No Country for Old Men, continued

By Fred Owens

A quick survey of my pals around the country -- from email contacts, phone calls and Facebook posts -- showed variations of Old, Weak, Tired and Scared, not to mention Poor and Lonely.

I am making this sound much worse than it is, but here goes:

Al K. in South Texas fell and broke his hip. He's stuck in the Rehabilitation Center for now. His wife said he got a four-hour furlough to come home on Christmas Day in a wheel chair. That was five days ago, he might be better now.

Stuart in LaConner seems to be recovering nicely from back surgery. He is out walking and playing golf and he sounded cheerful on the phone.

Marc Zappa has COPD. We have no new report here, but he struggles to walk the dog and climb the stairs. I told him we need to discuss the Grateful Dead in our next phone call. Zappa is a major Dead Head. He has every tape ever imagined of any possible Dead Show.

Bruce does nine hours every week at the kidney dialysis center in Santa Barbara. He says if you have two kidneys and you are under the age of forty, might he borrow one. Bruce continues to be in good spirits.

Jim, also in Santa Barbara, will find out if his prostate cancer has spread. He said it might be terminal.

Amy, back in LaConner, has a tumor in the back of her eye. Her husband told me it is too dangerous to perform  a biopsy in that location so they don't know what will happen. Hopefully nothing.

Mark in the Hollywood Hills has multiple myeloma. I have to look that up and learn what that is, otherwise his wife, who is a retired nurse, can fill me in.

So I heard from all these people and I wasn't even looking for bad news. You're supposed to not let it get you down. You're supposed to not feel Old, Weak, Tired, Poor, Scared or Lonely. But you do sometimes.

Enough of That. This is part of a series temporarily called No Country for Old Men, a title borrowed from Cormac McCarthy without his permission. The topic is Medical Education. The method  is to be lucid and matter-of-fact. These things just happen. I got the idea years ago from Roger Geffen, a retired Episcopalian priest who lived in Newton, Massachusetts, and raised twenty species of bamboo that could grow in the harsh climate of New England. Roger's left arm just hung there from a stroke. He pointed to it with his good right hand and he said. "My left arm doesn't work anymore." He spoke the truth. Truth is good. Truth is beauty. So in reporting on this topic I will lay it out as plainly as possible. I will write the truth as I am able.

Health Care Issues. Will millions of aging Baby Boomers use up every available health care asset in the country? That is a good question because the tidal wave is coming soon. I am on the cusp of the Baby Boom, born in 1946, so I have seen this crowd following me through life, and we are now facing the infirmities of old age. One partial solution to this problem is for us to make a lot of effort to take care of each other, and to depend less on the younger folks to look after us.

There aren't enough Filipino nurses to go around. The young Latino immigrants who would take nursing aide positions are being blocked at the border. Oh, we will get through this all right, and we'll do that by helping each other. If you have one good arm like Roger Geffen you can use that one good arm to wipe the fevered brow of a man with no good arms.

Gee, that's kind of serious stuff. I think we will go watch a movie tonight -- something funny and entertaining, like the Green Book with Vigo -- how do you spell his name? and the other actor -- how do you spell his name? Why don't they have Clark Gable and Henry Fonda anymore? They were good actors and it was easy to spell their names.

Twenty Years. Frog Hospital is celebrating 20 years of publication in 2019. Over 700 issues and some of them were pretty good. Our Credo has always been tell the truth and don't waste people's time -- meaning keep it interesting. We have done that. And we plan to keep going. Our motto is Onward!

Happy New Year,

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Hark, the Herald Angels Sing

Hark, the Herald Angels Sing

By Fred Owens

The lyrics were written by Charley Wesley, the melody was composed by Felix Mendelssohn. It is one of my favorite Christmas carols, mainly because you get to say Hark!  ..... Hark! is a word rarely used in conversation or written prose. Like Hark! the postman cometh. Or Hark! the dishes are done so we can sit on the couch and watch TV. Now we only get to sing Hark! once a year.

Christmas at our House

I suggested to Laurie  for Christmas this year let's not go any place or spend any money. She agreed to that plan. We, mainly her, made cookies last week, one batch of walnut puffs and one batch of rosemary shortbread. The rosemary shortbread cookies take finely chopped rosemary from the bush right out the back door and the rosemary just adds a hint of flavor. Quite delicious. We, jointly, went to Home Depot and spent 49 dollars on a five-foot noble fir, chosen for its shape -- not being too wide, to fit in the central place between the kitchen, dining room and living room. It is a prominent position for the tree, but also a high-traffic area. We decorated the tree with ornaments stored in the garage, many ornaments having a story from Laurie's folks. Laurie spread out figurines and Christmas knick-knacks around the house, with garlands and lights. Once again we could not fix the light on the angel that goes on top of the tree, but up the angel flies and she is beautiful.

This Friday we are going to Ann's house for an evening party. She is from Switzerland and she is famous for her chocolate mousse. Her cookies are outrageous and enormously complicated and made just so, she being Swiss. I keep a low-level of enthusiasm for her treats however and especially avoid comparisons about these things. Just saying "oh, how tasty!"

