It’s been almost a year since the Iowa State Hygienic Laboratory reported the first three positive test results for COVID-19 in Iowa on March 8, 2020. The pandemic continues and I don’t know about you, but I’m getting cabin fever. The lingering snowfall hasn’t helped.
I read the report of fund raising challenges for a new fire station for the Solon Tri-Township Emergency Response Agency. The fund raisers can’t get in front of people due to the pandemic. While the $1.2 million raised so far is positive, there is a long way to go. I encourage people who can to give generously to this project.
Thursday I put on my Carhartt jacket, the U.S. Army-issued scarf I wore in the Fulda Gap, my seed supplier logo stocking hat, a pair of Army boots I got in basic training, my buckled overshoes, and ventured into the unbroken snow. It was more work than expected to deliver two five-gallon buckets of compost to the bin. I felt better once it was finished, some relief from cabin fever. Now I need to figure out how much I can afford to give for the fire station.
The new fire station is designed to better meet our needs. Our volunteer fire fighters could use the support. Please give what you can.
12-inches of blog books and a replica of the first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
When I wrote it was time to get a grip on the narrative of my autobiography in issue #4 I wasn’t kidding. It’s a flipping beast!
Sorry to report I’m nowhere near that goal and the thing keeps growing.
Because I have written so many autobiographical pieces over 50 years, I’m constantly finding new and important work to incorporate. I have to choose to either mine the artifacts or focus solely on writing. I don’t think it’s an either/or thing.
I’m leaning toward mining artifacts until I run the seam.
The writing is the most engaging part of this work so I can’t imagine avoiding it completely. Thing is I need to understand the scope of what is to be included and I’m nowhere near seeing the big picture.
Yesterday I was reading folders of my undergraduate papers. Was I ever an undisciplined student! I marveled at how a teacher would provide a three-page, single spaced, type-written response to one of my papers. I don’t know if they did it every time, or if I was getting special attention. In any case, it was remarkable.
At the same time, my Shakespeare teacher was exceedingly brief. He used a pack of 3 x 5 index cards for his lectures and they were stained with age and the nicotine tar from his constant tobacco smoking. We knew class was finished when he crumbled his cigarette package, after chain-smoking the remaining cigarettes, and threw it in the waste can.
It is remarkable I continued as a writer after the drubbing I received getting my degree in English. Nevertheless, I persisted.
To provide a better working framework for collecting past writing, I designed what I’m calling a book tree. It is a brief outline with the current 37 chapters, or sections where I can park existing writing as I find it. Half of the draft is migrated there. Once I run the seam I can take each chapter and create a better narrative that will build toward a rough draft. It’s going to take me all year to finish, although I knew that at the beginning.
It did help to lay out the 37 chapters. While it may not be the final number, it serves as a meditation guide for contemplating my life. The more I do that, the better will be the narrative. At least that’s what I believe mid-February in the project.
I merged two versions of my autobiography this week and that puts the word count over 60,000. I printed the 155 draft pages of the book on Friday and this weekend is time to get a grip on the narrative.
My hope is by reviewing everything page-by-page, I can identify structural deficiencies, make a list of sections that need to be written or improved, and generally grok the person I am and have been. A revision of the outline is in order and I’m getting out my 25-year old ScanCard organizer to keep track of what requires attention. I keep wanting to deny there is a lot of simple editing to do in the form of typos, sentence structure, word choice and the like.
I now have four main tools: 3 x 5 note cards, a draft, an outline, and the ScanCard system to keep track of where I am and what needs doing.
Between this blog, rushes, and additions to the draft book, I produced 106,254 words since Jan. 1. It’s definitely time to get a grip.
Readers may have noticed my posts about 19th Century Minnesota, which were related to that section of the book. To do adequate research took time, more time than expected. I happened on the work of John Radzilowski who studied the exact community where my family settled beginning in 1883. I bought two of his books about Poles in the Midwest. It was a balancing act to stick with my memory of what happened, and oral tradition, yet provide a broader historical context. I’m not done with that section.
What’s best about writing is forgetting about life outside my writing space and immersing myself in whatever topic is the day’s subject. Those hours are among the best. Crossing the 60,000 word count was also good.
Toward the end of my seventh decade I continue to buy books. I should stop, turn that around, and reduce my stacks each week. I am loathe to do it.
