. Had your legal team been less vigilant, it would be frightening to consider all of the consequences.

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For your courage and nobility, you will be in my thoughts each time I gaze lovingly at a frozen tube of Pillsbury cookie dough. Fight on, Mr. Sanger and Ms. Chugg, and God bless America.

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Sincerely,

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And here is a photo of the business posing the terrible threat to Mr. and Ms. Doughboy: Go ahead and click on the link below the picture for a more intimate look at the Bake-Off.

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......................The Potsdam Co-op

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Here's something I wrote last summer but for some reason never got around to publishing. It seems somewhat timely now that a couple of degenerating vertebrae are keeping me away from my computer chair.

Age

Time has its subtle ways of letting you know you aren’t as young as you used to be. The jeans get harder to button, the joints begin to complain when overworked, and there’s the thinning of hair north and south. So you work out a little more, take aspirin, content yourself with the notion that your hair always was a bit thick and unruly. Old? Me? Nah.

Less subtle than time are children. Today I spent three hours at the playground with my five-year-old grandson. When there were no kids his age, I played with him, climbing up through the wooden maze, sliding down the slides, being a witch or “Queen of the Playground” as he dictated. I felt pretty smug that at 62 I could keep up with him. As I stood at the end of a wooden tunnel near the top of the grand structure (catching my breath), a new entrant on the scene, a six-year-old grinning the fanged smile of a kid missing his two front teeth, burst from the tunnel on all-fours and sounded a fierce roar. I jumped in faked terror, and the kid gleefully rose to his feet and shouted for all the playground to hear, “MOM! I just scared the crap out of this old lady!”
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Go away kid, ya bother me…
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Art Appreciation


..........................................Smaller Than Life (please click on the photo)

I spent the Thanksgiving holiday in New York, taking only one break from "family" activities (most of which revolved around food...) to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Tripods and flash exposures were not allowed, so the shot was hand-held using available light. The child is unknown, but I couldn't resist snapping this charming expression of art appreciation. The man, turning his head to view a large painting hanging higher on the wall, stepped into the picture just as I clicked the shutter.

Since returning home, my back has "gone out" and left me searching for some position that affords pain relief, so I will be taking a short - I hope - break from the blog until comfortable sitting is again possible.

I hope everyone had a good holiday week filled with many things to be appreciated.
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In Harmony

It's a struggle to get Grandson into a bathroom in any of the Ottawa museums because their thrones are all watched over by The Electric Eye, the master of the great, sudden, sucking, high-decibel, child-devouring flush. Grandson is absolutely terrified of those automatic toilets.

I can get him to go with me into the Women/Femmes - when he gets desperate enough - if I use a combination of reassurance ("I've already been in there, and they really aren't that loud") and a bite of the reality sandwich ("You're dancing, you have to go, and if you don't go pretty soon, you're going to wet your pants"). Once convinced/strong-armed, we get into a stall and I shut the door. This is when it gets dicey. Imagine being contained in a 3 x 4' space with a kid who is suddenly startled and sent into terrified flight... a kid who has a running garden hose he can't let go of. Sometimes I get the monster to flush immediately (as soon as the door is locked and he can't escape and before he gets his belt unbuckled) so as to prove that the automatic flush isn't as bad as he imagines, but that tactic undermines future trust in Grandma.

Exacerbating the whole matter is the fact that the ever-diligent Electric Eye can't seem to figure out what to do when it detects the movements of two people in the stall. Like the ass-kisser that it truly is, the E.E. invariably flushes more than once, making the point that it is never lax in its duties.

Our last museum visit was to what Grandson calls "the dinosaur museum" (otherwise known as The Museum of Nature). We had a great time and managed to survive the one and only toilet encounter, then we found an Ethiopian restaurant for dinner. To his great relief, this eatery was in an old building with an old bathroom...

The meal was spicy and very good, and eaten with your fingers: small mounds of food are placed on a large crepe-like injera. You tear off a small piece of the injera and use it to pick up a "pinch" of one food or another, so no silverware is needed. Grandson enjoyed it and seemed completely oblivious to the fact that we were practically the only white folks in the place.