Laurie's two daughters will be home. Mariah lives in a cabin in the backyard, Shannon just moved back from a year in Hawaii. Shannon is going to nursing school in Santa Cruz in January. I am convinced she will make an excellent nurse. Shannon and Mariah are both tall. Laurie is tall. Laurie's four brothers are tall. It runs in the family. They are all good-looking, smart and kind.

I saw my son Eugene this Friday. We ate lunch at a cafe in his east Los Angeles neighborhood. We had a warm conversation and I will see him again in the off-week again between Christmas and New Years. Eva, my daughter, has a lovely home with her wife Lara in Seattle, which is a fine place to live but too far away. Their child is Finnegan, a boy 18 months old now and about to be joined by a new child, a new grand child for Laurie and me, expected to arrive in mid-August. This is very joyful news.

For Christmas music I play the piano. I can play O Come Little Children, which was my mother's favorite and has only three chords. Otherwise we play Ann Murray on Pandora. Sometimes we play Dean Martin or Perry Como. Sometimes Brenda Lee, Connie Francis or Elvis. Sometimes Mahalia Jackson.

Decisions. Jerry Barajas was my barber. He worked at the Mesa Barber Shop until he left last month to a new shop that is not so conveniently located. I called him and told him I would get my next haircut at his new place. But not today, today I have a 10:30 appointment at the Mesa Barber Shop with some guy I don't know. The Mesa Barber Shop is so handy. The used book shop is right next door. And after  I cruise the used book shop, then I walk across the street to the Mesa Cafe for the noon meeting of the Kiwanis Club. And Jerry was my barber. It was all perfect. A man needs a good barber to feel right. And I'm superstitious --- I don't let people touch my hair unless I trust them. I trust Jerry, but now what do I do? Stay with the shop -- and the barbers there are all pretty good  -- or go with Jerry?

Silence. Laurie and I were having morning coffee and reading the newspaper. I said to her I'm not going to say anything until I say something that you haven't heard me say before. She said fine. Long silence while I tried to think of something to tell her that's new. Okay, I got one, I told her. I don't think they should shut down the government. We have the government because we need it, you know, libraries and cops and things. Laurie agreed. Another long silence. OK, here's another one I haven't said before. I'm going to buy new boxer trunks at Macy's and get them after New years when things are quiet......You're not going to Sears? she said. Everything is marked down at Sears.....Yeah, because they're going out of business. It's too chaotic. What if I want to return the boxer trunks and the store is closed. I'm going to Macy's.

Another long silence, but a pleasant, almost happy silence. You know, thinking of new things to say is good.

Merry Christmas to all of you,

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

No Country for Old Men

By Fred Owens

Three Stories about Health Care

Everybody calls him Zappa because that's who he looks like, but his name is Marc Daniel. He lives in Mount Vernon in the Skagit Valley. I have known him more than 35 years since we used to work in the flower fields picking daffodils for the Lefeber Bulb Company. We weren't really friends at that time because of his cocaine and Wild Turkey habit and he talked way too loud and too fast. But he overcame the drugs and we became friends although he still talks too loud and too fast.

I called him last week and he told me about the severe pain in his neck, which he got from a car accident more than a year ago. "Sometimes it hurts so bad that I forget about the COPD. But I get winded very easily these days like climbing stairs." Does he still smoke? I don't ask questions like that. He went on to complain about the doctor who treats him for Hep C, or hepatitis C. "I had to wait one hour for his appointment. Every time I go there I have to wait one hour. My primary care doctor told me don't bother getting mad because that doctor is always late for everybody. Anyway, I only need to go back in 12 weeks for a followup. So the Hep C is under control, for now."


I have only known Bruce Byers a few years, from the Santa Barbara Kiwanis Club. He was a naval chaplain, twenty years in the Reserves and several years on active duty. Bruce gave me a full record of his naval service, onboard ship during Desert Storm and two years at a naval base in Japan. The thing about being a chaplain is that you don't get to preach your own brand of religion, but you need to serve everyone who walks in the door who wants to talk, or who wants to listen, or who wants to jump overboard -- the chaplain probably has a mandate to resist that last request..... These are important details -- I need to take notes.

Today is Saturday. For Bruce that means he goes to the kidney dialysis center for a three-hour session in the chair. Every Saturday, Tuesday, and Thursday he goes for three hours. He brings his smart phone, his laptop and maybe a book. You can call him. You can be sure he's going to be there. I can be selfish about this. Everybody I know gets busy and they might not have time to talk with me. Not Bruce. I know where he is, three times a week. I call he answers. That's a comfort for me. I have been to the dialysis center twice and sat with him for a few minutes. He is hooked up to this very expensive looking gizmo that cleans his blood.

It's a good thing if you have two working kidneys because they are on the job 24/7. Bruce is a on two kidney transplant waiting lists. The local list has him waiting 8 years. But his naval service puts him on another list, only 2 years. Either way you do not get a new kidney, but a used one, and the donor needs to be under 40 years of age, meaning the kidney is 40 years old and good for decades more service. Bruce is a good fellow to talk to. He gave me a detailed description of the surgical procedure on his knee that led to an infection that even powerful antibiotics could not stop. The infection ultimately trashed his kidneys and that got him to the chair.