From my earliest days, going back to 1959 at least, I had a small library of books either given to me, or once I started working, ones I bought. The library has grown too big, and in truth, that happened years, maybe decades ago.
The easiest change would be to start reading books on an electronic reader instead of buying paper copies. Readers are convenient and the font size can be adjusted, making words easily legible. Quality of eyesight is increasingly an issue. A reader is better for reading in bed, and in a recliner or comfy chair. It would not be a big change to start reading fiction in that format. Adopting technology is a good thing and it would stop growth of the stacks.
A lot of volumes in my library were written by people I know, with whom I took classes, or did things. Others were special gifts. They have a souvenir value, a remembrance of time together.
For example, I made a driver recruiting trip to Southern Illinois University where, in addition to my recruitment event, I spent time with some teachers who felt isolated in the coal mining area. Students were more interested in getting a job in the trades — truck driving, coal mining, or manufacturing — than in learning. The teachers stuck together as a form of intellectual society. One of the group was Lucia Perillo who wrote a book of poetry, The Oldest Map with the Name America. I return to it often as a reminder of the challenge of intellectual pursuits in our time. I don’t recall if I met Perillo, but she was part of the group and it doesn’t matter to the memory.
The problem with books is they can be used as reference materials for my writing. It is a justification to keep almost any book. The idea I may return to it later for “research purposes” may sound good, but there is so much research and so little time. I need to thin the stacks. That, too takes time.
Our daughter expressed an interest in inheriting my books when I go. It would be a crime to leave her everything because some are more significant than others. If anything, the ideas of an inheritance will force a reckoning, a reduction in quantity, and an improvement in quality.
I started filling boxes that arrived containing mail ordered books with duplicates and others in which I lost interest. The idea is to give them to the public library for their used book sale. I have three boxes so far and it’s a start. I should fill more boxes.
Books are an addiction. In the scope of things, it is an inexpensive addiction. I spend no time on sports, movies and television, and go shopping only when we need something. Books can produce value in our lives. I’m reading more of them. Partly due to the coronavirus pandemic, but also because I realize the limited number I can consume before my inevitable ending. There is an increased urgency to read.
A friend said I should get rid of all the books. So did my late Mother. While I’m not ready to do so, a reasonable goal is to fit all of my books in the writing room. I have a long way to go to accomplish that, if it can be accepted as an operating premise. Today, I’m not sure it can.
These days of contagion seem like a blank slate. By leaving the workforce after the coronavirus pandemic was declared, I found a form of freedom in each day’s beginning.
I hadn’t planned it, yet the pandemic forced my retirement. With our pensions and health care, mostly from Social Security and Medicare, we have adequate financial means to survive without paid work.
Each day begins with a chance to do what I want. I have a daily outline, though, so I know what tasks I told myself would be next.
Once the pandemic recedes, I may return to part time work for the socialization it provides. That is, if I can find people with whom I would enjoy working. Any additional income will find a place to be spent, yet income would not be the main objective.
For now the focus is on writing. I should get more disciplined and stick to my outlines. That seems too much like work. In January, my average daily output was 2,179 words. With editing, that number will be reduced in the final product. During the last draft before starting another section, editing takes more time. Partly it is figuring out what to say and how to draw on resources. Mostly it is reaching for a form of satisfaction in the written words.
There is a good month of winter remaining before I set up the greenhouse and plant cruciferous vegetable seedlings. There’s no time to dally on a blank page. I’m young enough to believe I can do what I want today and tomorrow. At the same time the work ahead is clear and will occupy my days.
For a moment I’ll bask in this moment, when the day seems like an endless expanse ready to be traveled. That alone can make life worth living.
It was a full moon in a clear sky on Thursday. White snow showed the shadows of everything on its surface. We looked on in wonder as the moon rose.
When my maternal ancestors emigrated from Poland to Minnesota, Poland did not exist. It had been partitioned three times beginning in the late 18th Century and completely dissolved for more than a century before 1918. Serfdom had been abolished on May 3, 1791, yet the partition mostly nullified abolition. Serfdom’s vestiges persisted into the mid-Nineteenth Century. My ancestors came from the cohort of former Polish serfs. Our stock was peasant subsistence farmers for whom life in Europe, especially after the end of serfdom, made them want something better.
