Tag: Writing

Writing about writing, autobiography, cross posting selected work from other places.

Categories
Milestones Writing

We’re Going Home — Donald Kaul

RAGBRAI 1973; Photo Credit – RAGBRAI

We knew Donald Kaul had prostate cancer and it spread to his bones. He’d been ill for a number of years but after this diagnosis, the prognosis was not good — we expected him to die this year and he did on July 22, just as the Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa, which he co-founded with John Karras, was getting started.

I’ve never ridden on RAGBRAI, but made a few long runs on the bicycle I bought after graduate school. I even made a century ride through the countryside near Iowa City and discovered what glycogen depletion is. Kaul played a role in Iowa’s bicycle culture. His influence was more than that.

After returning from the military I found a paucity of intellectually engaged people in my home town. Not that there weren’t like-minded men and women, just not very many of them. I began to follow Kaul more than I had.

My first paid work was delivering newspapers for the Des Moines Register while in grade school. That was around 1965 which was when Kaul began writing Over the Coffee full time. The Register didn’t sell many papers in Davenport and my paper route involved a lot of walking with very few deliveries. I recall one of my customers talking about Kaul when I collected — his column was somewhat controversial. I moved on to the Times-Democrat which sold a lot more papers. When I began high school in 1966 I had to give up my paper route. There was apparently a rule.

Despite this history, I was not an avid newspaper reader. I certainly didn’t read every column Kaul wrote. He was a placeholder for the idea that we could do better in life than work for a wage, hit the bars, sleep it off, and wake up to do it again. I wanted something else from my life in Davenport and Kaul created an option.

“Donald Kaul is at least five different columnists, which is a pretty spectacular bargain for his readers,” Vance Bourjaily wrote in the forward to How to Light a Water Heater and Other War Stories: A Random Collection of Essays.

Bourjaily famously moved from the East Coast to work at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He lived in the country and named his place Red Bird Farm. He wrote about men and horses and going to the dentist: things that resonate if one lives around here. Bourjaily captured the essence of Kaul.

“It is one of the pleasures of following Kaul’s column in the Register most days, as most of Iowa does,” he wrote, “that one can never be sure which of the five columnists the paper boy will bring this morning.”

Since Bourjaily died in 2010, I won’t have to break the news “most of Iowa” didn’t have home deliveries of the Register, ever. Some of those who did detested Kaul’s columns, and cancelled their subscription over it. Nonetheless, I like to think the inflated picture Bourjaily drew of Kaul as representative of what I hoped would be… even if it wasn’t.

I keep copies of some of Kaul’s books close by. If I need a lift, or inspiration, I read one of his columns. He was part of the development of my pursuit of intellectual interests. He may have prevented me from staying on in my home town to become another shoppie. Thank God for Donald Kaul, although that’s pretty ironic given his atheism.

If only I could write so well.

Donald Kaul has gone home and we’ll miss him.

Categories
Home Life Writing

Staycation 2018

Garden Harvest

There’s plenty to do on the property so this week will be a staycation.

I took paid vacation from the home, farm and auto supply store. On day three of an eight day work hiatus, I left the property twice, visiting the warehouse club both times. I return to work next Saturday when my season at the orchard officially begins.

There are five stops on the staycation itinerary: the garden, the yard, the garage, the kitchen and my storage/study areas. It should be fun.

Yesterday was Mother’s 89th birthday. We had a nice telephone chat. She has trouble moving around because of arthritis, and no longer reads printed books because of macular degeneration. She seemed mentally alert as we reviewed her recent reading from an audio book subscription. We talked about her mother. Busha moved from the farm to Minneapolis at a young age. She took a job in a Chinese restaurant where she learned to prepare chop suey, according to Mother. I’m not sure “Chinese” is accurate, but the dish she learned and taught Mother has a unique flavor I’ve not encountered elsewhere. Mother said she continues to make chop suey from time to time.

It’s getting to be time for a visit.

And so it goes. Time to get outside and take advantage of the temperate weather. While the rest of the world bakes, it is good as it gets here… at least for the moment.

Later I’ll return to the kitchen to prepare a meal with some of the morning harvest. Summer gardening has been pretty good despite Spring’s late start.

Categories
Writing

Carrying the Past

Field of Yellow Flowers

We live each moment in a march of time weighed down by our past.

