crdahlberg

Appendix Street

No street lights illuminate my little street. The seventeen houses were built among orange groves before streetlights were commonplace. The oldest homes on this dead-end little lane date from the 1920’s. At night it is pitch black, a charm contrasting the white-light of the surrounding streets.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Like an appendix whose bodily service seems useless, this seeming inconsequential one-block long neighborhood means little to the town’s population. But here, intimacy is rewarded. Its members know of the life, and the death, of their neighbors.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

In the past few years, this small road has lost seven of its friends and neighbors. This seems a high death ratio, but perhaps because of its tiny population, the residents actually know all their neighbors. On Appendix Street, there is no second block.⠀

The residents all know each of these seven departed ones: the car mechanic with the failing heart, his school counselor wife with lifelong lung disease brought on by smoking parents, their policeman son with years-long debilitating pain due to an on-duty injury, Disneyland’s lighting and illumination engineer, the middle-aged son succumbing after surgery, the college professor whose heart gave out at his dinner table, the life-long teacher whose final stroke felled her. The homes of these last two neighbors faced directly across the street from each other; their obituaries appeared in last week’s local newspaper, directly across the page from each other.⠀⠀⠀⠀

The mulberry tree holding the neighborhood rope swing once stood in our front yard. The tree has died, and now nothing will grow in the soil in its place. A friend, a landscaper, informed me that a new tree cannot be planted exactly where a former tree has died. The decaying roots of the old tree still produce enough heat that a new tree cannot live in that same place.⠀⠀⠀⠀

We are all some kind of standard-bearer. The deposit of our lives, the standards that we carry, possess a permanence that a succeeding life does not replace. Each life deposits the labor of a life sowed, and for that, the other lives on our little street will not be the same.

Restoration

Imitating the moves of a geriatric ballerina cost me a year of good health. A practiced and willing orangutan could have performed the right-hand to left-toe reach-around hold without injury. Unfortunately, no such orangutans were present on the day my father needed his couch re-situated upon its wooden block risers, so I performed the risky contortion—and I survived the back-wrenching ordeal. The Flying Wallendas could not have been prouder.

Until, that is, the next day, when, like amputated insect legs, my lower limbs felt disconnected from my body. I wasn’t sure which way they were headed. Balance was unpredictable. Numbing weakness and throbbing aches took up residence in my back, legs and ribcage every day since.

My year-long quest for restored health featured x-rays, MRIs, steroids, physical therapy, neurologist nerve-tests, a series of two epidural injections, and six acupuncture sessions. Finally, a neurosurgeon performed what seemed the most elementary of tests: he tapped my elbows, checking for reflexes, and found that there were none. Absolutely none.

A new MRI revealed that the problem all along had been in the thorax, not the lumbar part of my spine. The neurosurgeon’s pronouncement, ”You have significant spinal stenosis and require surgery. This is not an option. Without it, you could become paralyzed.”

Twelve temporary staples now hold my skin together while the underlying backbone heals. Ten fragments of a ruptured disk were removed; while the disk was damaged, it was not destroyed, eliminating the need for fusion screws.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀⠀

Tunneling beneath the skin, long-dormant nerves are now re-awakening, re-uniting with long-separated relatives. And as they celebrate, waves of itching flesh and random shooting pains announce they are ready to party.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀⠀

Welcome home, legs. Welcome home, spine. Welcome home, burning, displaced nerves around my stomach. We are at peace once again.

Candlelight Revenge

Upon our return from a camping vacation this week, we discovered that the electricity had been out much of the day, and were told the lines would not be repaired until 4 AM. Okay. We can tough out heat and cold like cave people. After all these millennia, we’ve perfected survival skills.
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So we busted out the candles and flashlights and went to bed early. Windows open, the whole night I heard workmen yelling at each other up and down the street, flashlights blinking in and out among the houses, and finally, at about 3:30 AM, the power came on, underpromised and overdelivered! Yes!
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Power for 20 glorious seconds.
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Then, just as suddenly, all was extinguished again until noon the next day. So I didn’t sleep most of the night, the brain entertaining rambling, incoherent and unproductive thoughts. There’s no “off” switch in a brain thus energized.
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There was one consolation. Before going to bed, I had realized that a fly had entered the house with us, and he had found the one light source he could ram over and over again with his fly-skull—my laptop computer screen, illuminated as I gingerly drew upon the computer battery power. So as I was attempting to decipher 50 e-mails before retiring to bed, he kept ramming my screen, drawn in by its bluish, glowing light. Annoying. Aggravating. Demonic.
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So, then, what was my consolation, you ask? When I arose the next morning in my still un-electrified house, I opened my laptop again, and beheld—the smashed body of aforesaid fly! Apparently, without even trying, when closing the laptop before turning in for bed, I had squeezed him lifeless in the process.
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Sweet revenge by candlelight.
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Note: One animal was harmed in the making of this photoblog.

