Like most people, I want a decent meal when it is time to eat. In 2012, I launched a major study of the local food scene and was not disappointed in the results coming into and out of our kitchen. By working at a number of farms, growing and expanding our home garden, and participating in legislative advocacy, I learned so much about where food originates and conditions which engender growth of a variety of fruit and vegetables.
The impact of local food systems on our home life reached its peak in development of the kitchen garden idea. Now that the work is finished, I have less interest in writing regularly about food. It is an assumed part of a background against which I pursue other interests. I’ve learned what it means to know the face of the farmer. I maintain an interest in doing so. I just won’t write about it as often. Mainly, others are doing a better job of writing about our food system.
Food is basic to a life. It is not the most important thing. I am glad for the work I did, yet I feel it is finished. It is time to concentrate on more important aspects of life. It is time to keep a focus on life closer to home.
Reverse side: Made by Dexter Press, West Hyack, New York. Published by Mennonite Historical Society of Iowa, Kalona, Ia. 52247. Old Order Amish and conservative Mennonite daughters wear traditional plain homemade dresses familiar throughout 450 years of Anabaptist history. These are the children of a buggy maker living and working near the Kalona Cheese plant of Twin County Dairy, Inc., Highway 1, Kalona, Ia.
Two girls posing for a photographer who had permission to take their picture. There has been more than a little controversy about photographing Mennonites and Old Order Amish. It is permissible with the former, and against views about graven images with the latter. The images are well-circulated.
I used to visit the Twin County Dairy when bicycling from Iowa City. Cycling alone for the exercise, I would stop and buy cheese curds at the dairy. That is, if it were open. Often my trips were predawn when the glow and flicker of kerosene lamps came from house windows and the doors of barns. I no longer travel to Kalona as I learned how to produce almost everything I formerly bought at Stringtown Grocery and other shops scattered in the rural area.
Twin County Dairy, established by a group of Amish and Mennonite farmers as a cooperative in 1946, was shuttered in 2014. Kalona Creamery, a part of Open Gates Business Development Corporation bought it the following year. Their businesses included Kalona Organics®, Kalona Farms, Farmers Creamery, Awesome Refrigerated Transit of Iowa, and Provision Ingredients. I don’t know if they have a retail store that sells cheese curds. Since there is a creamery a few miles from home, I have no need to go and find out.
Author David Rhodes wrote about the area in his novel Rock Island Line. I have a library copy of the first edition, published in 1975. No doubt I bought it at a thrift shop. There is a rubber stamp inside the front cover that reads, “Outdated Removed from Circulation.” Young girls in the Mennonite community and their photographs won’t become outdated any time soon.
Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, July 20, 1969 – Apollo 11. Photo credit: Neil Armstrong.
Reverse side: Cumquat Publishing Co. P.O. Box 4932, St. Louis, MO 63108
When considering this photo the isolation stands out. Besides Michael Collins orbiting the moon while waiting for their return, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong were alone. The sense of isolation is profound.
They were trained to deal with the mission and by all accounts did well. It was a unique moment in history, one in which many Americans took pride.
I witnessed what I could on television when it happened or on replay. I remember grainy images, a reality that seemed surreal.
It is a great photograph. One I’ll think about all day.
The automobile sat in the garage since I returned from provisioning last Wednesday. There is plenty to do at home and I’m getting better at organizing each week. The last three days felt like a “weekend,” something I haven’t felt in a long time.
Absent work outside home, the days can turn into an endless stream of the same. By scheduling certain types of activities for different days of the week, a sense of normal is returning after the disruption of the coronavirus pandemic and ending paid work. I make the weekend seem as it is by intent.
If anything, I miss being with people and doing things together. While taking my daily walk I encounter neighbors I’ve known for years. There have been good conversations on the trail, yet it’s a different kind of interaction. I miss meeting younger people and doing things with them in society. Partly, my cohort is getting older and has less relevance to youth. However, it’s the isolation that has been challenging to embrace.