Jim Langley is a New York Life Insurance agent. He is mainly retired now. I also know Jim from the Santa Barbara Kiwanis Club. Last week he drove down to the UCLA medical center for a biopsy on his prostate. The prostate is a mystery to me. They cause so much trouble. I don't even know why we have them. Women get along fine without them. I could read some article on Web MD and study up on it. Jim is undergoing treatment for prostate cancer. He says the doctors in Santa Barbara are pretty good, but the doctors in UCLA have the latest technology, so he makes the two-hour drive to get that top-quality service. When I interviewed him for this story, well this is California, so I asked him about traffic on the 101. He said he flew down there like he had angel wings and got there in one hour and 45 minutes, early for the appointment, got it done, and then flew down the freeway back to Santa Barbara. You're a happy man in California if you can beat the traffic on the 101 thanks to those angel wings.

Laurie, my darling girlfriend and home companion, just know handed me her iPad with the Web MD prostate primer open for me to read. Time to study up. The prostate does have a purpose, but there are several design flaws in my opinion.

I will continue to monitor and interview these three men and keep you posted. They are all three good talkers supplying rich details without running off at the mouth about other things. Not taking notes helps to establish rapport and makes the conversation flow informally. But ultimately I will need to take notes for greater accuracy and find the level of detail without leading to pedantry. The idea is to present their situation in a matter of fact way without drama or depression. This is just what happened.

Books. I have just started the second volume of the Raj Quartet by Paul Scott --- titled the Day of the Scorpion. I am encouraged by the testimony of my college classmate Virginia Smith. She lives in Toronto and she told me she has read the Raj Quartet with great pleasure and more than once.

Movies. Movies we would like to see this Christmas season are -- Roma, the Green Book, the Bohemian Rhapsody and Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Politics. It was with thanks to heaven that we enjoyed the Trump-free days of George Bush's funeral. It took a phalanx of former presidents at the National Cathedral to shut him up, but there was Trump and he was silent. This gave me hope.

Happy Holidays,

Fred


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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Patti Detzer was in my dream last night

By Fred Owens

Patti Detzer was in my dream last night. We were at a party and she was wearing a chicken costume and she was dancing and laughing and her hair was wild...... I rented a room for two years at Patti's farmhouse on Fir Island. It was such an austere almost monastic atmosphere with the silence and the wind. Patti and I rarely talked or ever ate meals together, but we did go on one date -- to see Leonard Cohen in Seattle. We rode down to this concert with Marc Zappa and Kathy Woelke. It was pretty fine music. Other than that for two years while I lived there she sat on the floor in the living room eating popcorn and watching TV in the evening. I sat in my room and read books and drank wine.

My son bought me the Leonard Cohen tickets as a surprise gift, two tickets. I needed a date. Who to ask? Anybody special in my life at that time? Nobody. Except Patti, who was my landlady, and there are boundaries for that relationship, but I knew she loved Leonard Cohen, and I knew she would accept my offer. So we had a pretty good time.

But it was a cold winter in that farmhouse with wood heat and my bedroom was in the corner away from the warm areas. It was Dec. of 2007 when I moved in. I was working full time as a nursing aide on the evening shift at Skagit Valley Hospital and usually came home about 11:30. Had a glass of wine, went to sleep. Got up in the morning -- it was cold, cold, took a shower and dashed off in the car to the Rexville Store to have coffee and talk with my pals.

Patti charged me $350 for the room. A good price, except I had to split and stack the firewood and carry it into the house and pay for it as well....... Anyway, the view from my bedroom window was glorious -- muddy fields and thousands of snow geese. Eagles in the cottonwoods. It was worth being cold, but after two winters I had enough and moved back into town.

Patti was good people.

Johnny Carson. We came upon some DVD tapes of the Johnny Carson Show from the 1980s -- guests were Dyan Cannon, Rodney Dangerfield and the animal man with a pet alligator. Johnny was always there, from 1962 to 1992. Thirty years, five nights a week. He was always there. We loved watching it last night. It wasn't nostalgic. It's like we were just there in the present.  Dyan Cannon was wild and free. Rodney Dangerfield was funny but he got tiresome. Tonight we will watch the DVD with Robin Williams as the main guest  -- it could be good.

Johnny Carson, not to elevate him too much, meant that America was whole and one country. Everybody liked him. Well, not everybody, but everybody was used to him being live on the TV five nights a week. He was American -- like mowing the lawn.

I mention lawn mowing because lawns are almost gone from drought-stricken California. We had to cut back on lawns because of the drought but I am beginning to miss them. Going bare foot, green and wet under the sprinklers on hot days in July in suburban Chicago when I was a kid. Neighbor to neighbor. They still have all-green lawns in the Midwest  -- I don't want California to be too different.

George Bush Dies. Like millions of Americans I compared him to the guy we have now, and Bush comes out decent. Not to endorse Bush's accomplishments, but the point is that if a man is decent you might be able to influence his process.

Not too late to wish you Happy Thanksgiving one more time. And Happy Hanukkah.

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Immigration to America was Never Easy

FROG HOSPITAL -  November 26, 2018

By Fred Owens

Immigration to America was Never Easy

It's possible to become an American, but it's never been easy. Newcomers were given the worst jobs and lived in the worst neighborhoods. They were mocked and abused and worse, People said they looked funny and they couldn't speak English and their food smelled awful. People said much worse than that, but over a period of time, we got used to them, and they became like us, and we became a little like them. But it was always difficult.....It was never easy.

