The New Bike Path

  The village of Homer Glen has finally put in a series of bike paths that go all over our fair city. The northern terminus is right at the entrance to our subdivision. They cross some major and minor streets but mostly follow ComEd easements. Some day they'll connect with other paths and a cyclist could conceivably pedal all day without having to ride in traffic. I doubt it'll be open this year but it gives me something to look forward to next year.

   In anticipation of that, here is something I wrote about my weekly ride. 

   

Sunday Morning

     Early Sunday morning.  Not so early that the sun isn’t up but early enough that the shadows stretch clear across the yard and the creeping tentacles of light haven’t let the nocturnal insects know that it’s time to call it a night. Even at this hour it’s obvious that it’s going to be another hot, sticky one but now it’s still relatively cool in the shade.
     Sounds are clearer, sharper at this hour but I’ve never been able to figure out if it’s an atmospheric effect or if my ears haven’t filled up with their daily dose of the cacophony of modern living. The latch to the shed snaps open crisply and there she is.
     My trusty Schwinn Tempo, still looking pretty good after twenty-plus years and many thousand miles, awaits its Sunday run.  It was teal at the bike shop. Most of it still is but the chain slapping against it has turned the lower right rear fork the color of rusted metal. The pits and scratches of years of use give it the character that only longevity can confer. Then there’s the seat. Rock hard, worn down to a sheen like a highly-polished leather boot by thousands of Spandex strokes, it fits that part of my anatomy perfectly. None of these open-channel, ergonomic, gel-cell  “comfort seats” for us. 
     We used to do this eleven-mile circuit almost every day and many’s the night that the kids went with me after supper. Those days are over. The relentless encroachment of subdivisions has made weekday traffic a nightmare. Inattentive drivers on cell phones have made it downright dangerous.  That’s why we’re relegated to this time of Sunday morning; very few are headed to work, most of the Saturday night party people are home and the churchgoers are still laying out their Sunday best. The only motorists out at this hour are on their way to the lake to cast their lines into the water.
     High-pressure tires must be filled daily so I pump them to the prescribed 110 psi and off we go. Soon as we hit the main road, which is also the county line, we have to tackle a long, but not too steep, hill as if to see if a bike in its third decade and a rider in his seventh are up to it this morning.  We are, and our reward is an equally long downslope out of the subdivisions and into the forest.  Every Sunday I thank Daniel Burnham and the originators of the Forest Preserve District  who, over 100 years ago, preserved this land in its natural state for all time.  This is the Tampier Lake Preserve named after George Tampier whose quarry was flooded in 1964 to make a 160-acre recreational lake restrained by a ten-foot high arch dam.  
     Now on relatively flat land, forest on the right, savanna on the left, our shadow stretching across the road when there’s a gap in the trees,  I breathe the fresh air and the daily grind fades away. It’s hard to believe we’re less than twenty-five miles from the heart of the City of Big Shoulders. Out here it’s all very simple; no deadlines, no phones, no faxes, no interruptions; just me, the bike and the open road. My only concern is getting up the next hill. 
     Before long I hear “passing on your left” followed by a pace line of fellow cyclists, so close in formation that their front wheels almost touch the rear wheel of the rider ahead.  Each greets me with a friendly good morning as he passes and I respond in kind. In my younger years I’d have joined them but now I ride at my own pace and wish them well on their journey. Turning left at the crossroad, they’re out of sight in minutes.
     Going straight, into the John J. Duffy Preserve, we pass a pond on the right and notice a mother duck hustling her brood into the reeds to protect them from the two-wheeled intruder.   Now up another hill we pass twin flagstone gateposts that may have been made from tailings of the Illinois &Michigan Canal in the 1840's. They stand like sentinels to the past where a house now reduced to the remnants of a foundation once stood. Perhaps it belonged to a farmer who worked the bottom land at the other end of the hill. There, what’s left of fence posts mark a field, bisected by the road and now flooded as the lake filled in. No more than two feet at its deepest, this man-made lake can become parched, cracked mud flats in a dry summer.
     Up another hill into Cap Sauer’s Holding and the prairie is now on our right stretching almost a mile, a scant reminder of the ocean of grass that gave our state its nickname. I don’t know who Cap Sauer is or was but his area is part of the largest contiguous area of preserves in the Forest Preserve system. This takes us to the northern terminus of our ride and we head east, prairie on our right, thick woods on our left.  A herd of deer sunning themselves in the road doesn’t detect our silent approach against the breeze and, startled by our presence, they take off for the woods, high-kicking in all directions, their white tails disappearing into the foliage. 
     Turning south and back into civilization we pass the spot where the bell in the tower of a small chapel used to chime the quarter hour and was the timekeeper on our daily ride. It overlooked the ten-acre field where my club used to have its annual camp-out. The chapel and field are gone and in their stead are multi-million-dollar single-family homes, standing as temples to another god.  Just another sign of what some would call “progress.”
     Into a busier section of road now. This is where my son had his accident years ago.  He had to dodge a car that forced him onto the shoulder and soft gravel which flipped him over the handlebars. He did a perfect tuck and roll, winding up on his feet with huge smile in his face. I guess those judo lessons paid off. 
      Normally we avoid residential areas but we turn into a nice one with shady old-growth trees and a few challenging hills. It’s always quiet at this hour and a nice break from what traffic there is on the main road.  Here a red fox skittles across the road in search of breakfast. I watch it disappear into the bushes for a few seconds before looking back and noticing something different this morning...very different.
     There’s a tree-lined driveway where the road takes a sharp right. I’ve often wondered how many drivers have mistaken it for a continuation of the road.  Walking dreamily down that driveway to get the Sunday paper is a vision in nothing but a black robe.  I say “robe” for lack of a better word; it’s long and covers her but it’s sheer as can be.  I wish the sun was behind her but it’s behind me which is probably better since I’m invisible to her. To make sure she can’t hear me I peddle slowly to keep the freewheel from clicking.  She strolls lazily toward the road perhaps in fond memory of last night’s passion or anticipation of what’s to come this morning.  Or...maybe she’s seen the Sunday rider and is walking out to meet him after watching him pass by all these weeks. 
     No such luck. She finally sees us, grabs the paper, and runs back home. It was a nice, though short, dream but I have other thing to consider. My inattention to the road has allowed a mailbox to jump out in front of me and, if I avoid that, I must downshift or we’ll never get up the next hill.
     Back out on the main road again past the eastern edge of Tampier Lake where the waves lap almost right up to the pavement. Speeding downhill I ask a fisherman if he’s having any luck.
He turns his head to the right to the sound of my voice but I’m already past and never hear the answer.
      Up the next hill past the First Presbyterian Church, I wonder why there’s never a Second Presbyterian or Baptist or Methodist Church.  By now my mind is void of all the quotidian thoughts that crowd it and room is made for esoterica like this.
      One more quick pass through open country including a new preserve that was saved from “progress,” we’re back into the subdivisions and heading west.  Here used to be a huge stable with horses grazing by the road. Now it’s humongous houses that, although occupied, never reveal their owners.       
     Crossing the main road we leave the McMansions and pass more normal dwellings to our south while cornfields and a few small farms blanket the north.  Not long ago corn was king on the south side of the road too,  but the new crop is houses, swing sets, and the occasional tomato plant.  This is a quiet road and relatively flat. Pedaling is easy and I greet the walkers, joggers, and fellow cyclists I see out here every week. 
     Turning north we head the six hundred feet toward the entrance to our subdivision, the first in the area on our side of the county line.  I check my mirror, make the left turn, and speed past the house like Lance Armstrong winning the Tour de France.  Well, maybe not like Lance Armstrong but at least I have the yellow shirt.  After a victory lap around the block we head back to the shed.  The Schwinn is safely put away in anticipation of next week’s adventure and I’m refreshed and ready to face the week to come.
      
