May 17, 2021

As I watched the news last weekend one of the lead stories was about a woman who had become irritated while her neighbor was using a leaf blower on her lawn.  Rather than asking her to stop using the blower, she chose to go inside, get her gun, and take a shot at the woman.  While she did not hit the other woman, she was later arrested by the police.  Apparently, it is against the law to shoot a firearm within the city limits.  Especially if you are shooting at another person.  Who would have thought?

I bring this up because I faced my own irritation last week as well.  I had mentioned how I had decided to let the stalks of grain grow along the corner of my pool fence.  I had dreams of letting them ripen and then harvesting the grain and feeding it to my birds.  It seemed like a win-win scenario.  A friend knew the difficulty we were going through and offered to have her person come over and mow our lawn.  I admit, I felt sheepish accepting, but frankly the lawn was nearing the point of out of control.  I also knew the offer was made from a desire to help.  I agreed and she arranged for him to come over on Friday.  Sometimes it is harder to accept help than to offer it. 

When I learned the mower was coming over, I tried to be vigilant to catch them.  I placed a sign on the back fence saying not to cut the grain, but I have personal experience of not paying attention to the needs of the homeowner.  Mowing the yard is mowing the yard, and there are few variations.  I was in my office when I heard the mower fire up.  I went outside as quick as I could and got to the side of the house to see him mulching through the lawn along the back fence.  I started yelling to stop and he did turn around, but it was too late.  He had already mowed half of my grain field.  When I talked with him about my loss, I mentioned it was not all loss.  His lawn work was going to make my blog.

Thoughts:  The grain had grown in the lawn along my fence by no effort of my own (the birds did it).  Still, I was prepared to use this happenstance as a windfall and get a free supply of grain.  It would not have been a lot, but there was at least a peck or more in the heads.  It was my way of repaying the birds and to also give me the experience of hand harvesting (sounded cool as an ethnoarchaeologist).  I looked forward to both.  Much of what we do becomes routine, and we do not think about our actions, we just do them.  That is what happened when the mower cut my lawn.  He did not stop to read the sign.  He did not notice that the “weeds” had grown nearly three feet high and had to have been left for some purpose.  Instead, he just mowed the lawn.  I realize that what I was doing was not normal lawn care, but that did not make it bad.  Many habits of other cultures are different than those we are used to seeing.  When they are also accompanied by foreign words it can make them suspect.  Again, being different does not make it bad.  You may want to talk with people about what they are doing and why.  Who knows, you may want to try it as well.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 15, 2021

When I was driving back from the north, I came upon a truck that looked suspiciously overloaded.  When I first saw the vehicle, it appeared to be loaded with bales of hay.  I could not for the life of me figure out how they got the pile to stick out so far to one side.  Even more, I could not believe they thought the stress of this load would not send the entire pile toppling onto the highway.  When I finally caught up to the truck and passed, I realized rather than bales of hay, the truck was carrying roof trusses.  I had no idea what was on the truck, so my mind moved it into a known category.  Perception is often based on what is familiar.

When I looked online, I found an ongoing debate on whether it is better to use trusses or rafters in building construction.  The discussion seemed to come down to the size of the roof being built.  A truss is a prefabricated unit built off site and then shipped to the building location.  The truss is then lifted into place to form the roof.  The cost of a prefabricated truss package as compared to the material and labor costs to build rafters on site is 30% to 50% less, and since it is built in a controlled environment there are fewer mistakes.  Once the trusses arrive, they can be placed on the structure in little time.  Depending on the size, the rafters take about a week to build.  It was also mentioned that unless the truss is more than 40 feet long it might be quicker and better to build raters.  The ones I saw were on the back of a flat-bed semi and were around 40 feet long.  Even though they overloaded the truck, they were prepared to get the job done.

When I was in college, I worked for a friend who was a stone mason and custom builder.  One day he asked me to pick up a load of stone at a quarry about 50 miles from the job site.  I took his two-ton flatbed pickup to the quarry and they began loading the stone.  When they had loaded to capacity, there was just a few hundred pounds of stone that needed to be transported.  When they asked me what I wanted to do, I said go ahead and load it.  As I drove home, every time I hit a bump the load would force the bed down onto the wheels.  I ended up driving really slow to avoid an accident.  It would have been better to have made two trips rather than just making one overloaded.