There is a trouble at the San Ysidro crossing between San Diego and Tijuana. We can let the migrants in or we can turn them back. We can grant them asylum or we can put them on a plane back to Honduras. I'm not proposing a solution, but I do want to pose a context. Immigration has never been easy. There was no golden age when newcomers were welcomed with blessings and open arms. It was always tough. The Yankee kids beat up the Irish kids until the Irish kids became cops and then the Irish kids beat up the Jewish kids, and so it went. The Chinese were treated worse, and the African slaves worst of all. But it was the promise of a better life that made it happen -- those long, harrowing journeys and those hopes.

And we can do better. We can get better at welcoming strangers to join our culture. They can become like us and we can become a little like them. It just takes time. It starts out rough and then it gets smoother.

But one thing is sure. The trouble at the border is a difficult situation and Trump will make it worse. He will take a problem and turn it into a crisis. He will take a crisis and turn it into a war. There must be a way for calmer people to act and prevent a crisis and a war.

Thanksgiving and Driving Through Malibu

We had a swell Thanksgiving with Laurie's family in Manhattan Beach. I sat in the TV room and watched football games with Sam. Sam is Laurie's brother's wife's brother. Got that? Sam was born in Japan and came to California as a child. He is eighty years old

I would guess and he pretends he doesn't speak English. The first six years with Sam we watched the game together in silence, in full appreciation of the calm atmosphere while the other relatives screamed with joy and laughter in the living room.

But this year Sam and I began to talk. He offered me a beer, and went to fetch it. He offered me some edamame beans which he had cooked himself. His English vocabulary is very limited but good enough, and his smile is genuine, so we are friends now. Actually we were always friends even during the silent years, enjoying a mutual love for Beer and Football.

(Regarding the football game  -- I did actually rise to do a few kitchen chores, cleared dirty plates, took out the trash, etc.)

On Friday after Thanksgiving we visited my sister and my son and two of my nieces in Venice Beach. We walked to a restaurant and had brunch.

Then we drove up the coast through Malibu. The Malibu fire is out, but the blackened hill sides come right down to the highway and go on for ten miles and more. It will grow back if it ever rains. The homes destroyed and the lives lost -- I'm glad we saw it. We got back to Santa Barbara by dinner time and ate leftover turkey and pumpkin pie.

Happy Thanksgiving,

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Go Fred Me

By Fred Owens

I was getting kind of discouraged and feeling like a patsy. The last straw was one I bought two sticky buns at Gelson's and they overcharged me. I didn't object. I was too embarrassed. Why was I being so meek? Why did I not say something and insist on the fair price?

I decided to hold a pep rally. Go Fred Me. ...... It's like GoFundMe but much cooler, and it doesn't cost any money. It's more of a vibrational, psychological boost. Go get 'em, Tiger......

I want to be a hero like Gary Cooper in High Noon. He ended up facing the desperadoes all by himself, but first he asked for help. That's a hero to me. You ask for help. And if you get help, good. If you don't get help and you're sure you're right, then you face the desperadoes alone. That's me -- like Gary Cooper. That makes Laurie like Grace Kelly -- don't you think?.

In California we're asking for help from the federal government to help us rebuild fire-torn communities. But let's be clear. That's our money. We  have paid many billions in taxes to the feds for just this reason  -- disaster relief. So now we are asking for the money. as a courtesy. Truly it's our money and we need it back now.

In Praise of Nancy Pelosi. The really cool thing about Nancy Pelosi is that she sets the Republicans an edge. In the last issue of Frog Hospital I only mentioned her name. For doing that I got some unusually nasty mail from people who ought to know better. Are they afraid of her? Good. So better show her some respect.

There are those among the Democrats who wish to replace Pelosi with someone younger and more progressive. That will happen in time, but not yet, not yet. This year, this session of Congress is Nancy's time. This is her moment, high heels and all. She's going to go out a winner.

Trump is showing his Age. Trump skipped ceremonial duties in Paris because of the rain, and he did not lay a wreath on Veterans Day. I suspect he is just getting old and tired. He's 72 and it's starting to show. Hey, Mr. Strongman, better get some rest because you ain't what you used to be.

Trump has no Friends. A lot of old guys his age, they get up early, 6 or so, and they go to the local cafe and have coffee with other old guys and talk about how things aren't what they used to be. Trump ought  to do that. Go out in the early morning and have coffee with his friends. If he had any friends.

Bruce Byers gets KIdney Dialysis. Bruce Byers is a man my age and a friend from the Santa Barbara Kiwanis Club where we go to have lunch on Wednesday. Bruce's kidneys -- he has two -- have gone the distance, but they are per-squat now, at less than ten percent of function, so he needs the dialysis. He goes three times a week, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, for three hours each time. Bruce occupies a comfortable recliner next to the machine. The nurse hooks the tubes up to the port in his chest, one going with blood to be rinsed out, the other with cleaner blood to be returned. It is a miracle of progress that we can do that and keep living. I visited him at the dialysis center on Thursday. He seemed fairly cheerful considering. For his three hour stint he has a smart phone and a laptop. On the laptop he was watching Japanese animie cartoons.