Cognizant of what we experienced and hopeful for a future, we live lives drenched in the culture that engendered us and provided what sensibilities we have.

Living is not perfect and who knows what God sees when she looks down on us from the heavens?

Today and tomorrow I’m scheduled to work at the home, farm and auto supply store, then I’m off work until my shift at the orchard Aug. 4. Eight days to finish up summer projects (I hope) and prepare for the rush toward year end.

We carry our past with us — a rucksack of memories to help us live each day better. Sometime it becomes becomes a millstone. It draws our attention and delays us.

The past is the raw material of creativity when naivety serves no useful purpose in the matrix society has become.

It is okay to set the rucksack down on our way — to rest, drink water, and pick it up again. We are unwilling to leave it behind until the final curtain falls and that’s our humanity.

Categories
Home Life Writing

Moving On to Fall

July 15 Harvest

My supervisor at the orchard called yesterday to ask me to work this weekend. I said yes.

We’ll be selling blueberries from Michigan for a few hours on Saturday and we’ll discuss plans for the upcoming season.

It is my earliest start in six seasons. It’s also a sign the year is on the back slope. Fall will soon arrive.

Being home more has helped make the garden our best ever. Just an hour a day after planting has been enough time. Some of the new techniques: using composted chicken manure for fertilizer, mulching pepper and cucumber plants immediately after planting, using a fence to grow cucumbers, and putting a deer fence around the tomatoes have facilitated Mother Nature’s growth. I still haven’t had to buy a single onion or head of garlic at the store this year. We are eating something fresh from the garden daily.

I’m used to having events to which to look forward. That means I’m not used to the five-day weekends semi-retirement and completion of spring farm work brought this July. I’ve been doing a lot of resting in between activities. I’ve made a conscious effort to reduce the number of activities. So resting outranks doing for the time being.

Based on more than 50 years in the workforce, I’m used to a scheduled shift being the focal point of each day. In retirement, that changes and will take accommodation.The idea is not to replace work shifts with other, different kinds of events. Rather focus on awareness of tasks being required and doing them as needs rise to the surface of our new lives together.

For example, I planted 48 celery plants. Yesterday I harvested five to see how they were growing. I trimmed the heads of bad stalks and used what was salvageable in a stir fry for lunch. The five cores, or what grocery stores call “hearts” I bagged and refrigerated for later. What I learned was celery is about ready for harvest and that means a big project of cleaning, trimming, slicing and freezing for winter use in soup and stir fry. That task is lingering and will rise up soon.

The point of retirement is to perform tasks like this in time, but when fancy deems best. It would be a waste not to get this done, but I’m reluctant to write it on my calendar. I’d rather wait for the right intersection of seasonable temperatures, personal energy and peak vegetable readiness. That time will reveal itself outside the unforgiving tyranny of a calendar.

Milkweed Pods Growing

Even the milkweed plants are doing well this year. I did little other than weed around them and cut away the vines wanting to grow up the stem. Several plants are forming seed pods. I’ll learn a little bit about them and harvest the seeds to grow more in a different spot. Someday I hope to see a butterfly caterpillar on one of them.

It looks like as I’m writing the presser in Helsinki, Finland with Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump is about to begin. A reporter claiming to be from The Nation has been forcibly removed. Neither leader is a fan of a free press, although both use it to their advantage when they can. We also know about the many journalists who “disappeared” under Putin. I’d rather look at butterflies than think about U.S. – Russian relations. It’s hard to avoid, just like it’s hard to stop thinking about my next work shift.

If we’re to change habits, we have to work at it. That may be why I continue to write these posts, work at the orchard, and at the home, farm and auto supply store… for now. My life would be worse without it.

Categories
Writing

New Potatoes and Cucumbers

Morning Harvest

The ambient outdoor temperature is 89 degrees and the heat index is 100. Another midday spent inside.

I feel caged.

Near sunup I harvested cucumbers and watered. I tasted a red tomato — they are not ready.

Won’t be long.

In the kitchen I emptied the crock of fermented dill pickles and started another batch. I washed and sorted cucumbers on the counter: first the dills, then sweet pickles, then some for eating, then a pile of too plump ones for juicing. There are so many cucumbers I could be selective. Soon I’ll run out of things to do with them… not yet.

I felt restless. I feel restless.