    
   

Why Are They Clapping?

   Every night on the local news the talking heads give the stock market reports for the day. This is usually accompanied by a short snippet of a bunch of people standing on the balcony overlooking the exchange floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). If you’ve ever wondered just who these people are and why they’re standing there, here is the answer thanks to the good folks at investopedia.com. Yes, Virginia, there is an investopedia.
   The NYSE began having special guests ring the closing bell on a regular basis in 1995. This daily tradition is highly publicized and often done by a company. (It doesn’t say if that company pays for the privilege). Prior to 1995, ringing the bell was usually the responsibility of the exchange's floor managers. There are bells located in each of the four main sections of the NYSE that all ring at the same time once a button is pressed. The ringers press the button for approximately 10 seconds. A gavel is also used on some occasions.    
   Without fail, there is much smiling and applauding as, presumably, the honored company’s CEO presses the button that activates the bell.
   Recently, the market had had an especially bad day and the nightly report lasted longer than usual. In fact, it was the lead story. Any time the market report tops the news, the news ain’t good. As the newsreader gave the grim statistics, there were shots of traders shaking their heads staring at the boards in disbelief and a pervasive feeling of doom. Yet, up on the balcony, a beaming CEO pressed the button while an equally beaming group of his minions wildly applauded the closing of the day’s trading.
   Given the carnage on the floor below, the gaiety on the balcony seemed wildy inappropriate. Maybe those traders weren’t staring at the boards in disbelief but were staring daggers at these highly insensitive yahoos as they contemplated a future living in a cardboard box. The contrast between the two moods reflected the general feeling out in the real world as the incredibly wealthy few who control the bulk of the money stare down impassively at rest of us who wonder daily how we’ll make ends meet.
   Therein lies the question. Are these people cheerful just because it was their turn to have the honor of ringing the closing bell? Are they blissfully ignorant of damage below? Did they know what happened but were paid a bonus to pretend all was right in the financial world? Do they really care that their relentless accumulation of wealth is leading to a permanent underclass of formerly gainfully-employed, taxpaying, economy-boosting Americans?
   This inquiring mind wants to know...before it’s too late.

Dodging A Bullet, Part 1: The Jawbone Of An Ass

   When someone gets out of a sticky situation, it’s said he’s dodged a bullet. Obviously, it’s a metaphor; not many of us actually avoid a round of ammunition fired in anger or even by accident. I have, but that’s another story. While most of these figurative bullets are external, the one I’m going to tell you about was just the opposite and a sticky situation in the most literal sense of the term.
   The question of where to begin is tricky. I’d tried over the last few years to live a healthy life: no fried foods, reduced fat intake, making fresh fruit and vegetable juice every morning, hiking in the winter, and cycling in the summer. I never smoked. I’m twenty pounds lighter than I was the day I got married and in perfect health, or so I thought.
   Could it have been the result of a youth ingesting tons of fast food or the downing of thousands of gallons of RC, Coke, and Pepsi infused with high-fructose corn syrup over a span of forty years? Maybe it was an unfortunate convergence of DNA from two very healthy parents who lived into their 80's and 90's despite years of drinking, smoking, and eating red meat while never getting any regular exercise. The culprit could be the stress of trying to keep a small business afloat in these troubled times. A case could be made for just about anything.
    I’ll probably never know the cause but the result soon became obvious. For the purpose of this story I’ll begin on the eighth of June, 2011.
    That Wednesday was my first bike ride of the year. It had been a very wet spring and my day off from work had finally aligned with some good cycling weather. As I pedaled down the Illinois and Michigan Canal Trail in Willow Springs, a relatively flat course of 12 miles over two loops connected by a straightaway, I noticed an unusual pain in my jaw. I chalked it up to the stress of my first ride of the year and being out of shape. Subsequent rides, more challenging, made the pain worse. My usual Sunday morning ride has a long hill about a quarter mile from home. I’ve climbed it with ease every summer for the last thirty-four years but this year it was different. I could still make it easily but the pain began in my jaw as usual and migrated to my chest. My breathing was labored and I felt clammy but wasn’t sweating.
   I did this ride three times this summer. Each time I topped the hill I thought of tuning around, but once my pulse settled down I was able to complete the eleven-mile ride pain free even though there were some steeper hills along the way.
   During this time the pain started happening on some mornings when I wasn’t cycling. Then it happened every morning. Sometimes it was a twinge in the jaw. Other times it went to the chest with that clammy feeling and irregular heartbeats. These spells could last just minutes or go on for an hour or more. I chalked it up to the unusual heat we had in July.
   “Yeah, that’s it  Gotta be something to do with the heat and my allergies. Our central air conditioning isn’t working and we sleep in a bedroom with a window air conditioning unit. This happens only when I come out of the cold and into the heat. Yeah, gotta be it. Besides, it never happens after noon anyway. Can’t be anything serious.” Two words: yeah, right.
   I’m a volunteer with our town’s emergency management agency where we maintain a regular training schedule throughout the year. Fortunately for me, first aid was on the schedule for July. We learned how to handle everything from minor cuts and scrapes to strokes, seizures, and heart attacks. I didn’t hear anything after our instructor, a paramedic who’s seen it all, went into graphic detail on that last subject. Pain in the jaw was one of the symptoms. This ass got jawboned right upside the head.
   Deep down inside I knew exactly what was happening but it took another bike ride on a cool morning to finally get me to face the fact that this wasn’t going to go away. I’d spent years avoiding the doctor but the time had come to swallow my pride and make the call.
  