The public response to the pandemic is shifting. Last week a COVID-19 vaccine was approved for children aged 5-11. Locally, there was a rush to get it, yet a large segment of the population could care less. They say the coronavirus is with us forever, we must get used to it and develop natural immunity through exposure. Getting vaccinated for COVID-19 is recommended by most medical authorities, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The current seven-day moving average number of deaths per day attributed to COVID-19 is 1,110. In 2020, COVID-19 was the third leading cause of death in the U.S. behind heart disease and cancer. It is difficult to accept a thousand deaths per day from COVID-19 as the new normal yet people who once said getting vaccinated was a personal choice are now saying vaccination is bad. Scheduling a booster shot of the COVID-19 vaccine is on my to-do list for today, so you know where I stand.
To maintain good mental health we need structure in our lives. When confronted with a decision of what to do next, the part of the week devoted to planning pays dividends. If things keep going how they did the last few days, weekends will take on new meaning. They will be differentiated from the rest of the week and become something to which I look forward. Lately I’ve been enjoying Sunday afternoons working on sundry projects without structure. I hope they continue.
The pandemic changed our lives permanently. Humans will figure out a way to cope with it or die trying. My recent activities serve as an example of human resilience. If anything, humans are that. It turns out, so am I and I’m happy to have my weekends back.
We often co-exist with an illusion we have unlimited time to live our lives. Living each moment, our fundamental outlook is there will be another. Many of us believe that each new moment has the potential to be better than the one in which we find ourselves. It may be true, yet there are limits.
When I retired April 28, 2020, at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, I wasn’t ready. I looked forward to getting dressed in my uniform (jeans, a shirt with the company logo, and hard-toed boots), driving across the lakes in my 1997 Subaru, and working an eight-hour shift that had a unique yet recurring set of variables that demanded something from me but not a lot. It was a retirement job to pay bills until Social Security kicked in at the full rate. I exited the work force with eyes open to avoid contracting the coronavirus.
I want another source of steady income.
If I return to the workforce, it will be on my terms, avoiding any public-facing job because of infectious diseases living in members of the public. That was a lesson of my last employment. I spent a lot of time sick before the pandemic because of contagious people.
While transferring files from my 2013 CPU to the new one I found file folders with ideas for earning money. Some of them brought income, yet not enough to rely on them without other sources. Having retired from my main career in 2009, I spent time exploring alternative forms of employment that would help pay the bills. It was a mixed bag, the best part of which was meeting so many people. A fellow couldn’t live on it.
We have a decent home life. I improved my gardening and cooking, and I’m writing more. I am focused on being a better photographer. I don’t view any of these activities as sources of income. If I have an abundance from the garden I may sell it at the local farmers market or donate to the food bank. Freelance writing brings something in, but it is lowly paid work. I would rather enjoy this creativity for what it is: a regular decent meal with ingredients I grew, and a legacy of writing. From time to time a subject gains a broader readership, as in the recent school board election coverage. There is personal satisfaction in it and that’s enough.
I resist commercializing our home life. A life worth living has some privacy. I enjoy creative outlets provided by gardening and meal preparation, opinion pieces to newspapers, and posting photos on Instagram. I attempt to refrain from stupid stuff on Twitter, which is my main place to mouth off. I am careful about what I say and depict about our private lives on those platforms.
What will I do with this moment? Write a few more words, edit, then hit schedule so it posts at 5 a.m. comme d’habitude. I look forward to breakfast as it’s been 11 hours since eating anything. There are onions and garlic from the garden… and a half used jar of Guajillo chili sauce I made. I’ll concern myself with breakfast just as soon as I finish this post. The anticipation makes life worth living.
Photo Credit: The American Scene Collection, American Oil Company 1969.
Reverse side: Washington Skyline, Washington, D.C. Located on the axis of the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument, the Capitol Building is shown in the foreground with the Washington Monument illuminated in the background. See the U.S.A. in a Chevrolet. As you travel ask us.
Life would have been simpler if I had stuck to the same path as friends in high school. Maybe follow a narrative such as after school and military service find a job, raise a family, work it until retirement, then settle back and relax in the golden years. Simple.
