Autumn Morning

I spaded the garlic patch on Saturday. It was too wet to till. I’m not in a hurry, yet I’d like to finish planting garlic soon. Rain is forecast all day today.

On Sunday, someone who helped edit my memoir pointed out the whole book was an origin story. Upon reflection, that seems accurate. It takes my story from the earliest times up until my beginnings as a married person in society. After that point, I drew on the origin story, and still do. However, what happened afterward was built on the foundation of my origin story, and is much different from the earlier period.

Last week I visited the new, multi-story University of Iowa clinic at Iowa River Landing for the first time. My physician and attending staff seemed competent. The facility is very nice. I noticed the presence of double-wide chairs in the waiting room and in the examination room. That furnishing is making a statement about the obesity epidemic in the United States. It’s not subtle. It did feel like I was smaller than I am when sitting in those.

I have been visiting various clinics a lot the last 3 months since I had COVID. It took me 2-1/2 hours to read everything that documented my visits and make a plan to heal. With that kind of time commitment, no wonder folks don’t always follow doctor’s orders. It’s a long and complicated process if done right. I noticed physicians often pointed to me as the decision maker. I mean, what do I know about whether I should take a medication or not? I ended up asking a lot of questions.

If you are an Iowa Democrat, Sunday’s front page article in the Cedar Rapids Gazette is worth reading. I believe much of what was said is wrong, especially the assumptions about how messaging functions in politics. All the same, one has to understand the establishment viewpoints if we want to change our politics to regain the majority. The authors rounded up the establishment for us. Here’s a link to a printed copy of the article.

On Sunday I called my Aunt who lives in Southwestern Virginia. According to my phone, the call lasted 37 minutes and 51 seconds. We had a good talk. The last time we visited in person was more than 40 years ago. We shed the preliminary pleasantries and got right into the conversation. That’s how we did it back in 1983. Unfortunately, I couldn’t answer some of the questions she asked me about my grandparents. What she asked was never discussed.

She refreshed my memory on some of the old stories, like the “Dude Hole” where the three boys (my father and his two brothers) would swim in a creek next to the railroad tracks, then hop on the train as it passed to ride through town. They found it to be fun, she said. We recounted the story of my grandmother’s death in Summer 1947. My grandfather was away in prison so they split the three boys up among grandmother’s siblings. “You can imagine, three boys! There was not enough food (to keep them together).” My great aunt and uncle adopted my aunt, who was much younger than the other three.

We retold the story of the coal mining company that strip mined the valley near my great aunt’s home. They augured out the coal from the high wall and spoiled the well. The family got no money from the mining company for ruining the water. For years my aunt hauled jugs of water out to my great aunt so she wouldn’t have to use the “sulfur water.” She updated me during the call that she had paid the fee to run clean water out to the property. Her daughter now lives there.

We discussed a number of other topics of a kind that is best left within a family. At the end of the call she said “this call isn’t over.” I agreed and made a note to call again before the end of the year.