One Baby, One Butt

Babies are warm, cuddly, and delightful. And they can be terrorizing, especially for new parents, for whom every moment of a twenty-four hour day presents a new learning frontier: “What do I? When do I? How do I? Where do I? Why do I?”

The counsel I gave myself then, and have since given others, is to simply do the one necessary thing immediately before you. Check the butt, change the diaper. Because every baby’s body works sort of the same. They eat, they sleep, they pee, they poop.

But, of course, babies are not automobiles. They need more than oil changes or diaper changes. Humans are a complex amalgamation of genetics, environment, opportunities and many other components, including Choice.

The woman I photographed transported one, two, three, four, five babies. I don’t know why or where she was taking them. But certainly each child was unique, and partially formed from infancy onward through their own Choice and consequence—to rebel, to obey, to comply, to tantrum.

Beyond infancy, the power of Choice plays an ever-growing part of our lives—our friends, attitudes, our values. By the time of adulthood, the power and the outcome of our choices can be gratifying or overwhelming—our faith, our career, our spouse. Many choices prove to be exceptional; others, disastrous. Some choices we want to mulligan, golfing slang for a “do-over.”

But the way to our future is far from re-living the past. We are given only one way out—one way to move forward. And that is by making even more choices—mature, forward-thinking and consequence-embracing choices, even in the light of some spectacularly poor ones in the past.

We all share the same human condition. To be human is to have one butt, but many choices.

Aflame

Shortly before today’s five-mile hiking regimen, I applied a new (for me) pain medication, bathing my midsection from navel to right hip. Typically, I apply Aspercreme, but today I inaugurated the stronger, bolder pain treatment medication to my abdominal paunch.
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A brief explanation of my belly’s epidemiology is in order. Seven months ago, I moved my 101-year-old father’s couch, allowing him easier accessibility. I did it the “easy” way. Why bother moving the heavy end table before lifting the couch? Instead, my contorted right-arm-reaching-over-left-shoulder movement resembled that of a geriatric ballerina, hands groping for the little wooden block that had slid out of place, while simultaneously lifting up the entire end of the couch.
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The damage was done. X-rays, an MRI, weeks of physical therapy, a growing relationship with my neurologist and two epidural injections have all served to accomplish—exactly nothing. Tingling, numbness and pain have been my companions for these seven months, including the aforementioned abdominal discomfort, in which the nerve endings feel like they have been dissected and laid upon my belly. Aspercreme touches the pain just a little; today’s new salve would surely provide an improvement.
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So out the door I jaunted, anointed with my newly-acquired pain retardant. Half a mile later, I recognized the severity of my folly—my belly was aflame. Imagine an open wound into which you pour liquefied chili pepper. The active ingredient of my so-called salve, I soon discovered, is a chemical drawn from chili peppers.
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I pride myself in believing there is not a lot of retreat in me. The next 4-1/2 miles I walked aflame, throbbing, and desperate for a change of underwear, the circumnavigating elastic waistband rubbing and re-rubbing the blazing cream into my seared flesh.
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Trousers now loosened, my crimson belly reminds me that all ointments are not created equally. And like friendship, the mild-mannered salve of a trusted comrade can be a far better companion than a flamboyant acquaintance of uncertain promise.