  
  

Dodging A Bullet, Part 2: Into the System

  Once I’d committed to seeing the doctor I felt a little better. At least he could let me know that it wasn’t anything serious. I saw him on Wednesday, August10. I hadn’t seen him in a while and he told me I wasn’t looking too well. So much for reassurance. He sent me out for blood work, and a stress test. Holy crap, any reassurance would have to wait until I passed those tests. I made the appointment at the lab for Friday of the following week and the stress test two days before that. I never made it to the blood test.
   The folks at the diagnostic center told me to wear gym shoes and loose clothes because I was going to be on a treadmill. Piece of cake. I thought I’d impress them with my excellent physical conditioning by wearing my skin-tight cycling shorts and showing that treadmill what I was made of.
   As soon as I arrived for the test, I was stuck with about a dozen leads hooked up to an EKG. The doctor took a base line blood pressure and off I went. It was pretty cool because I could watch the monitor as I walked. My pulse was elevated as expected but I didn’t see any wild or erratic changes in the lines on the screen. I thought I’d aced it. Each time the treadmill  got a little faster and a little steeper, the doctor took my blood pressure. 140/60 the whole way. Another reason not to be concerned.
   At the ten minute mark the treadmill was getting steeper than I was comfortable with and my brisk walk was on the brink of a trot. Then I felt the jaw pain. When I told the doctor about it he quickly stopped the test and gradually brought the treadmill to a stop. I still thought I’d passed the test as my pulse quickly returned to normal. Then he said something that made all the lines on the monitor look like a seismograph on the San Andreas fault, “Go home, get a change of clothes and get to the hospital. You’re going to have an angiogram.”
   I protested that I had a business to run, this was inconvenient, yada, yada, yada. He was adamant. What sealed the deal for me was the assistant. As she yanked the sticky pads off my chest, she looked me square in the face and said, “Don’t blow this off.” I swear she said it in my late mother’s voice.
   Except for a couple of emergency room visits I had managed to avoid hospitals since October of 1963. I sure wanted to keep that record intact but two hours later I had a hospital ID bracelet and a room in Little Company of Mary Hospital. Shortly after that I had two IV ports in my left arm, was weighed, had another EKG, and was hooked up with dozen more leads attached to my chest that connected to a wireless transponder that sat in a pocket of my gown. Then came the first of what seemed like several hundred little tubes of blood taken from my veins. I was officially in the American health care system of the 21st century.
   If there was any plus side in all this, the food was excellent: lasagne with garlic bread, salad, and ice cream. It was a far cry from that overcooked gray crap hospitals tried to pass off as food back in the sixties.
   My wife, Judy, who had driven me, stayed through dinner and drank my coffee but I told her to go home when dinner was done. There was nothing for her to do. Besides she’d have to fill in for me at the store on Friday and Saturday. She’d need her rest.
   Not long after she left, my kids started filtering in. Colleen and Kristen came first followed by Jim. Ed showed up last because he’d been all the way in Naperville. After the initial shock of seeing me all hooked up, they settled into the usual party mode that breaks out when they all get together. Fortunately, we were at the end of the hall because it got pretty loud in there. You don’t want to make a lot of noise in the cardiac ward, especially when you’re sure you don’t belong there.
   Then Ed noticed the pizza joint across 95th street as he looked out my window. They all realized they were hungry and headed over for pizza and beer as soon as visiting hours were over. Not only did they not invite me but they didn’t even bring anything back. I found out later that Colleen’s husband had called wondering where she was. She told him she was across the street from the funeral parlor. Funeral parlor? I didn’t think I looked that bad.
   They even posted a picture on Facebook of themselves enjoying their pizza. I was touched by their concern.
   Then I was left to my thoughts about what would happen the next day. What if they find something? What if they don’t? What if they have to crack my chest open? Will the store survive without me? How am I gonna pay for this? What the hell is that noise?
   What had sounded like the gentle flow of air from a cooling register over the window turned into an obnoxious roar in the silence after everyone had left. I turned off the air conditioning but the roar continued. Then I realized that the two galvanized ventilation stacks that terminated right outside my window were the culprits. These tubes, about a foot in diameter with coolie-hat tops, emitted what would make the night seem like an endless trip in one of the cheap seats behind the engines of a 747 on an all-night flight to nowhere. This, plus the thoughts pinballing through my head, the incessant beeping of the monitors at the nurses’ station down the hall, and the occasional wail of an ambulance approaching the emergency room added up to a lot of wakeful hours on a very long and lonely night. I passed it going from the TV to my books and magazines, occasionally turning everything off in a fruitless attempt at peaceful slumber. I got two hours if I was lucky.
   But wait, there’s more. When a child is born in the hospital, they play “Brahms’ Lullaby” throughout the facility. It must have been a busy night in the delivery room because I heard it over and over, but not even that could help me sleep.
   At long last, morning came and activity ramped up. Nurses came in to check this and adjust that. One came in to mark pulse spots on my feet. This would be important later. Another came in with towels, wash cloths, and some mega-antiseptic soap. She gave me explicit instructions on how to use it to wash my entire body from my chest to my shins, especially the groin area. At least I knew which of the three routes they were going to take to get to my heart. I thought the nurse was supposed to do this. I guess I need better insurance.
   My regular doctor stopped by as did the cardiologist and the doctor who was going to do the angiogram. Three of the hospital’s pastoral ministers came in to pray with me and offer communion. I took the prayers but communion was out because I was not allowed to eat. The saline IV was to be my only sustenance until the procedure was over.
   The last pastoral minister introduced himself as Brother Brian. After some small talk I asked him what order he belonged to. He was in street clothes and it was hard to tell. He told me he was Precious Blood which is the same order of priests that taught me in college. He said his brother had studied at the same college, starting the year after I graduated. We had much to discuss because he knew many of the same priests I did.
   That would have to wait, however. The activity ramped up even more as the hour drew near. It was after lunch, I was starving and just wanted to get it done no matter the outcome. Before long I was on a gurney headed for my destiny somewhere in the bowels of the hospital.
  