Actual living was not simple. While many in my cohort married and started a family immediately after high school, I did not and that made a difference.
The trauma of being injured while young, and the subsequent hospital stay, removed me from conventional pathways. I wrote about it in 2009:
My earliest defining moment was the day, at age 3-1/2, when a swing-set set up in the basement of our Madison Street home collapsed and injured my head. My parents were horrified. I remember the pool of blood on the basement floor, holding the thumb of the ambulance driver, taking ether dripped into a funnel to anesthetize me for the stitches to mend my gashed head. I am lucky to be alive. What I learned through the injury and recovery in the hospital was that there is an infrastructure of knowledge and caring to support us when things happen. I watched the routines of the hospital staff, the doctor checking up on me, changing room mates and bed linen, daily visits from my parents and the handling of my propensity to get out of bed and walk around. This experience assured me that although we are vulnerable, we are not alone.
Over the years, Doctor Kuhl would examine the scar on my forehead and talk about my recovery when I visited him in his office. Today, I don’t think of the scar, and suspect most people do not even notice it. What I do think about is that while we are not alone, we must be part of a society that helps protect those who are most vulnerable, including the injured and infirm. When I was very young, I made a withdrawal from this bank and now the debt needs repaying.
Big Grove News, Jan. 18, 2009.
Little has changed since I wrote this. While I relied on the infrastructure of society, at high school graduation I had neither the interest nor skills to get married and start a family. I went to college instead.
In late 1968 or 1969, I sought Father’s approval while figuring out what to do after high school. Maybe I would study engineering, I told him. The practical, rational approach of an engineer to problem-solving was appealing. He neither approved nor disapproved. He looked surprised it was on my mind. He was completing his own education and perhaps was preoccupied. He would be gone soon afterward.
During senior year in high school we made a class trip to Washington, D.C. and New York City. It was my first trip on a commercial aircraft. We saw the U.S. Capitol and Washington monument depicted in this postcard at about the time it was printed. We played cards for nickels and dimes in our room each night. My winnings paid for incidental expenses through New York. In some ways the class trip was the beginning of living on my own and experiencing the world outside my home town. It seems appropriate it would start with the nation’s capitol.
My life divides into segments: preschool, education, work and family, moving to Indiana, and moving back to Iowa. Each was important for different reasons. As I went through time I didn’t know how each step would unfold.
My education, including military service and graduate school, had the momentum of youth. When I finished school at age 29, I was ready to do great things. Available opportunities were a disappointment. The trajectory of youth found me alone and unsettled, without a career or path forward. I would have to make my own way and that complicated things. In retrospect it was a good complication. If I hadn’t left my home town permanently for university, life may have been simpler.
I’m glad my circumstances gave me the chance to leave home and be different.
Elizabeth Warren Meet and Greet in Tipton, Iowa. April 26, 2019
I was invested in Elizabeth Warren’s campaign for president and attended some events about which she wrote in Persist, her memoir published this year.
Like tens of thousands of others I waited in a selfie line and got my moment. I don’t recall what we talked about. Of all the things I thought about Warren during the campaign and afterward, the book is about something I hadn’t considered much: she’s a woman living in what largely was and remains a patriarchy.
The book is worth reading whether you are a fan or not. It explains some of her major policies in a way only a teacher could: clearly and rationally. For example, I didn’t understand the importance of child care to society until I read her explanation in Persist. When talking with friends and Democratic acquaintances during the run up to the Iowa caucuses, I heard the discussions about whether we should run another woman for president, whether a woman could win against Donald Trump. Those questions weren’t asked of men. Warren recounts these attitudes and what they meant in detail. I knew there would be wonkish policy stuff yet I didn’t expect the book to be as good as it was.
I couldn’t live the kind of life Warren does, mostly because I’m not as smart and don’t have the same kind of drive she does. The book serves as an example of a life worth living, an example of how to deal with prejudice, sexism, racism, economic injustice and more. It inspires us to dream big, fight hard and be better citizens.
We’ll never know what the United States would have been like with President Elizabeth Warren. For the time being we can be glad she’s in it with a position of power. We can also follow her suggestion and persist.