"I watch them to keep up on my Japanese. I lived in Japan for two years and became somewhat conversant."  Now, just what Bruce was doing in Japan for two years I do not know. I could have asked. He is on two waiting lists for a kidney transplant. The transplant is the only way Bruce ever gets off the dialysis machine. But his overall health seems good and I liked his smile. More about Bruce next time.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Ten Days in Hawaii

Nov 6, 2018

Ten Days in Hawaii

By Fred Owens

Today is Election Day and you are probably glued to the tube or out canvassing for your candidate. Good..... but life goes on, so while we wait for results let me tell you about our recent trip to Hawaii, to the Big Island.

We stayed five days in Kona on the fourth floor of a condo with a balcony overlooking the sunset and the pounding surf. The air was warm and humid. Let me say something right off about humidity. I like it. Dry air is just air. Humid air is like a warm pillow, you just move slowly and the clouds are comfy.

We went snorkeling and saw golden fish. Snorkeling is light exercise, at least for me. I'm a floater -- why paddle after fish? why not let them come to you? I saw a sea turtle moving slowly along side me, unconcerned and friendly, about 2 or 3 feet across on the hard back shell. The sea was calm and gently swelling.

We took the helicopter ride over the volcano. It's really big. The pilot played dramatic volcanic music on the headphones, right out of Lord of the Rings. Plumes of smoke rose over plunging craters and roads destroyed by recent irruptions. Then she, the pilot, flew us to the waterfalls and she played Elvis Presley singing Blue Hawaii as we drifted over cascading ribbons of rain water. It was quite special, so calm we floated above the green valley.

It was delightful. We walked through Botanic Gardens and ate Poke, delicious.

That's all, but after ten days on the island you begin to get Hawaiianized and it stays with you.

Everyone, Be Well on this Election Day.

Fred

California is Burning

By Fred Owens

"California is Burning," I wrote that a few months ago when the huge Ranch fire swept through the northern part of the state. Now it's happening again. People are exhausted and despondent. I mean people like me in Santa Barbara and all we got is a little smoky air and a TV news show of helicopters red-bombing the flames. Let alone the tens of thousands who had to evacuate, let alone the thousands who have lost their homes and the many who have died in the fire. It has been quite awful and if I look out the window I see a tinder-dry landscape. There has been no rain for months.

We expect the rainy season to begin in late October, but so far we have had only one sprinkle and the blues skies that make us famous now make us worried. Clouds feel better. Hoping for clouds.

Some people have a better attitude than me. I have lost nothing, but I am bummed out to even be near this. Neil Young lost his home in Malibu or was it in Topanga Canyon? Or was it Bob Dylan? Either way, famous people who have pets and memories just like the rest of us have lost everything.

We can build new homes in California. We have the resources to replace the 6,000 homes lost in Paradise. We can build 60,000 homes. We can make a new city. What else can we do? 

There is no replacing the lost oak trees, not in a hundred years, but still we will plant them.

The next issue of Frog Hospital. The next issue of Frog Hospital will include political talk, fundraising plans and medical concerns. A friend of mine is undergoing kidney dialysis and he is in line for a new kidney. Talking with him about this has been interesting. And, if he agrees, I will tell his story.

For politics, I have in mind something like "In Praise of Nancy Pelosi." And for fundraising we will announce the Go Fred Me fundraiser which will commence in mid-January.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Me too and the patriarchs, plus lawyers and medieval history

FROG HOSPITAL -- Sept. 28, 2018

Me Too and the Patriarchs

Fred Owens

I saw the Patriarchs sitting on the left, lead by Sen. Grassley of Iowa. I saw Me Too on the right, lead by Sen. Feinstein of California.

I have to admire the stamina of these people, sitting through a nine-hour hearing, especially Feinstein at age 85.

I wouldn't last an hour in that room. I supposed that's why I work in the garden.

Having heard most of the testimony on Thursday, I was most impressed by the vehemence of Lindsey Graham of South Carolina -- he got really lit up and he is usually the calm one.

Blasey was direct and clear, maintaining her composure. Her presentation was credible. Kavanaugh was defensive, maybe because he was defending himself.

I certainly liked Blasey a lot better than Kavanaugh, but that doesn't make her right. And I go out of my way to avoid guys like Kavanough, but that doesn't make him wrong.

I wished Blasey could have put a time and place on the event in memory. She described the assault in detail, but where on this earth was it? Time and place would give it an anchor, if that makes any sense.

Kavanaugh talked too much. He didn't really have much more to say than I'm a good guy and I didn't do it. His opening statement was way too long at 45 minutes. I would have advised him to limit his words.

If I was on the Judicial Committee I would have to come to a decision and vote, but I don't have that responsibility. I do not have to decide this. I can mull it and chew it and sit on it until things fall into place and that might never happen.

Most of the people I know believe Blasey. But I'm hearing a lot of talk that goes like this -- "you can just tell"

Well, maybe you can just tell, but I can't just tell. That's how it seems to me this Friday morning. I'm still listening. 

new post starts here

Writing a 750-word Frog Hospital essay requires focus and discipline. Normally, I just sit down in front of the laptop and start typing, even if I don't want to, even if I have no ideas. I never wait for the inspiration. I just write.