Cucumbers

I cleaned under the kitchen sink and returned the soaps, cleaning supplies and waste basket to their appointed places. I’m glad that work is done. I’ve been putting it off.

Using fruit thawed from the freezer, I made a smoothie for lunch with cow’s milk, kale, a banana and the fruit. It was satisfying…  and very blue.

There is only so much kitchen time a person can take before moving on.

Someone spotted water coming up through the ground near a main water line junction. I emailed our crew of well volunteers and we met near the leak. We saw water seeping up but couldn’t diagnose the problem. I told them I’d call our well service to come out and fix the leak. It was a productive exchange as I hadn’t seen some of them for a while. It was a chance to do something outside home. It will be an ongoing project for the weekend.

I came back. It got hot and here I am.

Our president had tea with Queen Elizabeth II today. I wonder if they had scones like she did with Ike. In Washington, D.C. Robert Mueller’s investigation produced 12 indictments of Russian intelligence officers who had been hacking U.S. computers in the run up to the 2016 general election. The hacking was with nefarious purpose and intent. The press event was at the same time the president was having tea. It will give him something to discuss with Vladimir Putin next week in Helsinki.

In the hottest part of the day I feel an urge to go somewhere else. I felt the same way when I lived near the main train station, the Hauptbahnhof, in Mainz, Germany, especially on weekends away from the kaserne. I would drive to the big box stores over in Wiesbaden… or maybe walk to the small grocery store down the hill and buy fresh fruit and a liter of Coca Cola. I had to time it right because they closed for a couple of hours in the early afternoon. About the same time it is now. I feel connected to those days 40 years ago.

I just got the call the well technician is on his way. Guess I can meet that urge… for now.

Categories
Writing

Writing My Way Out

Compost Bin

The culprit is a long, engaging worklife. The crime? Diminished creative output.

Early on I realized, with a few exceptions, creative endeavor doesn’t pay. To support it I took work… for over 50 years. We raised a daughter, built a home, worked outside home, and lived an often exhausting life.

Older, I’m not sure I’m much wiser. I’m worn down and less productive than I hoped to be. Yet the creative impulse persists. I hope to write my way out of the current situation into new energy and creativity.

I haven’t given up.

The wellspring of creativity has been several things, most important among them is meeting and engaging with new people. If we are to be successful as artists we need an audience. I’ve been lucky to find one on this blog and in our community. Relationships with people are important.

Here’s my problem. For too many years reading and writing has been a way of processing society and the world around me. Such processing engaged me and produced two results: a good quantity of writing and distraction from more specific creative output. At age 66 there’s no time for distraction so I must renew focus on writing.

Like the compost bin in the garden I keep throwing life experiences in, hoping to get to something elemental and nourishing. It’s time to spread compost on the garden plots and see what grows. No doubt there will be some weeds… and hopefully a flower or two… and vegetables for nourishment.

Life, its beauty and ugliness, is all around us. An artist must be able to perceive it, process and make something useful of it. On a summer Tuesday that’s what I’m hoping to do.

Categories
Kitchen Garden Living in Society

Garden is In

Friday Harvest

It may seem late yet I declared the garden planted on Friday.

We’ve already had a bumper crop of vegetables and we’re not even started with tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, green beans and more. There will always be garden work to do but for now it’s planted.

Time to turn to other things.

What I mean is between now and Aug 4, when orchard work begins, there is writing, household repairs and cleaning, and loads of work to improve our home life. At some point I switched from being a consumer to a doer and that makes the difference in my mid-sixties. I just stay home and do.

Water Bottles

Politics plays a role in current affairs and it’s much different than it was. My focus is to understand the complex world in which we live and work to make a positive impact. My themes haven’t changed (environment, social justice, economic survival, good governance) although my understanding of what needs doing has. During the re-election of George W. Bush I re-activated in politics. Each succeeding campaign was both learning and engagement. After seven campaigns, I enter my eighth with a deeper understanding of the role social networks play in determining winners and losers. I’m not referring to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter here, but broader social movements and the momentum they bring to an election.

The first Obama campaign, with its demographics analysis and targeted voter lists seems like ancient history. What Obama did can’t be replicated, even if we wanted. To better understand the electorate, we must knock on every door, hear every voter, and determine how to fix the broken politics endemic to our lives. Creativity and networking are important. We don’t know if what’s broken can be fixed in a generation. If we don’t start now, it may never be fixed.