A hard frost is coming. This is Iowa and it has usually been here by now. We wait.
Lilacs near the front door are beginning to bud, so it’s crazy warm. Rain is in the forecast, although chances seem slight. A dry spell would be better so the lawn can be mowed one last time. Outside my personal world, we could use more rain. We could also use a hard frost. I went walking on the state park trail since we had neither.
Determining where I left my autobiography this spring is not as easy as I thought it would be. I know where the major documents are located and the ideas I had for structure (sigh of relief!) yet things migrated elsewhere in the intervening months. The main trouble is when one has written consistently since 1974, and has access to much of that writing, it is hard to get through it to see where the narrative should go. These things don’t write themselves, I’m finding. At present I want it grounded in some kind of reality. That could change, yet not now.
Year two of this autobiographical writing will proceed differently. I must lay out a timeline and hang documents and artifacts on it. I accumulated stacks of three ring binders for the purpose. I wrote extensively about some key moments in my life, others come to mind frequently, and some I haven’t even touched. Need to organize, fill our the voids, and pare down repetition. If by spring I have a set of binders on a shelf with documents arranged in chronological order in them, this year’s writing will be deemed successful.
Friday was good. I have positive feelings about the coming weekend. We will make through winter again, I believe. On the other side awaits a new garden and fresh opportunity of the kind spring in the Northern Hemisphere can bring.
We anticipate the renewal which begins here and now. Yet first we want a hard frost.
Last week was arguably the best summer weather we have had in many years. Temperatures were moderate and humidity low; some rain, but not too much; and glorious partly cloudy skies coupled with a light breeze. A bit of imitation vanilla extract on the nose, and even swarms of gnats couldn’t spoil the enjoyment.
Everyone I know who has a garden is having an abundant year of produce. Foragers can find plenty of black raspberries, and while the Iowa DNR sprayed the lily pads on Lake Macbride near Solon, one more toxic substance in the water won’t kill us — we hope.
Climate change is real. Any question that greenhouse gases are warming the planet, and are caused by human activity has fallen away to leave the more appropriate one, “what will we do about climate change?” The crazy weather we have been experiencing recedes from view on days like last week, while coal and natural gas power plants continue to dump CO2 pollution into the atmosphere like it was an open sewer to air-condition our homes. There are two issues: protecting what we hold dear from the effects of climate change, and doing something to address the causes of greenhouse gas emissions.
While addressing climate change is complicated, things we can do to help are not. Reduce energy use at home by turning off lights after leaving a room and unplug your computer and mobile phone chargers when they are not in use. Change how we think about transportation by consolidating errands. We should be doing these things anyway.
The point is not to radically change how we live, but to join the vast majority of Americans in acknowledging that climate change is real, and poses a tangible threat to how we live. Then take steps to personally do something about it. You will be glad you did.
The brush pile included the last branches blown down by the Aug. 10, 2020 derecho. With enough rain to sate the drought, it was time to burn it. By nightfall it was reduced to ash, then a steady rain fell until morning.
One more mowing and I will get the John Deere serviced. After that, it will rest in the garage until spring. Deconstruction of the garden is ahead. I’ll need the mowed lawn to spread things out and organize for winter storage. I want to salvage and reuse landscaping fabric and the staples used to hold it in place.
The compost piles need to be moved and turned. I want to clear the garden plot where they are for more productive use. As my gardening skills improve I want more planting space next year. I have many wants.
I sat on the grass and watched the fire burn. I re-stacked the burning logs with a garden hoe and reduced the perimeter of the fire as it burned. I used old business cards mixed with shredded paper to start the fire. A pile of them lay under the burning branches. Once I turned them over they ignited.
We had an unexpected overnight visitor. I made a pot of chili using a fresh tomato, canned whole tomatoes, two kinds of frozen tomato sauce, and a can of organic tomato paste. It provided flexibility for supper time so we could focus on conversation.
A new day begins in our post derecho lives. The brush pile is gone, preparing a path toward garden’s end and winter.
Journey Home 
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