Maciej Nadolski emigrated from Poland through Philadelphia and took wage work as a coal miner in Allegheny, Pennsylvania. He was recruited from there to be part of a new colony near Wilno, Minnesota. Beginning in February 1882, 40 Polish settlers bought land from the railroad in Royal Township, Lincoln County, Minnesota. Great, great grandfather bought his parcel on Sept. 22, 1883.
Most of the Polish settlers in the new Wilno colony didn’t know each other before moving there. The organizing principle of the colony was for the Winona and St. Peter Railroad Company to deed land in Wilno for a Roman Catholic Church and cemetery to support a new, Polish-speaking community to whom they hoped to sell land. St. John Cantius Roman Catholic Church was built in 1883 and served to bring the community together. In this these Polish immigrants began a new, American life.
Lincoln County was one step out of the frontier in 1883. The first white child was born there in 1869. The first newspaper was published in 1879. In 1874 there was a grasshopper infestation that continued for a couple of years. The presence and perceived threat of Indians was real. If the Poles were coming to Royal Township to become subsistence farmers, the county had not previously seen a lot of success in it.
As I study this period and culture, a couple of things have been on my mind.
The historical accounts make scant mention of women. While writing about Nadolski land ownership and the Wilno colony for my book, I had an epiphany that Maciej was married to Franciszka Nadolski and her name appears on some of the deeds. It would be a mistake to leave women out of the story. After considering what artifacts survive from that time, the historical narrative makes more sense: there was a rich cultural life in addition to the hard work of subsisting on the Minnesota prairie.
Until this year, I did not understand that there was a Wilno colony and what it was. When I visited Wilno in 1991, the place did not seem like much. That’s partly because automobile culture had been dominant for a long time since settlement. Early settlers just made do with what they had. The rise of mass marketing and consolidation of business and wealth was yet to come.
The colony developed indigenous solutions to common problems of commerce and agricultural cooperation. While the railroad said they might run the line through Wilno when the original plots were sold, they ended up platting a new town of Ivanhoe (a.k.a. New Wilno) to the south because there would be more land sales to benefit the railroad. As an inland community it is remarkable the hamlet of Wilno survived at all.
The Polish immigrants’ connection to the Catholic Church was a main part of the settlement. If the railroad had not given land to the church, there would have been no colony. While there were established settlers in the county in 1882, they were not Polish. As the Poles arrived, their common language and culture created an insularity as they farmed, congregated, and socialized among themselves. Over time that changed, yet it was a cultural trait that persisted through my grandmother who was born there, and in some form was passed down to me.
In the shade of the spruce tree on Thursday I was thinking about how few cultural connections we have today. Anyway, we don’t have them the way the original Polish settlers of the Wilno colony did. We have many friends and some family. During the coronavirus pandemic we email, text, telephone, and video conference with them a lot. It’s not the same. Broader community connections especially like the church, although other cooperative ventures as well, have been broken by mass communication, consolidation of business, and concentration of wealth. While my ancestors may have escaped post-serfdom life as wage earners in partitioned Poland, in the United States today, with wages stagnant, unemployment high, and jobs that create a sense of community scarce, we may be returning to our serfdom roots.
It seems a long way for them to have come for life in society to end up this way.
A few onion sprouts poke toward the grow light from channel trays resting on a heating pad. Planted Jan. 20, more of them should germinate soon and rise up. I check them multiple times each day. Successfully growing them is not a given.
We are a distance from working in the garden. Tuesday I cleared a deep snowfall from the driveway in case we have to get out. A neighbor plowed a two-foot berm left by the snowplow at the end of the driveway. We are well-provisioned and can stay home for a while, that is, unless something happens. I would enjoy visiting friends over coffee in town. But for the coronavirus pandemic I would.
Joe Biden has been president for a week. Already he ramped up COVID-19 vaccine distribution to bring an end to the pandemic. News reports say if his actions are effective, we could see the end of major risks of the virus by the end of summer. Partly, it’s why we elected Biden.
Tuesday was a good day for research on my book. I found a historian who used information and artifacts about my Minnesota ancestors to write about Polish immigration. While I printed copies of historical documents when I visited Lincoln County, his work pieces together a story I couldn’t see on my own. He tied together the locations where my Polish ancestors lived in Pennsylvania, Chicago, LaSalle County, Illinois, and Lincoln County, Minnesota with a specificity I hadn’t found previously. His work gave context to their lives in a way I couldn’t see when I visited the home place and surrounding farm community. His short article presented a believable picture of life at the end of the 19th Century that informs understanding of my family history.