After dinner we began the drive home, and as we traveled along the four-lane I turned to the back seat and said, "You know, we all have fears, things we're afraid of." Grandson was quick to reply, "I'm afraid of flushing toilets and the boiler." (The boiler "lives" in our mudroom and has terrified him irrationally since he was very young). I said, "Yes, I know you are, and I wish I could take away your fears."

A beat of silent thought; then, "Well I'll talk to Jesus about that."

I answer that sure, that might be a good idea, and I sound like I mean it. His parents take him to church, and apparently he's soaking up the message. Okay, I think, I used to believe in Jesus. And Santa Claus. And the Easter Bunny. If it gives him comfort in this world, that can only be a good thing.

A minute later I start to say something and he says, "Be quiet, Grandma, Jesus is whispering in my ear." (!) I obey, wait another minute, and then ask, "So what did Jesus tell you?"

"That these fears are okay for me to have."

"Well, that's good," I say, and Husband and I suppress amazed giggles.

A day later, it was Husband who made the musical connection. We had been listening to a Lucinda Williams CD on the way to Ottawa that morning. One of her songs, Lake Charles, contains the lines:

Did an angel whisper in your ear
Hold you close
Take away your fears
In those long, last moments

There is a game Husband and I sometimes play. We'll be discussing some event or topic, and he'll say, "Okay Wizard, what's the song?" I then quote a line from the lyrics of a song that succinctly sums up the point of discussion. (I know a lot of songs). Without realizing it, I had borrowed the third line from Lucinda's chorus when I told Grandson I wished I could take away his fears. What warms this grandma's heart is that apparently he remembered the lyrics too, and his reply made use of the first two lines.

"You are in My Prayers"

My religious or spiritual beliefs are personal and not Christian. That's neither a boast nor a feeling of deficiency; it's just what I've come to believe over the course of time.

When I was a kid, I used to pray the ritual "now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the lord my soul to keep" and then add the "goblesses": gobless Mommy, gobless Daddy, gobless Gramma and Donna and Aunt Lil; but one night as I clasped my hands to pray for the undoing of a bad choice I had made, the voice of Reason within me said, "God is not listening to you, and even if he was, do you really think he'd grant your prayer and undo your stupidity?" And I did not pray. Not that night, and not for over thirty-six years. If I were trying to be really biblical here, I'd say "not for forty days and forty nights," but this wasn't a symbolic hiatus.

My resumption of prayer was brief: "Please God, help this baby," my unborn grandson, the reason for a team of medical personnel scurrying to answer a delivery room code. And then my agnostic self returned. I guess some habits run deep - like the way I still "rock" my supermarket cart while pondering various laundry detergent options, despite the fact that it's been almost thirty years since any little kid in my care needed the rocking. Maybe my early religious conditioning shoved my rational mind aside and took over for that instant in the birthing room.

I'm reminded of prayer and my rejection of it because lately a couple of friends have been going through some very hard times. Shaman is seriously ill, and there is a line of support that I am having trouble with. Most people would say, "You are in my prayers," but for me that would be a lie. Another friend, a survivor of breast cancer and the mother of one daughter who has battled the disease, has just learned that her other daughter has an aggressive breast cancer.

"You are in my thoughts" just sounds shallow to me. They are in my heart, a heart that aches with concern and caring, but they will not be in my prayers. Agnosticism does not supply answers or something to have faith in; it is the belief that whatever divine forces might exist or be at work are unknowable.

This aching heart, these hopes, is what I offer. I hope for the best for each of my dear friends, hope in a fervent and sincere way. My concern is no less than that of a Christian or a Jew or a Muslim or any other who prays, but it is not prayer.

And so, Shaman and Helen, I hold each of you in my heart, and I hope that you can feel these sentiments and know that this is my way, a way that I believe is no more and no less valid than prayer. But sometimes I wish I could just honestly say, "You are in my prayers." That would not need an explanation.

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There are Places I Remember...