That spirit had been guiding me since 1999 when I began the Frog Hospital journey. But these past few days, nada, no energy. I did have enough energy to shovel pea gravel on the path down the hill in back of the house. That was yesterday.

Today I will get a haircut at 10:30 --- I should write about that barber shop. After the haircut, I go to the Santa Barbara Kiwanis Club for lunch --- I should write about that club.

Or I could write about my friend, Attorney Matt Moore. We are scheduling an appointment for legal advice in November. Oh, I don't need a lawyer, not for any pressing problem. But that is the point. The best time to meet with a lawyer is when you don't need to. That means you will actually have to like him. That means you will have a bit of social context and he or she will know your story. That way, when you do have a problem, you just call the guy and he or she already knows who you are.

You don't want to be looking for legal help when you're under the gun and a little desperate. It's like buying property insurance when the house is on fire.

Beside that, I like lawyers. I mean I like the lawyers I like. And being free of a prejudice against that profession, I can choose the agreeable ones -- the ones who can stand with me should that ever become necessary.

Did you notice that Brett Kavanough stood alone in defending himself against the accusation of sexual assault? He being too proud and arrogant to appear to ask for legal counsel. He being too entitled to realize that a man who represents himself has a fool for a client.

Okay, that's politics. Back to the law. I love the law. The law protects me. The law is a shelter in the storm of nature.

I finished reading a medieval history book about the law, 1215, the Year of Magna Carta by Danny Danziger. It's quite a good book and easy to read. For me it was the antidote to watching the Kavanaugh hearings, knowing that brave men struggled with legal issues 700 years ago, and seemed to be getting nowhere, and seemed to be writing powerless words on sheets of parchment. Yet the words of that day were strong and true, and written down, and they have lasted 700 years.

Seven hundred years give us a context. The Kavanaugh debacle is a bump in the road. No, it was more than that. It was important. I just can't find the right metaphor.

So that is my Frog Hospital essay for this week. I tricked myself into writing it. Now I have more gravel to shovel on the path below the house, and trumpet vine to trim next to the garbage bins. These ever-growing vines partially conceal the brown, green and blue trash bins, but after a while it gets too complicated and I must cut them off.

Unstoppable

FROG HOSPITAL -- Oct. 20, 2018

Unstoppable

By Fred Owens

Trump is unstoppable. He is flying around the country and banging on his war drum. I am disturbed and pessimistic and it feels like there is nothing I can do about it except mourn for the future.

But wait. There is an answer. I can go to Hawaii. In fact, we are going to Hawaii, on Tuesday, to the Big Island, for ten days. Enough of this election gloom that I have been generating. Instead I will be lying on the warm sand and soaking up the ultimate energy of sublime relaxation. That is how we win in the finally analysis.

Did you know that Hawaii is part of the United States and that babies born in Hawaii are American citizens? Barack Obama himself was born in this tropical paradise and he is an American citizen and he was a darn good President too...... But I see the point about Hawaii not being so American -- because it doesn't look at all like Kansas. I have been to Kansas and it looks very different than Hawaii. I lived in Kansas for two months in 1976 and I should tell you about that sojourn some day.

But if you have a big heart and a big mind, you can imagine Kansas and Hawaii both being part of our grand and glorious country. Each place special. Each place a home and way to make a living and do good things.

Yes, we are going to Hawaii, and it is we who are unstoppable.

Elizabeth Warren for President in 2020. I'm starting to like Warren, but she needs a nickname. Not Elizabeth, not Liz, not Betty. Certainly not Pocahontas. But I am beginning to warm up to her since the DNA fiasco. Her effort to prove her native American lineage didn't fly right, but I liked seeing her vulnerability. She made a mistake in doing this and good for her. She will make a good president and she will make a lot of mistakes.

Trump never makes mistakes. He is always right and never wrong. That's scary. Warren is more like the rest of us. Normal.

Warren, if elected, will be the first Okie in the White House. Almost everybody from Oklahoma is part some-teenth Native. Go to Oklahoma, and you can almost feel it, that Native air.  Warren is one of those Oklahoma people and it's a good thing. I call them Not Quite White..... and unstoppable.

Raising Children. This is a complete change of topic. Raising children is an important responsibility. I raised two children and it was the most important thing I have ever done. Every morning when I woke up, I knew what my priority was -- to take care of those two kids. Nothing else mattered very much. You do the mom and dad thing until you are finished or until you drop dead, but you never stop doing it until they grow up.

And they do grow up and move out and that breaks your heart. I remember when my youngest went off to college in 1996. It was fun for about two weeks, but then I began to miss them and I had this emptiness all around me. What was I supposed to do? Work? Have fun? I was lost without those kids to look after.... Well, a lot of people go through that.... which is why we have grandchildren, to get some of that feeling back, of being a part of something very important, which is raising those little children. They need us and they keep growing and they are unstoppable.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Issa Rae is Insecure

By Fred Owens

Issa Rae starring in Insecure

Issa Rae created the HBO series known as Insecure. This link goes to a news story about Season 3, Episode 4, which is current.

Our housemate tipped us off about this engaging show. Issa Rae plays the main character, a 29-year-old single African-American woman living in Los Angeles, working at a non-profit, liking her job and her pals, and looking for love.