  

 

Dodging A Bullet, Part 3: I’ve Never Even Been To Brazil

   After a short trip in the down elevator and several turns on some labyrinthine lower floor, we entered the Cardiac Catheter Lab. I wasn’t allowed to raise my head so my view of it was pretty much what the ceiling had to offer. Peripherally, I could see a control room behind big sheets of glass and a wall lined with shrink-wrapped packages of different lengths of tubes or cables. It looked like the do it yourself section of a sterile car parts store.
   They don’t mess around in there; time is money, I guess. After “skootching” (must be a medical term) from the gurney to the table where the job was going to be done, my arm was tucked into an automatic blood pressure cuff that periodically squeezed my upper arm like it was trying to get juice out of it. Leads were hooked up to my chest. They gave me something to relax.
   There are three ways to do this procedure: through the arm, the leg, or the groin. I already knew they were using the third option. The male scrub nurse told me he was going to cover my “middle” and start shaving. In my drugged and sleepless state it took a few seconds to realize what he meant by “middle.” Immediately to the left of the table was a bank of monitors and he was working to my right. I assumed the doctor would be working there, too, and that’s where the nurse started shaving. My dilemma of the moment was, do I let it stay lopsided and wait for it to grow back or finish the job when I got home. Then he did the other side too. Was he giving me a “Brazilian?” 
   That was the last I felt in that area as they injected something to numb it. Seconds later, the procedure began.
   I mostly stared at the ceiling as the room went from bright to dark to dim to yellow and I don’t know how many other colors. A white box hovered over my chest, moving from left to right as they looked at my heart from different angles. Occasionally, they told me to turn my head left or right. Otherwise it was like I wasn’t there. They didn’t even warn me of the burst of intense heat injecting the dye would cause. It felt for a few seconds like the sun was inside my body.
   The day before, the cardiologist told me that it could be something or it could be nothing. Up to this point there was nothing to indicate anything. Not much was said because this team appeared to have worked together a lot. I heard a few things I understood amid all the medical jargon. Then I heard, “Ho-lee shit ”
   Holy shit? I don’t know a whole lot of doctor talk but I didn’t think “holy shit” was part of the lexicon.
   “Jim,” the doctor said, “you have a 90% blockage in your proximal circumflex.”
   Holy shit indeed. On further review it would later be upgraded to 95%. Hoooo-leeee shit  There was a heretofore nameless, at least to me, blood vessel in my own body threatening to do me in.
   Then they did an angioplasty using a balloon that they inflate to press the blockage into the arterial wall. When they did that I told the doc that I was feeling the jaw pain.
   “Good,” he said, “that’s how we know we got it.”
   They put in a stent to keep the artery open and that was that. I never felt the jaw pain again and never hope to, now that I know what it means.
   And just that quickly it was over. At least the surgical part of it was. The scrub nurse put some gauze on the spot where they’d put in the dye and the stent and put all his force down on it to hold it for at least fifteen minutes. It’s basic first aid. Use pressure to stop the bleeding, just like they’d taught us in that first aid class. While he was doing that he showed me a replay of the procedure. The circumflex artery, as its name implies to those of us who suffered through four years of high school Latin, circles the heart. My blockage was half an inch long. It was fascinating to see how they opened the artery to let the dye, and the life-giving blood, go through freely.
   Finally, the bleeding at the incision site stopped and it was time to leave. On the way out, one of the nurses said I was probably two days away from coming in by ambulance, “if I was lucky.” At that moment I considered myself very lucky.
   In two days it was supposed to be my turn to move the trailer generator from our EMA station to the local farmers market. It provides electricity to keep the dairy products refrigerated. The trailer has to be manhandled from the wall where we park it and moved to the center of the garage so we can hook it up to our SUV. It’s easy to move but takes a little muscle to get it going. Who knows what would have happened had I tried it. There’s no one around at 6 a.m. on a Saturday morning and I’d have been in serious trouble had something happened.
   I’d hung ten on the brink of my mortality. By the grace of God I was able to step back. I had truly dodged a bullet.
  