Airbags

There’s no good time to have a belt explode. The sudden unhinging of my tightly-hitched pants could initiate rapid decompression, hurtling leather, zippers and buckle components into my gut, and endangering innocent passersby.
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Similarly, no excuse exists for the current automotive scandal—malfunctioning, exploding safety airbags. The near-universal Takata airbag safety recall is the latest water cooler topic. “Have you had yours done yet?” as if the subject were fingernail polish or hair colorizing.
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Today was my airbag replacement day. My red-inked “Urgent Safety Recall” notice noted threats of metal fragments injuring the car’s occupants, in exploding pants-belt style. Today’s service chore was aggravated by my previous encounter with this dealership, when I still grieved the loss of our beloved RAV4. When its transmission, transfer case and differentials simultaneously went to Glory, there was no choice.
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A perky, used 4Runner on the dealership lot had beckoned me. Soon enough, the sales vultures gathered, bedecked in logo-embroidered shirts. Their task was to avoid the subject of price and corral me into the dealership showroom, the inner sanctum—the Holy Place. The Showroom Bishop awaited me, white pressed dress shirt distinguishing him above the common sales priestly rabble, kindness and sympathy oozing.
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“How much for the car?” I inquired, forgetting that this question was the unpardonable sin. The Bishop started his slow “monthly payment” waltz: 48 months, 60 months, 72 months. He could work out my redemption.
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I would have none of it. The waltz devolved to a bitter note, me with extended index finger, performing the out-the-showroom-door shuffle. Incensed, the Bishop’s face reddened as he followed, to ensure I didn’t “key” any vehicles on my way out.
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Now, three of us stare at the TV in the dealership service waiting room, anticipating our rides home. We sip the complimentary coffee and price the tires displayed on the wall.
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And I’ll dodge the Showroom Bishop on the way out.

An Artist in Darkness

“So you are a widow, living at this retirement center—what happened to your husband?” My question spilled out with unexpected bluntness.

“Oh, he was a doctor—a pulmonologist. He died in a mine.”

“In a mine?” I puzzled. The irony of a pulmonologist dying in a mining accident was inescapable. Was he researching black lung disease?

Carol cackled. “No! He didn’t die in a MINE! He died in oh-nine! As in 2009!”

I scrambled for cover.

Fresh from a Netflix docudrama about Ann Boleyn, I decided to up the ante of our breakfast chitchat and impress upon her my fresh-from-TV insights. But she soon left me in the dust, rattling off 200 years of English monarchy melodrama.

Checkmate. Nothing to do but retreat to, “umm-hmm’s,” and “ah-ha’s.”

Eager for a change of subject, I inquired about her education. “Double major in history and art,” she replied.

No wonder. She wisely avoided pressing me about my own educational pedigree.

She had called Boise home, but after her son-in-law’s fatal heart attack, she moved to be closer to her daughter. “In warm weather when they visited me, he would literally run up the nearby ski slopes for exercise. His death—well, it was totally unexpected.”

I asked Carol about her current art interest. “Being an artist can be a very lonely life,” she explained. “It’s only you and your art. That’s not enough for me. I need other people.”

I have never seen Carol without a hat, or sunglasses, or both. This art major, in her element with pastels and a sketchpad, lives in a dimly-lit world. A medical condition has rendered her eyes so sensitive that light pains her. In her apartment, drapes are drawn, the light nearly non-existent. Artwork hangs on the walls about her, barely visible. These days, this aficionado of form and color craves near-total darkness.

Carol abruptly excused herself. “Gotta go! Today’s New York Times didn’t arrive before I left for breakfast. Time for my crossword puzzle!”

Of course. The New York Times crossword puzzle. She has worked them for decades.

Watch out, art and history categories—Carol’s on the loose.

The Stewardess

Jan’s inaugural stewardess commission was on the World War II “Gooney Bird,” the twin-engine DC-3. They began flying in 1935. They are still in service to this day.

So is ninety-something, Jan. Over breakfast, she recalled her favorite flight crew.

“In those days, the unpressurized planes flew low. On long flights, our two mischievous pilots would open their cockpit windows and deploy long strands of chicken bones, all tied together with string. They let out enough line so the bones would hit and clatter against the windows of the unsuspecting passengers, provoking shock and dismay, while traveling at several thousand feet altitude.”

“I suppose turkey bones would have been too big and heavy for the fragile windows!”

Jan eventually graduated to DC-4’s, and to DC-6’s. The latter contained sleeping berths for upscale passengers, reminiscent of the era’s train transportation.

Based in Los Angeles, she served Hollywood royalty: Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin, Hedda Hopper, Walt Disney, John Wayne, Barbara Hutton.

Jan lived in a stewardess dormitory, where a visiting pilot ran into Jan quite by accident when he lost his way, arriving at the wrong dormitory; Jan was smitten.

One day, after making repairs under the hood of her Model A Ford, which she had purchased from another pilot for $125, Jan drove across town to visit him. He invited her to Tucson, where he was based. So she spent the next several weeks “visiting her grandmother” in Tucson. Two months after they met, she married her sweetheart pilot.