Issa is Insecure -- the title of the show. We can all relate to that. Insecurity means being self-conscious, keeping score on your wins and losses, worrying about your hair, or the style of your shoes. "Maybe people don't like me. Or they don't understand what I just said. Hell, I don't understand what I just said. How am I supposed to feel? What am I supposed to think? I guess I'll have a drink. I ain't that girl from Pretty in Pink."

Insecurity strikes most people at age 15, and gives you that stuttering gaze where you keep rubbing your head, and it lasts until age 35 when you realize that nobody cares, and nobody is keeping score, and some people like you and some people don't. Period. It's over.

A lot of people get married and have children at age 35. That is a solid cure for insecurity. You get a spouse and a squalling baby in diapers -- you are too tired and too busy to feel insecure. Insecurity is a small luxury that most of us can afford, like a triple grande latte.

In the first season of Insecure Issa lives with her boyfriend Lawrence. Issa goes to work every day, but Lawrence sits around the house in his sweat pants waiting for the phone to ring.

You know the phone is never going to ring for Lawrence. Issa knows that too because she's a realist. "You may have to take a job a notch lower than you already had," she tells him.

Lawrence hears that. He goes Man Up and takes a small-wage sales job at Best Buy. That's doing the right thing, in my book.

You see, the men in Issa's life are not losers and toxic abusers. Not hopeless causes, but like men really are which is to say "in good condition but needs work."

Then Issa  goes looking for what she already has, and she does something very stupid. She has a one-night fling with her old ex-boyfriend and Lawrence finds out and walks out of her life. Stupid. Major Stupid.

What I like about Issa Rae as an actor is that she doesn't try to sell it. She doesn't over-act. She's happy when it's fun, and angry when it's bad, and she can be major stupid if that's what's going on. Not a Drama Queen.

The young woman who told me about the show said it was the story of her life. Reality can be painful, but sometimes it's just funny.

We like this show. All the characters and all the Los Angeles neighborhoods are African-American, so you get an education in culture and language if, like me, you're 72 and you live in Santa Barbara.

The rap music in the background goes right over my head. I just don't get it. Well, I get some of it. But I don't try to get it, because if you try to get it, you won't get it. Better to just let it come to you as it does.

Meanwhile

Meanwhile Pope Francis is in a lot of trouble and the Supreme Court hearings are underway in Congress.  The news is full of breakdowns and tragedies. The old saying is "Heads will roll."  But we have progressed as a society because in centuries past courtiers who fell from favor were executed -- heads actually did roll --  now the losers get a book deal and a spot on MSNBC or Fox.

I wish, more than anything, that Donald Trump was not in the White House. I can put some substance behind that vacuous statement, but I am through writing for today.

The days are getting shorter. Here in Santa Barbara we see a lot of dried leaves on the ground, more from dry weather than from the approach of autumn. We are harvesting apples from the tree in the backyard and making apple sauce.

Nice talking to you,

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

To Get My Fair Share of Abuse

To Get My Fair Share of Abuse

By Fred Owens

I have a story to tell about how I went to a wedding in Chicago in 1968, just a week before the infamous Democratic Convention and Police Riot.

It was the wedding of Mary B Mueller and Peter Ahr -- two classmates of mine at St. Michael's College. What made that day special to me was the arrival of Mayor Richard Daley as an honored guest because Daley was the cousin of Mary B's mother.

His black limousine was parked right outside the church. He greeted one and all, being careful not to stay too long and upstage the bridal couple. I enjoyed a brief conversation with the Mayor, and then off he went, speeding in his motorcade.

That's the kind of mayor he was -- going to weddings and funerals, and giving that hands-on neighborhood family feeling.

I was disarmed by his warmth. I decided not to go to the demonstrations at the Democratic convention the following week. I knew the Yippies were going to challenge the cops and pick a fight. I thought picking a fight with the Chicago cops was about the dumbest thing you could do. There were better ways to protest the war beside getting your head smacked with a club.

Anyway, I stayed home and watched the cops club the Yippies on TV. Well, they were looking for a fight and they got one.

My brother Tom went downtown for the demonstrations and he said that the cops might have distinguished between the peaceful demonstrators and the ones causing violence. He said the cops just waded into the crowd with clubs and they didn't need to do that. My answer to him -- and we still disagree fifty years later -- is that if you're standing next to the guy who is calling the cop a pig, then maybe you should go someplace else.

I remembered how the Chicago cops protected  Martin Luther King and the civil rights marchers in 1966. I was in those marches and the cops protected us from a violent racist mob. The civil rights marchers behaved lawfully and the cops protected them. That was the way to do it. I had no quarrel with those policemen.

I did not go to the demonstration in Chicago in 1968. The following year I did not go to Woodstock -- too many people.

Last Week of Summer

The weather on the West Coast has been too interesting. Fire and Flood. Flood and Fire. Hot days and sultry nights. It has been cooler this past week so we are relieved in Santa Barbara. But September looms and that month can be hottest of all....

Such a dreadful vision of climate catastrophe, but we are resourceful and determined people and we will get thorough this.

John McCain dies.

I voted for Barack Obama in 2008, but I always thought John McCain was a decent fellow and might have served as President.