  
 

Dodging A Bullet, Part 4: Irritation Chamber Unlimited

   Back in the hallway I was informed that I wasn’t going back to my room. My next stop was the ICU. Cool  I wouldn’t have to listen to those vents from hell all night or the occasional wail of a siren. As it turned out, that would have been an improvement over the night that was to come.
   For the first four hours I was not allowed to move because they didn’t want anything to happen to the femoral artery where they had made the incision. I didn’t either. I’m not the kind of person who can sit still for any length of time, but possibly bleeding to death via a torn artery was the only other option. Lying motionless until 6:30 pm it would be. It was OK to move my head and arms, so I could see the TV and use the remote to adjust the channels. The hospital TV system didn’t offer many channels but at least they had USA so I settled in to watch reruns of NCIS, a decent alternative to the mind-numbing crap that passes for daytime entertainment.
   Settling in lasted under a minute before what would become an incessant parade of nurses, aides, technicians, phlebotomists, and seemingly every employee on duty as they stopped by to poke, prod, test, check, and inspect.
   They had to check the incision. It was covered by a three-inch diameter dressing stuck on with some kind of industrial adhesive tape. It wasn’t going anywhere. They had to check my blood pressure. They had to pull the blanket off my feet to check my pulse where the nurses had put the X’s the night before. If the pulse in the foot of the leg where the incision was didn’t beat as strong as the pulse in the other, we’d be going into surgery pronto because that meant there was bleeding from the artery. They had to check my oxygen sensor and draw blood. Basically, they didn’t leave me alone.
   One nurse kept insisting I go pee. I told her I didn’t have to. It had been over twenty hours since food or drink had passed my lips. There was nothing there. Then she accused me of being embarrassed and holding it.
    “For Chrissake,” I said, “if you want to look at it, help yourself. You can even touch it. I can’t stop you. Nothing’s gonna come out. It’s freakin’ empty.”
   She left me alone after that. Maybe word of the Brazilian had spread through the facility and she just wanted to have a look.
   On the plus side, the staff couldn’t have been nicer when I clamored for food. If I could move my hands, I could feed myself. One nurse scrounged up a can of pop and some cups of fruit and pudding. Another put together a turkey sandwich. Granted, it was sliced turkey on plain wheat bread but it tasted like warm, freshly-carved white meat straight from the breast. By the time the afternoon shift left for the night, my tray was covered with all kinds of goodies. I ate til I thought I’d explode and still there was more. I finished every morsel by morning. God bless those nurses.
   Judy was there almost as soon as I arrived but couldn’t stay long. She had to go back to work because that bastard she works for wouldn’t give her a lot of time off. She came back after the store closed. In the meantime, the deacon from our church stopped by to offer some prayers.  I never did get to see much of NCIS.
   When Judy came back it was getting close to 6:30 and time to get off my back. The nurse kept me waiting until 6:34 by the time she came in and another few minutes to make sure everything was fine. I had been flat on my back for a more than six hours. Getting on my feet was liberation.
   Colleen and Kristen brought Courtney, my only grandchild old enough to visit the hospital. She was having fun making the bed go up and down while I enjoyed the luxury of sitting in a chair. It gets loud when my wife and daughters are together and by 8 pm when visiting hours were over, I’d had it. I sent them packing in the hope of getting a good night’s sleep.
   By now the visits to feel me up were coming regularly at the top of the odd hours, the next one due at 9 p.m. My plan was to get through that one and see what sleep I could get before the next one. Not much as it turned out. Ten p.m. brought a blood draw taken by a woman with a very thick accent.
   “I have come for some bluuuhd.”  The way she said it had me wide awake.
   “Where are you from,” I asked.
   “R-r-r-r-o-mah-nya. You have pr-r-roblem with someone from R-r-r-r-o-mah-nya ahsking for your-r-r bluuhd?”
   “Let me see you smile.” When I didn’t see any fangs, I told her to proceed as if I had options. That left a bruise on my left hand.
   If the night nurse made her first visit at eleven, I never knew it. Her one a.m. visit woke me up enough to feel her cold hands on my warm feet and see her checking the oxygen sensor on my index finger. I wish it had been on my middle finger because that red light would have really made a statement I so needed to make. No nurses woke me up at 2 a.m., not in my room anyway.     In my foggy mind I heard the sound of a party at the nurse’s station. There were males and females yukking it up like they were in some seedy south side bar. One woman’s braying laugh made those sirens from the night before sound like a symphony. My curtain was drawn and I was attached to a monitor so I couldn’t get up to see who it was. The night nurse swore it wasn’t her at my 3 a.m. feeling up. She promised to keep everyone quiet and closed my door.   
   At five a.m. the bright room light coming on woke me up again. Coming around the curtain I saw a short woman with what appeared to be a black veil on her head, a white apron from her neck to her toes, and a black cloak over that. I thought it was a nun. When my vision cleared, I could see it was a dark-haired woman in a yellow hospital gown. She was there to take more blood and leave a nasty bruise in my right hand. I asked her to please not take it all. I needed for the trip home. If there was a five a.m. feeling up, I didn’t notice.
   There was one last feeling up at 7 a.m. when the day shift came on. I thanked the night nurse for spending the night with me and that was it. The regular visits stopped and I was left alone with my thoughts until the doctor came to set me free.
  
   

  
  
  
  

 