“Did that turn out to be a good thing?” I was incredulous. She curled her index finger to meet her thumb, forming an “O,” as in “perfect.” “We had an amazing life together. We traveled to every part of the world. Greece! We loved Greece!”

Later that afternoon, accompanying my father down the hall, we once again ran into Jan. “Didn’t we meet you yesterday?” asked my Dad. Good try. I suggested to him that it had been just that morning.

Jan’s son, John, who happened to be visiting her, accompanied her down the hall. We introduced ourselves, yet I felt I already knew John.

After all, we could both recite Jan’s fondest stories.

The Patent Lawyer

Chuck stared blankly after he placed his breakfast order. “No, I’ll take the cold cereal instead.”

Sometimes, Chuck’s esophagus blocks his food. It gets stuck—“right here.” It remains there until he eats again, when it may journey up into his mouth again. “And there’s not much that’s coming out the other end, either,” he explained.

“Do you still drive?” I asked the 98-year old, trying to change the subject. I could still imagine the taste of the food, the second time around.

“Yes, but I wouldn’t want to meet another driver of my caliber on the road!”

Chuck had fallen prior to his move into the retirement home, landing on his head. 30 stitches patched him up. The fall had reduced his short-term memory, and he now required the use of a cane. So, in his mid-nineties, he reluctantly gave up golf and tennis. “Tennis doubles is a wonderful thing. Don’t need to cover nearly as much court!” I guessed so; I had given up on tennis three decades ago.

Chuck was a patent lawyer. The precise details of every patent were still packed in the back of that cranium. Long-term memory was definitely not a problem.

“You know how a ship being attacked from an aircraft has to take three readings on the location of the plane and its angle of attack before you can aim, load and fire a 2.9-inch shell from the ship’s deck?”

Of course. Everyone knows that.

“You have time to take two readings. By the time you try to take the third reading, you’re toast! Up in smoke! No one could figure out how to take that third reading in time.”

Chuck’s client had figured out a way to accomplish this, using a sort of scrabble board contraption.

Another client developed an invention that produced weird electrical waves. Whenever Chuck inadvertently left his lunch near the gizmo, his lunch got hot. “You’ve got the descendent of this in your kitchen. It’s called a microwave.”

Just then, two men dressed in black suits made their way down the corridor, a black gurney between them. All they lacked was a body.

Chuck smiled. “What do you expect?” he asked rhetorically. “Just take a look at where we live.”

With that, cane in hand, he headed down the hall, as if he were hunting down a new tennis partner.

The Diamond Sorter

At 85, Art is a youngster compared with my 101-year old father. For breakfast, he’d have the waffles, Dad wanted oatmeal and poached eggs, all easy to chew.

Saturday at the retirement home means a two-hour drive each way for me. The breakfasts are routine, except for who is assigned to sit with us. Today, it was Art, a two-week resident newbie.

At the end of his Korean War service, Art’s home became the hospital for a full year. When he was released, he was still a teenager with no job skills.

He took a vocational skills test and discovered he possessed a hidden, latent talent: sorting.

Art could sort anything. He could detect the minutest differences. Sizes. Colors. Shapes. Anything. Think it’s tough to tell one leaf from another? Art doesn’t; he’s a born sorter.

His unique skill landed him a job as a trainee in a jewelry company where he was given plenty of stuff to sort: all of them diamonds. Thousands of them, and they all needed sorting by color, cut, size, quality.

His proficiency eventually made a way for him in the jewelry wholesale market. His skills had brought him into the limelight, into the big time, and into one of the most exclusive communities of Los Angeles.

He lived there all by himself. His wife had left him fifty years ago, though they have still never divorced.

Halfway through Art’s waffle breakfast, Edna, stopped by the table to greet us. She stood directly next to Art. But Art couldn’t see her. He only turned his head when he heard her voice.

Macular degeneration has stolen most of Art’s once-legendary gift of visual discernment. He feels lost in his new environment and misses his former neighborhood. He could have become a bitter man.

After breakfast, I fixed his television for him. A baseball fan, Art was suffering withdrawal. When I got it to work, he pumped his fists in victory, and we hugged triumphantly.

“It’s been a good day,” he explained, “for two reasons. First, you fixed my TV so I can watch The World Series! Second, because your dad called me an Old Geezer. Because that’s what I call myself! I love that! We Old Geezers gotta stick together!”