Flower at the Farm

Politics is not everything. After only three hours at yesterday’s garlic harvest at the farm I felt a bit dizzy, presumably because of hard work in the sun. It was a temperate day, nonetheless, I played it safe and called it early. My point is I’m not getting any younger. Working a six or eight hour shift in the sun doesn’t work as well as it did a few years ago. Working smart is replacing working harder.

The rest of the year goes something like this. July is a month to work at home: advance my writing projects, get space at home to be more livable, and work to get the yard into better shape. August through October is work at the orchard. This year I may be taking on additional responsibilities, but for sure I’ll be there weekends and on Friday Family nights. November and December will be focused on writing. While this is going on, I’ll continue to work at the home, farm and auto supply store two days a week. Every dime of income has a place to be used at this point.

Declarations like mine about the garden are ephemeral. What matters more is a process of continual improvement in which life goes on as best we can make it until the final curtain falls. In the meanwhile, we expect there will be garden vegetables to eat.

Categories
Living in Society Writing

Pickling

Pickling Cucumbers

Beginning Monday, I’ll be covering the editor’s desk for Trish Nelson at Blog for Iowa for the month of July.

Everyone needs a vacation and Trish works harder and more persistently than most to get a progressive message up every weekday.

That means a lot of writing for me. It also means I get better with the work. I’m looking forward to the renewal.

With work at the farms finished and the home, farm and auto supply store down to two days per week, There is more time for writing.

For today, it’s home repairs, cleaning and making the first batch of dill pickles with this morning’s harvest. It is expected to be a full day and for that I’m thankful.

Categories
Environment Home Life Writing

Under a Rainbow

Rainbow Framing the Garden

Clouds broke while I watched it rain through the west-facing garage door. It was a slow, steady, gentle and soaking rain of the kind remembered from childhood.

Realizing there might be a rainbow I rushed upstairs and looked out an east-facing window. I saw a double rainbow framing the garden plots and our back yard.

The colors were as intense as I remember ever seeing. A sign the shit-storm of American politics would eventually end and our lives might heal.

Earlier I’d been on the roof cleaning gutters. A tree branch had blocked one of them, collecting leaves and impeding water flow. The view of the nearby lake was obscured by trees and vegetation that had grown up since we moved here. In the beginning there had been a clear view of the lake from the roof peak. We, people and plants, are older now.

Refraction of light through rain is simple and powerful physics. Outside quotidian affairs of which lives are mostly made, a rainbow brings hope. For a few fleeting moments we marvel at the colors and reflect upon the role rain and recovery can play in our lives. We notice.

Rain clears the air and washes away dust created by simple lives. On days like that, a better life seems possible. We weathered the storm and that may be enough.

A rainbow reminds us of that.

Categories
Kitchen Garden Work Life Writing

Last Day of the Season 2018

Chicken at Sundog Farm

Beginning on Feb. 25, and 862 trays of soil blocks later, my 2018 farm work season ended today at Sundog Farm. I finished at Wild Woods Farm on Friday.

More than anything, farm work has been time with young people — doing the work and talking about crops, challenges, and everything else.

In my sixth year of soil blocking I kept up physically. I plan to do it again next year if able.

Now to take a break from farming until returning to Wilson’s Orchard for the fall season.

This will be the first summer in a long time we haven’t taken a share from the CSAs. Our garden is big enough to provide most vegetables and I’m confident of the yield. What we can’t get at home I’ll secure elsewhere. Getting enough to eat is never a problem when working in a local food system.

Next on the practical agenda is home repairs and cleaning. There is never a shortage of work for home owners.

It’s also an opportunity to resume writing. Each time I rejoin the project I lose track of everything else. Hours and days pass and like a coal miner I follow the seam wherever it goes. There is a lot more reading, thinking and organizing than writing at this point. I’ve forgotten more than I know about my own life and it can’t be re-lived, merely touched through a gauze woven of memory.

I began addressing the chronology. I’m not sure that will be the presentation. As I delve into the volumes of writing and artifacts collected since college a thematic approach seems better. It would be cultural aspects of growing up, education, work life, how we developed an ecology of living as a family, and my path toward social responsibility. It will also focus on what readers may find interesting.

Writing is exhilarating at a time when the rest of the world seems weary and worn down. What a great way to spend the rest of this summer.