Thoughts:  When I made the one overloaded trip, I thought I was saving my friend time and money.  What I did not realize was the potential damage to his truck and my life had one of the springs snapped from the weight.  There are times when we ignore overloaded warnings.  This can happen like me because I was not aware of the risks involved.  This may also happen because we have followed the warnings in the past and never had any problems.  We become complacent and decide to take the risk and drive overloaded.  While taking risks can come from ignorance or complacency, it can also be the result of self-interest.  I often find claiming your rights has little to do with the constitution.  Instead, what is being “violated” are one’s personal preference.  Do the work.  Follow the science.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 14, 2021

I spent several nights in the hospital with Melissa this last week.  What struck me most throughout the entire experience was the incredible compassion of all her nurses.  The tight restrictions that had been in place have been relaxed, but there are still guidelines that are in force.  They have specific visiting hours and limit the number of visitors per day for each person.  Despite the restrictions, the nurses allowed me to spend the night before the procedure with her in the room.  I went home after the procedure, but things did not go well that first night, and she asked if I could stay with her the next night in ICU.  The nurses told me this was about Melissa and anything they could do to make her feel safe was OK.  She had another long night, but things went better the following day.  The nurses even asked to have a curtesy tray brought to me, so I had meals while I was in the room.  I was grateful.

One thing I noticed during my stay was the relatively young age of the nurses.  When I looked online, I found that was generally true for the night staff.  The day shift usually has more experienced nurses because they had worked nights as new hires and have waited to get a position on days.  That is not to say that there are not experienced nurses who work nights by choice.  Nights are generally not as hectic as days, but you also only have about 2/3 the staff than the day shift.  That means more patients and less staff.  The patients do not get the same level of care as they do on days (hourly checks during the day and every two hours at night), and the staff is less experienced.  That puts enormous responsibility on the young nurses who have not had any exposure to the different scenarios that can happen at night, and often do not have experienced nurses as a resource.  These are what gives them “experience.”  That makes their level of compassion even more amazing.

In our case, it was true for both day and night.  None of the nurses I saw were older than 30 somethings.  During the day there were what appeared to be trainees (early 20’s) who were shadowing experienced nurses (early 30’s).  When I asked my sister (Nurse Practitioner, Public Health) if this was true across the board, she confirmed it was.  As nurses gain experience, some move into administrative positions and others decide to take less stressful and/or less strenuous jobs.  Registered nursing is the largest occupation in the US health care industry, with more than 3 million employed as of May 2019, and most of those jobs were in hospital environments.  A hospital nurse’s wages vary depending on the type of hospital where they are employed and the region of the country where they work.  Along with teaching, this is another one of those jobs where no matter what they make, it is not enough.

Thoughts:  My sister mentioned that her daughter who works as an ICU nurse is taking a strength building course.  Overweight people tend to be sicker, and the percentage of our country is moving closer toward obesity every year.  It takes strength to muscle people around in their beds.  Like many jobs, this is not taught in school.  It is something nurses learn through experience.  Being essential and on the front lines rarely translates into being well paid.  We leave that to those who are the CEO’s and administrators who do not have contact with patients.  Perhaps we should redefine who the essential workers are and pay them accordingly.  Do the work.  Follow the science.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 12, 2021

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Melissa went into the hospital to undergo a procedure last week.  As is normal, it involved the typical hurry up and wait.  Arriving just before the weekend we needed to wait until Monday before it could happen.  I was just thankful they had opened the area for visitors.  As little as two months ago none were allowed due to restriction caused by the covid-19 pandemic.  While I understood the need for the precautions, I was also touched by the additional trauma this placed on both the patient and their loved ones.  It is hard enough to wait, but even harder to wait alone.

On Monday, the wait was over, and the doctors were ready to begin.  Melissa was whisked off and I was told where to go to wait.  A friend had already arrived and been shown to a private room to wait.  When I arrived from upstairs, I was directed to the same consultation room.  As we began to wait, she asked if I had ever played Backgammon.  When I mentioned I had never played, she told me she had brought the game if I wanted to play.  As the wait went on, I decided to give it a try.  She had never taught anyone to play but had brought the rule book that came with the board.  I read through the book, asked a few questions, and we began to play.

The game of backgammon is more than 5,000 years old and is one of the world’s oldest games.  The checkers are set up on one of the board’s four quadrants, each with six landing spots.  Each player rolls dice in turn to determine how far to move any of their checkers.  The aim is to get all your checkers past those of the opposing player and then off the board.  If you are first to move all your checkers off the board, you win.  Backgammon is not hard to learn to play, but the strategy and luck of the roll means it never stops posing a different challenge.  Initially, my wait partner was easily winning. Then I was able to roll doubles on multiple turns, allowing me to pull ahead and win by one checker.  Since the game took about 30 minutes to complete, this was a good way to wait. 