Dodging A Bullet, Part 5: Deliverance

   Except for serving a delightful breakfast of French toast and turkey sausage at 8 a.m., the day shift was pretty much hands off. There were other patients coming in and they needed a lot more help than I did. The only time they paid attention to me was shortly after breakfast when the transponder which sent my vitals by radio to the nurse’s station stopped working. Just as the nurse came in to fix it, the aide at the station yelled, “Fourteen is flatline   ”
   I could see her from my bed and yelled back, “Fourteen is still alive.” I didn’t want the crash team flying into my room.
   The nurse told me she always looks at the patient first before believing the monitors. That's a good policy. A breathing patient trumps dead electronics every time.
   That was only excitement for the rest of the morning. As I sat waiting for the doctor, the events of the last days settled in. Everything had been lost in the whirlwind of going for a simple stress test, winding up in the hospital, having the blockage found, and walking away from the brink of death. Add to that the futility of trying to convalesce while not being allowed to. It turned me into an emotional wreck.
   I found myself laughing hysterically at the absurdity of the night before and crying uncontrollably that I might not have lived to see it. The TV brought no relief, nor did my books so I lay in my bed composing these words in my head. Writing, even mentally, is cathartic to me.
   Later in the morning, Brother Brian stopped by to offer communion and prayers of thanks. I accepted both gratefully. I asked if he was on any kind of schedule. When he said he wasn’t, I told him to shut the door and draw the curtain. We continued our conversation of the day before, discussing a wide range of subjects including the priests we both knew and our love of bicycling. It was a joy to talk to someone who just wanted to talk. When I told him about my emotional state, he told me I should write it all down. So you, gentle reader, have him to thank...or blame.
   At long last, my cardiologist came in. Never in my life did I ever think I’d have a cardiologist but fate proved me wrong once again. He gave me the all-clear go home but there was still paperwork to process and other stuff to do. I got rid of the hospital gown, got into my street clothes, and sat on my bed to wait.
   It’s a good thing they took their sweet time with the dismissal process. Lunchtime brought a baked cod that tasted more of butter than fish. “This can’t be mine,” I thought, but the menu bore my name and it indicated that it was a cardiology patient’s meal. My compliments to LCM’s food service.
   It seemed an excruciatingly long time but the porter finally came and I was wheeled out into the bright, beautiful sunshine and air that smelled of life and not antiseptics. Our old Impala never looked so good, Judy never looked so beautiful, and even 95th Street seemed to present an aura of cheerfulness that wasn’t there two days before. It might have been the drugs, lack of sleep, or diminished quantity of blood in my body. Or it could have been the knowledge that I might not have lived to see this day. I felt like I’d been born again. Everything was fresh and beautiful.
   It was too far for Judy to take me home and go back to the store so the plan was to go to work with her and leave when she did. My car was in the parking lot but I was under strict orders not to drive. Any sudden movement in my right leg could cause that artery to let go. I didn’t want to bleed to death in my car.
   I sat at my desk attempting to do the two day’s worth of Sun-Times crossword puzzles I’d missed but it was hard to concentrate. Instead I looked at Facebook and all the nice things people had written when Colleen posted what had happened. Words cannot express my gratitude for all the prayers and good thoughts that came in from around the world. There were even more when I posted my own message. It good to have friends, especially in times of trouble.
   Speaking of Colleen, she was in the neighborhood and stopped by to drive me home. The old saying that there’s no place like home seems trite until you realize that you might never have seen home again. There’s also nothing like your own your own shower. That’s where I painfully pulled off the last ten EKG leads and removed all that sticky crap from my chest and sides. That’s also where I found out definitely that it was a Brazilian. And finally, there’s absolutely no place like your own bed, especially when there are no smokestacks, sirens, beeping monitors, or people touching you all night, unless you want them to.
  
  

Dodging a Bullet, Part 6: The Beat Goes On

   I slept nine solid, uninterrupted hours that first night back home. As the first day of my new life began I was a mass of bruises from IV’s, injections, blood draws, and incisions but at least I wasn’t a stitched-up cadaver in some morgue. The bullet had been dodged, indeed. Avoiding another bullet was up to me. There was a new medicine regime to get used to and dietary rules to self-impose. Other arteries are partially blocked. Keeping them from getting worse is a top priority.
   The hardest thing to get used to was not being allowed to do things for myself. My son Ed came over to put the air conditioner in my office window and help clean the pool filter. Both required physical exertions I wasn’t cleared for. My neighbor Dan was kind enough to cut my grass. For the first time in a long while I actually took it easy. I work almost every Saturday. This was highly unusual--my second, and most likely last, Saturday off for the year.
   Sunday brought a trip to Mass and greetings from people who were glad to see me back while those who didn’t know were shocked at what had happened. My name was mentioned in the prayers for the sick. I was just glad to be there standing and sitting instead of lying in a box listening to muffled prayers and the occasional spatter of holy water.
   That afternoon was a big family gathering celebrating the fact that I was here to share in the party. We celebrate everything and this was a big one. It was treat to be waited on and not have to grill.
   Back to work on Monday. The doctor wasn’t happy about it but he knows what it’s like to be self-employed. I promised not do to anything strenuous and to make every attempt to keep the stress level down. Avoiding heavy lifting is easy but, in this economy, stress comes with the territory.
   As the beat went on I was able to cut the grass and go back to see my friends at EMA and at Hamfesters Radio Club. Once again, it was good to be standing and talking to everyone.
   Two weeks after leaving the hospital, the last of the bruises was gone.
   Finally, four weeks to the day and almost to the hour after the blockage was gone, I made a follow-up visit to the doctor. All is well and I have the go-ahead to resume normal activities. Yes! Time to get the cobwebs off the bikes. I’m back, baby!
   So what did I learn from this experience? In addition to finding out that there is a circumflex artery and its blockage can be deadly I learned that:
   An unusual pain in the jaw is nothing to play with. I will drop everything and head to the emergency room if I ever feel it again.
   The order not to lift anything heavy does not necessarily have anything to do with going to the bathroom.
   My wife likes Brazilians.
   People really do care. The comments on Facebook, the phone calls, the cards, and the face-to-face greetings really do help make the healing go faster. Thanks to everyone from the bottom of my heart. Actually, it’s from the middle where the circumflex is but you get the idea.

   So that’s it. Thanks for taking the time to slog through all this. It’s been a real catharsis putting all these thoughts out here for you to see. The beat goes on, however, and it’s time to get back to my normal self, pointing out the idiocy and complaining about the stupidity that runs rampant in our world.
  

So Why Is My Grass Still Brown?

Until July 22 of this year our area was under a major heat wave. The week prior to that date was especially brutal with daytime highs averaging in the upper 90's with the 20th and 21st both topping 100 degrees. The heat index hovered between 105 and 110. We were headed to the hottest, driest July on record.

It was so hot and dry my heat-loving tomato plants were wilting and the normally omnipresent mosquitoes were nowhere to be found. We couldn't even get relief in our pool (see previous post). It was as warm as bathwater.

On the plus side, I hadn't needed to cut the grass in ten days. Usually, I have to cut it twice a week just to keep up.

 Then came July 22 and .53 inches of rain, a welcome relief to be sure. That was followed by thunderstorms bringing 1.5 inches the next day and 2.99 inches the day after that. That was just in my rain gauge--yeah, I'm a weather geek--many places got more and had to deal with serious flooding. On Tuesday evening I fired up the lawn mower just to even up the few blades of green grass that were growing with all the brown ones that weren't.

Last night and into this morning we got another round of storms that dropped .9 inches and counting. Some places up toward Wisconsin got close to ten times that. So instead of this being the driest July on record, now we've set a record for the wettest July ever. There's rain predicted for the next two days, too.