Jack and Jill went up the hill
To fetch a pail of water
Jill forgot her birth control
And now they have a daughter

I came from the Adirondacks. My parents had decided against having children because - in 1942 - they were convinced that there was not a bright enough future for children on this planet. That plan was undone when the two of them took a vacation in the late summer of 1944 at a rustic resort called "The Mohawk" on Fourth Lake, and my mother forgot to pack her birth control. Maybe my humble beginnings in that place of wildness and natural beauty explain in part why I ended up living where I do.

The Adirondack "Park," as it is rightly or wrongly named, remained a special place for this family my parents created (which later included the addition of three foster daughters). Our summer vacations were spent there in tents, around campfires and in canoes or on trails; our winters always included ski trips to Old Forge or Whiteface Mountain.

To me, the Adirondacks represented heaven, and so when all that eventually remained of my parents was a pair of ash-filled plastic bags, our favorite camping place was the natural choice for freeing those remains. In August of 1999, close family and two dear life-long friends gathered at Brown's Tract Ponds.

The chosen morning dawned wet. My father always claimed there were only two kinds of Adirondack weather, "dazzling uncertainty, and drizzling certainty," and his description held true as the gray downpour abruptly gave way to beautiful sunshine in mid-afternoon. The canoe served as a water taxi for our small band of eight, our elderly friends making the trip with both arthritic difficulty and characteristic grace. Once assembled, in a very unplanned sort of ceremony, we scattered those gray remains from the rocks on the small island's south shore where we had picnicked and swam so many times over the years. It all seemed very right.

Our mission accomplished, the first of the return trips was begun. Bekir and Sallie were helped into the canoe and Husband and I started paddling toward the mainland. Spontaneously, Bekir began yodeling my father's favorite, the pure beauty of his alpine tribute soaring across the still lake and echoing back to us. It was the perfect salute, and I am certain that every person within earshot stood still to listen.

Eight years have passed, and I haven't been back there. I always thought I'd return, but lack of time and too many responsibilities - or maybe just a failure to properly prioritize my life - had combined to stall my return until two weeks ago when a week-long photography workshop at Big Moose Lake just a few miles from Brown's Tract put the opportunity squarely in my sights. On October 6th, the 17th anniversary of the date of my father's death, I returned to the shore of Brown's Tract.

It was fall and the campers were gone. I expected to be completely alone, but to my surprise, there was a lone photographer beside the lake's outlet where I planned to launch. I'm pretty uninhibited and friendly with strangers, and those you meet in the solitude of the woods are usually kindred spirits, so we struck up a conversation. The emotions of that day probably greased my tongue even more than usual as I explained my reasons for being there. "I'm going to mess up your lake," I told him. It was still and all-reflecting, and I knew my paddling would disturb any reflection shots he was attempting to take. His reply was an enthusiastic, "Oh, no, your blue kayak will be great on the water!" We exchanged blog addresses, wished each other well, I put the kayak into the lake and began the final leg of my trip to pay respects to Bill Toporcer and Evelyn Andrus, my parents.


Photograph by Russ Devan. I hope you'll visit his website and his blog.

My parents gave me the gift of life and the self-assurance that has helped me to make the best of my time here, and it seems that even years after their deaths they continue to give to me, for on that Saturday two weeks ago they introduced me to a new friend and a very talented photographer.

Thank you, Russ, for this photograph that I will always cherish. And thank you, dear readers, for taking the time to travel back with me to this special place.

Streaming (CLICK ON A PHOTO TO ENLARGE IT)

Here is a photograph of a Tug Hill Plateau stream. There has been a drought this fall, and the creeks are shallow. Rocks that would normally be well under water are now catching and collecting the leaves that float downstream, stacking them together like so many playing cards.

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Below is a river flowing well below usual fall levels, exposing vast expanses of its rock bed. I decided to play with grayscale on this one - not something learned or encouraged by the photo workshop, but rather, something I just had some fun doing.

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Remember, these pictures were part of a learning experience, and as such, they represent steps in the right direction...

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I miss my camera.

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