For the last few years I’ve had trouble reading. When I visited an ophthalmologist at the University of Iowa clinics, years ago in the before the mobile device era, he identified a condition where my eyes don’t always focus together, resulting in a kind of double vision. Over the years I’ve gotten used to seeing double. Before he identified the condition I wasn’t aware of seeing double. I improved my reading ability by sitting at my writing table with eyeglasses on, instead of reading without glasses in bed or in a recliner. There was more at work than slight nearsightedness. Reading earlier in the day at my table has been more productive. While I wear bifocals and have specially made eyeglasses for desktop computer use and reading, my sight is pretty good. For that, I’m thankful as I read a lot, Now maybe I can read more.
It is another day in the time of contagion. I look forward to the gardening season, yet while there is snow cover, indoor work continues.
My decision to enter the military created a personal challenge. I had protested the Vietnam War in high school and college, and favored non-violent approaches to resolving conflict. At the same time, Father had served in the Allied occupation of Japan after World War II. While he did not talk much about his military service, it was an important part of how his life evolved after graduating from Leon High School in Tallahassee, Florida.
Mother took me to register for the draft when I became eligible at age 18. I still have my Selective Service card. People in my birth year were eligible for the draft lottery on July 1, 1970 for calendar year 1971. I took a student deferment to attend the University of Iowa in fall 1970. Because of it, my number would be drawn in 1973 for the following year, after graduation. Rather than take a chance in the 1973 lottery, when the Selective Service drew 125, I canceled my deferment, and accepted eligibility, because my draft number was 128. One could be eligible for the draft lottery only once, so I was off the hook on conscription.
After graduating from university in May 1974, I stayed in Iowa City contemplating next steps. When Richard Nixon resigned the presidency on Aug. 8, 1974, a weight was lifted from me and almost everyone I knew. This freed me to take a long tour of Europe, a modern-day equivalent of the 17th and 18th Century Grand Tours. I returned to Davenport as winter set in. I worked a couple of jobs in 1975, yet living in my home town wasn’t for me. I remained restless about what would be next.
When the Vietnam War ended on April 30, 1975, I revisited joining the military. Without the danger of the Vietnam War, my father’s service came to mind again. I discovered a program to enlist for Officer Candidate School to become a commissioned officer. I took all the tests, went through various hearings, and despite frowns from the panel at my shoulder-length hair, was accepted. I enlisted in the program and left for Fort Jackson, S.C. in January 1976, the Bicentennial Year.
Why did I enlist? I felt the U.S. Army at the end of the Vietnam War was a despicable mess. The March 16, 1968 My Lai massacre of more than 500 people, including young girls and women who were raped and mutilated before being killed, was particularly on my mind. I believed the only way to address problems like My Lai was for people like me, who valued non-violent means of conflict resolution and common decency, to enter the military and do a better job of leading it. Father’s military service played a role in my decision, as did the opportunity of youth and being single. I have no regrets in following my father’s footsteps and joining the Army.
DAVENPORT, Ia. (Dec. 28, 1975) During the last three days I have heard two significant quotes and several metaphors well worth remembering here.
Christmas Day as I escorted my Grandmother down the front stairs (of the American Foursquare) and as the sun was sinking in the west, she said, “The day we have prepared for so long is gone.”
Also Joe, on the eve of his 24th birthday said, “The ink has dried on the last year, and already it begins to fade.”
Both of these touch home for me at this time of my life.
Spanish Moss on a Tree in Thomasville, Georgia Photo Credit – Wikimedia Commons
THOMASVILLE, Ga. (Dec. 7, 1997) For the past three weeks I have been wrapped up in the transition between CRST and Oil-Dri. The time has gone quickly and with the 12-16-hour days, I have had little time for reflection. It was only Friday night I did something for myself — I went to Walmart and bought some shaving cream and underwear.
Yesterday, after five hours at work, I drove toward Tallahassee and went to a Goodwill store, a large bookstore, and got groceries — to last me until I fly home on Friday.
What I observed is difficult to put into words. Mostly it is difficult because I am not accustomed to writing observations. But I will attempt something now.