So why is my grass still brown?

Increases Means Raises, Right?

   It’s hotter than hell today so I spent some time in the pool. Yeah, I live in northern Illinois and have a backyard pool even though the swimming season runs from Memorial Day to Labor Day... if we’re lucky. Unlike most people I don’t get a summer vacation and I work every weekend. Even a short getaway to the beach is out of the question. That’s why I have a pool.
   In checking the chemistry with a little test strip that comes with all the chemicals crystal water requires, I found the chlorine level was low. It didn’t take a test strip to figure that out. The heat and sun remove chlorine from the water faster than a CEO lays off a thousand employees and takes a ten million dollar bonus. The water was as murky as what goes on in Washington. The strip also told me that the pH was very low. That leads to high chlorine use.
   So I reached for the bottle of pH Rise. This is a powder that you mix in a bucket with water and pour the resulting slurry into the pool to raise the pH level. Makes perfect sense, huh? I thought so too until I took a closer look the bottle.
   The product is called pH Rise but I guess that’s not clear enough for some people. Right below the name it says, “to increase the pH of swimming pool water.” On the back of the bottle it says, “this product is meant to increase the pH of swimming pool water.” Now here’s the kicker. Even though that statement is crystal clear as chlorinated water, in parentheses it says. “causes it to go up.” When did we become so ignorant that we have to be told three times that something called pH Rise is designed to raise the pH level. Thankfully, they didn’t go into an explanation of just what pH is.
   Maybe anyone who has to be reminded that “increases” means raises shouldn’t be adding chemicals to water, or anything else.
  

Freedom 7 Fiftieth Anniversary

   May 5, 2011. To most people the day will pass without much notice unless they’re of Mexican heritage. Cinco de Mayo is a big deal to them. The fifth of May should be a big deal to Americans, too, but most of us are too young to remember and a lot of us who were around then have forgotten.
   It had been only three and a half years since the Russians surprised us by putting the first man-made satellite, Sputnik, in space. On April 12, 1961, they did it again by sending the first human, Yuri Gagarin, into orbit.
   On May 5 it was our turn. More specifically, it was Alan B. Shepard’s turn. We, as fellow Americans, were riding along vicariously. The Russians’ rocket launches occurred in extreme secrecy and were announced to the world only if successful. Our attempt would be broadcast on live television and radio. Shepard, strapped into a space capsule he named Freedom 7, which would be launched atop a Redstone rocket, would succeed or fail in front of the whole world. America’s nascent space program was riding on this mission.
   To this seventh-grader at St. Sabina School on the South Side of Chicago, Room 32 was Mission Control on that sunny, warm Spring morning. The only difference was that half the room was full of girls and there was a nun. The boys looked like anyone in the control room: crew cuts or flat tops, white shirts, dark pants, dark ties. Some of us even had pocket protectors. For years we’d watched Sunday morning reruns of Flash Gordon movies and Buck Rogers TV shows. This was the real deal.
   We didn’t have a TV but the principal announced that she would begin playing the radio coverage over the PA and reminded us to remember the day for the rest of our lives. She also requested (in Catholic school any request from a nun was considered an order) that prayers be offered for the safe journey of our astronaut.
   Then the countdown crackled through the wooden box above the blackboard. “Ten...nine...eight”. With every second, the tension mounted. “Four...three...two”. Our collective breath was held. “One...zero...ignition...” And, after what seemed an eternity, “liftoff.”
   For the next 15 minutes and 22 seconds we listened to snippets of conversation between Shepard and Mission Control, hanging on every word but not really understanding much of it. Our room, indeed the whole school, was never as quiet as during those few minutes.
   Then, splashdown in the Atlantic. When Shepard announced that he was safely back on Earth, the school erupted. Girls cried and hugged, boys shook hands and slapped backs. Finally, Sister got everyone calmed down and had us sing a hymn written hundreds of years before but nonetheless perfect for a day when someone would slip the surly bonds of Mother Earth and safely return. I never forgot it.

Now thank we all our God with heart and hands and voices,
Whom wondrous things has done, in whom this world rejoices.
Who from our mother’s arms has sent us on our way
With countless acts of love and still in ours today.

   In the ensuing years we’ve watched as Americans walked on the moon, Lt. Colonel Shepard among them. We’ve seen the triumphs and tragedies of the shuttle program. I have had the privilege of witnessing two shuttle launches in person. But nothing compares to that first time we went into space on that sunny Spring morning fifty years ago.
  
         

A Day Off

   I woke up late this morning. It was so late the other half was already up and dressed. That rarely happens; she's not a morning person. That gave me pause. I knew I'd been doing a lot lately but didn't realize just how tired I was until this morning. I decided then and there to take the day off.
   There were magazines to be read, lots of loafing to do, and a book to finish, all good things to do on a crummy April day. Looking out at the leaden sky started me thinking--always a dangerous thing. Last April was much warmer and drier. What was the difference this year? Then it hit me. I had promised myself to do a project this winter. Now, four weeks into the Spring that isn't, I had not given a thought to that winter project. My unkept promise had kept the winter going. I was the reason for the lousy weather.
   Back in September I moved my table saw, bench grinder, and drill press out of my small basement workshop and into the garage. That room was way too small for any job of size and the effluvia from those power tools was choking in such a small space. I put the saw and grinder on a movable table which I roll to the open garage door when I use it and all the dust goes outside.
   That left a lot of space in the basement shop. Unfortunately, that space was in the form of an empty workbench. Like any horizontal surface on the planet, it began to collect stuff and the space became less usable than it had been with the tools on it. (Disclosure:  All that stuff on the bench was what I'd moved out of the garage to make room for the power tools.) My promise was to organize all that stuff which was mostly hardware of every size and description. Screws, nuts, bolts, clamps, drill bits, and countless other small items littered every corner of that room as did sawdust collected from years of projects. Also on the bench was the compartmented container I was going to organize all the small parts in.
   So, this evening after the wife came come from work and made me a nice pasta dinner (yep, she has sisters and they're available), I got a burst of energy and went downstairs to keep my promise. I never got to the organization project but, after two hours, I now have a clean space in which to do it. Stuff was ruthlessly thrown out or recycled and all those small parts are in containers from which they'll be assorted into containers with their kin.
   Spring should start any day now.