Thoughts:  I have been in several situations where I needed to wait on both sides of this process.  While I had to wait as a patient, I have been anxious about the procedure, but once it started my wait was essentially over.  As a loved one the real wait comes as the procedure is being done.  You wait during the procedure, during the recovery, and then as the patient is moved to the ICU.  I have noticed different ways how either I or a wait partner have responded.  Some think it is important to maintain an ongoing conversation to keep each other occupied (distracts me).  Others sit in silence and turn to their own thoughts (isolates me).  Thankfully, my wait partner used a mix of both approaches.  She talked when I wanted to talk and left me to my thoughts when I needed to be left.  This form of communication is a good rule to follow in all situations.  It means you also need to pay attention to the needs of the other.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 11, 2021

As I was reading my paper on Saturday, I was watching the caretaker for the church who owns the property behind us.  He often rides his mower the day before services to make sure the area looks nice for worshipers.  While the front of the church is on higher ground, this back field is lower and tends to collect water.  Prior to the church buying the property the grass often reached one or two feet before the owner would bring out his mower.  Now it is done more often.

One of my “other duties as assigned” when I was director of a conference center in Kansas was mowing the grass.  I did not have to do this, but I found it relaxing to get on the mower, plug in my headphones, and escape the office by mowing into the evening.  Since we had 61 acres, there was always something that needed to be mowed.  One area always caused me concern.  This was a thin strip of ground situated between a sharp rise and a small creek.  Most days this was just tricky, but when the grass was damp it become precarious.  I admit, I had to pull the mower out of the creek on two occasions.  Maybe it would have been smarter to let someone else ride the mower in this area.

I thought of my experiences when I noticed the caretaker had gotten the mower stuck in the wet mud in the field.  He tried for several minutes to first rock the mower and then try to push it out.  He finally gave up and got his truck.  He pulled the mower free and returned the truck to the parking lot.  He came back to the freed mower and went back to mowing the wet patch of field.  It did not take more than five minutes before he was stuck again.  Apparently, he did not learn from his mistake.  He had learned something, however.  He immediately went to get his truck, pulled the mower out of the mud, and this time left his truck in the field.  This time he was ready in case he got stuck.  He jumped back on the mower and tried to complete the job. 

Thoughts:  As I thought about the caretaker and his mower it struck me how often we only learn what we want to learn.  The field was too wet to mow.  This was evidenced by his mower getting stuck not once but twice.  The obvious learning was the ground was too wet and to wait for another day.   Rather than learning the obvious, he first learned he needed to pull the mower out with his truck, and then to leave the truck in the field in case it got stuck again.  We sometimes find ourselves in similar situations.  The obvious solution for the pandemic was to immediately wear a mask, wash your hands, and maintain social distancing.  Most choose to ignore this obvious learning and instead banked on creation of a vaccine or reaching “herd immunity”.  While this solution seems to be working, the cost is 33.5 million cases and 595,000 deaths in the US alone.  Follow the science.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 10, 2021

Yesterday was Mother’s Day and I thought I would give a shout out to all the mothers.  When I looked online, I found the celebration of mothers and motherhood can be traced back to the ancient Greeks and Romans as they held festivals in honor of the mother goddesses Rhea and Cybele.  The modern precedent for Mother’s Day is the early Christian festival known as “Mothering Sunday.”  This was once a major tradition in the United Kingdom and parts of Europe, and the celebration fell on the fourth Sunday in Lent and was originally seen as a time when the faithful would return to their “mother church”, or the main church in the vicinity of their home, for a special service.

Mother’s Day is a holiday honoring motherhood that is observed in different forms throughout the world.  In the US, the day originated in 1908 and became an official holiday in 1914.  While the dates and celebrations vary, Mother’s Day traditionally involves presenting mother with flowers, cards, and gifts.  Melissa and I decided to give my mother a special treat by going to see her with a trip to Kansas (really?).  Since the pandemic struck, we have not seen my mother in over a year.  Sadly, that did not work out.

The official Mother’s Day holiday in the US rose in the 1900’s because of the efforts of Anna Jarvis. Following her mother’s death in 1905, Jarvis conceived of Mother’s Day as a way of honoring the sacrifices mothers made for their children.  Over time, the Mothering Sunday tradition shifted into a more secular holiday, and children would present their mothers with flowers and other tokens of appreciation.  The custom eventually faded in popularity before merging with the American Mother’s Day in the 1930’s and 1940’s.  Jarvis remained unmarried and childless throughout her life but resolved to see the holiday added to the national calendar.  She argued that American holidays were biased toward male achievements and started a massive letter writing campaign to newspapers and prominent politicians urging the adoption of a special day honoring motherhood.  Rightly so, we now honor our mother with a special day.