From the Department of Getting Right to the Point

Mabel Rye, age 97, lives across the street from us. I often take her grocery shopping. Yesterday I picked her up. As I helped her into the car we had this conversation.

Good morning, Mabel.

"Good morning, Fred"

How are you feeling today?

"Old."

What's that like?

"It's kind of hard to describe."

Well, I guess I'll find out.

take care and happy last week of summer,

Fred

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

Do the Right Thing

By Fred Owens

This is a variant on the theme of summer vacation. This one is about the Worst Summer Job I Ever Had.

In the summer of 1965, I came home from the excitement of freshman year at St. Michael's College to the crashing boredom of suburban Chicago. My Dad said not to worry, I have work for you. My folks published a fishing magazine. It was a cool business and they made a good living. Dad worked at the office about ten minutes walking from the house. He did the publishing and editorial chores. Mom worked at a desk on the back porch and kept the books. We Owens children got drafted into various chores. They didn't have to spell it out -- "You get to eat, you get to live, and you get to go to college, so here's the job."

Circulation work. The mailing list. 12,000 names and addresses in a stack of binders over a foot high. In 1965 the Post Office decided that you had to have a zip code on every address or you would lose your second-class mailing permit. So they handed me the zip code directory which weighed about ten pounds. I started with Abbot and Anderson, one address at a time. Look it up in the directory, write it down on the binder. Look up the next address. I think it took me more than six weeks to finish. Boring? This was the dark underbelly of a family business.

But necessary. Dad said never argue with the Post Office, you don't have a choice.

Actually, since that summer of 1965 I have had other boring jobs. It happens. You get used to it after a while.

Do the Right Thing

The title of Spike Lee's 1989 masterpiece is actually a question. What is the Right Thing?  This is a profound moral question that we all face.

I need to see it again. There was Mookie the first time and he was right. Then Mookie the second time and he was wrong. Now I'm ready for Mookie the third time..... It's a pretty good movie that keeps you wondering whether Mookie was right or wrong.

Why Read Moby Dick

Why Read Moby Dick is a slim volume written by Nathaniel Philbrick. He has read the novel 12 times. I have read it twice. We both love it. The book answers the question, but I have not needed any encouragement. Like those long so-called divergent chapters about whaling technology  -- they're the best part of the book. And so politically not correct. This book is about killing whales. We don't do that anymore.

California Senator Kamala Harris for President in 2020

Harris might run. We'll get a decision from her after the November election. One friend told me Harris had little experience since being elected to the Senate only two years ago. But she was Attorney General of California for six years. That's a tough job.

I hope she runs. She has the grit and the stamina. She has the smile and the laugh. Not the charisma, but she engages well with a crowd. She can work a rope line and give a good speech. Women will vote for her because she's a woman. Men will vote for her because she's good-looking. Young people will vote for her because she's only 53.

She speaks for Dreamers and immigrant families. Her career is not touched with scandal. She can win against Trump. She will not scare away the moderate Republicans who don't want to give Trump another chance.

She grew up in Oakland, attended Howard University and then law school. Her parents are both immigrants -- father from Jamaica, mother from India. She is married with step children. She had an affair some years ago with Willie Brown who was married at the time  -- imagine how her life will be examined for stories like this if she runs for president.

Kamala Harris is well-known and liked in California. Let's see how she does when she visits Ohio and Pennsylvania.

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital

BlackkKlansman

By Fred Owens

Saturday and the beach was crowded, so we went to the afternoon movie, choosing BlackkKlansman.

I like Spike Lee's work, especially Do the Right Thing. You can interpret that 1989 film several different ways.

So it is with this new film, based on a true story, about how a black police detective infiltrated a Ku Klux Klan outfit in Colorado Springs in the 1970s.

I thought to myself that I have never met a genuine Klansman, but then I thought maybe I have. Maybe, when I was hitching rides around the country, and the guy picked me up, he seemed friendly enough, he sounded me out on various topics of conversation as we loafed along the highway at high speed -- maybe that guy was in the Klan. I mean, how would I know? It's not like he would tell me.

I never met Stokely Carmichael either. He was a true-to-life firebrand. He got a lot of press in those years -- Black Power! His speech before the black student union in Colorado Springs is a high point of the movie. I did meet Jesse Jackson back in 1966, and saw him daily for several weeks in the basement of the Mount Olive Baptist Church on the south side of Chicago. Jackson wore a big Afro back then, like the Ron Stallworth character has in the current film.

You should go see this movie. It is a compelling film. It's not a documentary. but far from a work of fiction. Spike Lee doesn't make things up, he records what he sees and tells what he knows and does not qualify his language. Spike Lee lays it on pretty thick.

Not a small thing, but the sound track is wonderful. Plus there are a few scenes that are played for laughs. It's a more powerful drama that inserts a bit of humor, like the comic interludes in a tragedy by Shakespeare.

Almost the last scene is a re-enactment of the KKK burning cross ceremony -- a powerful image and most terrifying. Is it a real cross? Are those real flames and real Klansman in real robes? Who lit that fire?

Spike Lee closes the film with footage of last year's white nationalist march in Charlottesville. That was a one hundred percent real. And who lit that fire?

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Fred Owens
cell: 360-739-0214

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens

My writing blog is Frog Hospital