Corporate Giants versus Mom and Pop

I normally don't write newspaper columnists but Neil Steinberg's column in the the Sun-Times of Monday February 14, 2011, got my attention. He wrote about the difficulty of a mom and pop business trying to keep its head above water in a era of mega-retailers. Being in the same boat, I had to respond. 

 Dear Neil,

   I read your column regularly but today's forced me to sit down and write you.
   Like Holly Sjo of Cupcake Counter I'm "concerned" about the encroachment of giant, soulless conglomerates who snuff out the dreams of small business people like them, and myself. You absolutely do get "a little heartbroken." Actually, a lot heartbroken. They've been at it two years. We've been doing it almost seventy-four. It doesn't get any easier.
   You could probably spend the rest of your career writing about the plight of mom and pop businesses making a stand against the relentless force of giant mega-retailers with their economies of scale, fancy logos, and huge advertising budgets--if they last that long. Unless something changes, and quickly, small retail business in this country is doomed.
   At some time in a dismal future, I see Walmart as the only retail outlet of any consumer commodity. Gone will be the days of visiting a store and dealing with the same person again and again. You won't get to know anyone in that store and they won't care about you any further than what it takes to sell you something and get you out of their hair. You'll know their name only because it's laminated on a plastic tag hanging on a lanyard or pinned to their apron. They won't make an attempt to learn yours. Personal, caring service will be a thing of the past. Doing something for the love of it and making a living at the same time will be long gone. Making a buck will be the only reason to go to work.
   Until that day comes, we'll be here in our little stores, ready to help our customers any way we can. They'll know us even though we don't wear fancy name tags. We'll know their faces, greet them personally, and even start getting their orders ready when they walk in the door. That's customer service, a rapidly dying art.

 

Catholics, Come Home

   Our local archdiocese has been running a series of beautiful, moving commercials attempting to get fallen-away Catholics to return to their faith. These spots run one to two minutes and would make even the most hard-core lost sheep consider coming back. If they’d preached in the past the message of love and forgiveness they’re presenting now, maybe they wouldn’t have to call for Catholics to come home.  
   But that’s not the problem for me. As anyone of a certain age who went to Catholic school knows, the nuns, priests, and brothers were sticklers for grammar and punctuation. An error in either of these areas would get the errant student a rap across the knuckles or any convenient body part with a wooden pointer, steel ruler, leather strap, or other instrument of torture. 
   In my own experience the worst was Brother Collins, my junior-year English teacher at Leo High School. His weapon of choice was a leg from a broken stool. The student would read a sentence with no capitalization or punctuation while standing next to the good Brother. The student would make corrections as he went. Brother Collins stood ready to reward a wrongly-placed comma, missed capital, or errant quotation mark with a swift shot just above the knee. Make another mistake and he struck a little higher. Those of us who were taught this way strive for perfection in our writing under a threat of swift retribution, permanently etched in our cerebral cortex, by teachers like Brother Collins and his ilk. 
   Let’s face it. They turned us into grammatical sticklers. Our eyes are immediately drawn to a misspelling in the text of one of those tiny disclaimers that flash for two seconds at the end of a car ad on TV. We cringe when we see a sign that says “Kitty’s for sale” on the side of the road. We actually pull over to determine if they’re selling kittens or trying to get rid of their daughter, Kitty.
   Therein lies the problem with the Catholics Come Home campaign. Anyone taught the way we were would catch it right away and fear being struck blind by seeing such a linguistic travesty. It’s the bane of sticklers.
   Catholics Come Home is direct address and requires a comma. Otherwise it’s merely a statement of fact. For example, “boys run” isn’t the same call to action as “boys, run.” Catholics, Come Home says, “We want you back.” Hard to tell what it means without the comma.
    Any stickler not “comma-tose” from the error of the ad campaign would be stopped dead by the sign outside our church door as they try to return. It reads, “Welcome Home Catholics.” Without the comma it sounds like the name of a Christian Band. This weekend at all Masses: The Welcome Home Catholics. Welcome Home, Catholics would keep the leather strap in its sheath.
   As one who’s seen the declining attendance at Sunday Mass I hope this campaign is a success of biblical proportions. Maybe it would do better with proper punctuation,.
  

Packer Backer? No Way!

I recently received this forward from a friend:

Every Red Blooded American should now jump in line to support the Green Bay Packers!

 

The Packers defeated the Chicago Bears last Sunday thus earning them the opportunity to go to the Super Bowl. By doing so, they saved the Hard-Working, Red Blooded, Taxpaying Americans literally several million dollars of tax money.

 

How you say?

 

Simple. 

 

We were told that if the Chicago Bears had won that Chairman Obama (and probably his family) would be attending the Super Bowl to cheer on his hometown team. Since the Bears lost, the Chairman won't be attending. The money saved from not using Air Force One, the limousines, all the additional security, and let's not forget Michelle Obama's extensive entourage, is literally several million dollars! 

 

Therefore every American should cheer on the Green Bay Packers at the Super Bowl to show them our gratitude. 

 

Back the Packers? No Way!! I'm not gay.

BTW, I looked it up. No sitting President has ever attended a Super Bowl! I didn't know that either.

Round 1

This will be my first, and maybe my last, foray into the world of blogging. Some of what you'll read will come from the journal I've been keeping since 1977. The rest will come from the daily occurrences that make up the three-ring circus that is my life. In keeping with the title, it will be broken into three categories:

Rants: stuff that ticks me off. There will be lots of these. I work with the public every day.

Raves: stuff that really impresses me. Other than my grandchildren and my wife's cooking, these will be few and far between.

Random thoughts:  stuff that doesn't fit into the above categories.

There will be no indication as to which category each post fall into. I'll leave it up to you to decide. So feel free to check back often, or not at all.  I'm doing this for my personal amusement anyway. 

Siochana