On Georgia Highway 3, near Ochlocknee, is a huge clay mine. Across the street is the Oil-Dri plant which processes the clay into absorbents and cat litter. The reason I am here is to train these people to provide the transportation services needed to move products to market. This is something Oil-Dri was doing on their own, but in a changing economic environment they now chose to outsource the function.
People are very nice, and determined to preserve their way of life. What that means, I am not sure, but I detect that many in the area do not have a lot of money, and things like a person taking home a bag of rolls from the farewell luncheon, and statements about living in Cairo or Moultrie because a person cannot afford to live in Thomasville, are revealing.
Yesterday I took my clothes to a coin-operated laundromat where there is a wash, dry and fold service. The proprietress is a woman who will, for 75 cents a pound, wash, dry and fold clothes. There are two very young children who stay with her — they are young enough to be grandchildren. When I returned to pick up my clothes, there was a gathering of older females who were of an age to be daughters/mothers of the others. The proprietress indicated that Iowa was a long way from that coin-operated laundromat.
Saturday afternoon I drove south on 319 toward Tallahassee. As I entered Leon County, I remembered entering that county with my parents when I was seven or eight years old. I am not far from where my father spent time as a teenager. I liked the road with the trees reaching over the road surface — Spanish moss hanging from them — a cozy drive on a busy road leading to shops, and eventually, the airport from which I will fly home.
It was inside Walmart yesterday afternoon I was inspired to buy this paper and continue my journal from Georgia. The idea of writing in it as an escape and as creative endeavor seems inviting after 23 straight days of endless activity. I never know if I will write volumes or if this will be my solitary entry as Monday comes and I move back into a work mode — engaged in what must be done.
It is a place of solitary enjoyment — as usual, I know not when, if ever, I will return to read these writings… or if, like the writings I had stolen in France, they will just be gone forever — to be composted into some other matter. Now, it is rewarding to put the words to paper, and so, on what is turning into a retreat weekend, I am at this table writing.
It is in writing down thoughts I am able to move on to the next activity. It is like putting money into a repository where it is unseen and as such out of my attention — letting me be free to engage in new thoughts. I have left the curtain closed in my room. I can see it is light outside, and when I emerge, I will have a fresh view of what potential there is in my environment.
Now it is time to end this journal entry. I have come to this place in my day and the promise of my future calls me. I have used this morning — the three hours since I woke up — to bring focus to what I am doing. Now mental activity pulls me toward work. Indeed, that is the reason I am here in Georgia.
So now, I will close this page, this entry — go to the exercise room for an hour, then begin writing in other actions, the next phase of my career as an Americanist.
“Battle map has been drawn,” wrote our enthusiastic meteorologist who hails from Florida. We’re expecting heavy snowfall by mid day and continuing until morning.
I plowed the driveway yesterday, so the concrete absorbed heat from the sun and will melt the first flakes. After that, as always in Big Grove Township, we’ll see what happens. We are in the middle of the red zone she mapped out for us.
Staying inside was the plan all along. People are talking about the end of the coronavirus pandemic with hope in their voices. Now that people we know are getting vaccinated, there may be an end in sight. A University of Iowa epidemiologist wrote yesterday it won’t be over until cases of COVID-19 are minimal in our community. One hopes public health professionals will instruct us in what that means.
Thus far in January, I wrote 54,175 words, more or less. That includes three categories of writing, blog posts, rushes (first drafts), and a final draft of the book that follows the outline. I’m rapidly learning the quantity of words is less important than their quality. With so much output, I need a week to catch up on editing. It does appear this autobiography from the contagion will proceed to a finish. With seven more days in January and a snowstorm in the works, I should be able to focus on the work.
We cook all of our meals and have been since the pandemic began. Saturday I made a batch of chick pea salad, one of my favorite dishes. Our meal rotation includes spaghetti with tomato sauce, pizza, chili, stir fry, soup, sandwiches, oatmeal, tacos, quesadillas, and various small plates intended to break down and disperse our daily eating over a longer period. In a nod to southern cuisine, we make a “meat with two sides,” although our meat is typically a veggie burger with two different vegetables. With both of us retired until after the pandemic, home cooking will continue.
Seven more days of living this January. I’ll take mine one at a time.
Journey Home 
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