Thoughts:  While we now honor mothers on the second Sunday of May, we need to remember to honor our mother on every day of the year.  Just like Father’s Day, which honors or fathers, honoring those mothers who went before and gave rise to us is an important celebration.  We are not just progeny; we are future generations.  We need to remember and celebrate the memory of those who came before.   We honor them for what they taught, but also for what they sacrificed for us.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 08, 2021

We have a running conversation on messenger between my siblings, our spouses, and mom.  Melissa is preparing for a procedure and when she talked about it on the feed my brother wrote back saying, “Shalom.”  Melissa immediately responded, “Shalom u vracha.”  Shalom is a Hebrew word meaning “peace”, while shalom u’vracha is translated as “peace and blessings”.  My brothers’ response was that Melissa knew two more Hebrew words than he did, and he would have to look it up (I did as well).  When he did, he responded, “Shalom u Vracha indeed.”  A little bit of friendly one up man ship.

I have mentioned that I worked on an archaeological excavation in Jordan one summer when I was in school.  The director of the excavation had been coming to the site for several years and had gotten to know many of the Bedouin who lived there.  When they greeted each other, one would provide a greeting and the other would counter with a different greeting.  The greeting “as-salaam ‘alaykum” literally means “peace be upon you,” and is a traditional greeting among Muslims.  Since most Arabs are Muslims, it is also the most common Arabic greeting.  The response to this greeting is “wa ‘alaykum as-salaam,” which essentially means “and also with you.”  While this may have been common, the director and the Bedouins would continue the greeting, using several different forms.  This would take the greeting and stretch it out over several minutes.  Again, I thought, a little bit of one up man ship.

When I checked online about Arabic greetings it mentioned several common practices.  If you do not feel comfortable with the religious greeting, “Ahlan” is the basic way to say “hello” in Arabic.  “Ahlan wa sahlan” is the more formal version of “ahlan,” and is used with people older than you or in a position of authority.  Again, the response is “ahlan bik” (if you are male) or “ahlan biki” (if you are female).  Like Spanish, politeness calls for different endings to indicate gender.  “Ma’a Salama” is another greeting, although it literally means “With peace” and was formerly used to say goodbye.  Now it is used by many for both greeting and departure.  It is not surprising how much is said by how we greet others.

Thoughts:  I made a phone call when I was in Jordan to the American Embassy.  I picked up the phone and the operator came on and said, “Hello.”  I was relieved to hear she spoke English because my Arabic was broken at best.  I began to rattle off the information I needed to convey until again I heard, “Hello.”  That was when I realized this greeting was the only English she understood.  American English usage has stripped much of the politeness from greeting and conversation.  We do not change address based on gender or social position.  While we have made our language more democratic, we have also lost the respect deserved by those with whom we speak.  This respect is not confined to age or gender; it is basic human decency.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 07, 2021

When I went to work Monday a friend showed me a picture of some of the damage caused by the extreme rains over the weekend.  While some were buffeted with high winds and even a small tornado, most of the damage in our county was caused by flooding.  That included several low water bridges, including the bridge across the river on the west side of town where I work.  The waters had been so fast that it took out the bridge. While this only serves a few families, it was the only access they had across the river and into town.  I was told there was a one lane dirt road that could serve as a go around.  The bridge being out meant a huge inconvenience for those on the other side.  It will also take a while to fix.

When I worked as director for a conference center in Kansas the state decided they needed to replace the bridge that provided access to the camp.  When they first brought the proposal to me, I was told the bridge would be out for four months during the summer, the main camping season.  While I had little clout to change the date, delays for materials and a major business located further down the road meant it was delayed until the fall.  We also had a go around, but it was four miles out of the way along dirt roads the few knew existed.  I received constant calls for directions while the bridge was out.

The fast-moving storm passed through west-central Arkansas Monday night.   Winds up to 90 mph hit Van Buren around 10 pm.  The storm and resulting EF-1 tornado moved through mostly rural county but also left damage in Alma.  Arkansas Valley Electric reported that they had approximately 14,500 members where the power was out after the storm.  The outage stretched across Crawford, Franklin, Johnson, Pope, Sebastian, Logan, and Scott counties.  Damage to the Crawford County Court House was centralized on the roof of the building as well as the many fallen limbs across the property.  Debris from the building was blown across the lawn of the courthouse and across the street to neighboring parking lots.  The local school districts shifted to virtual learning, but the power was out in many areas.    Rather than snow day schools now need to have virtual out days.

Thoughts:  By Thursday evening the power had been restore to all but about 100 customers.  While that is good for most, it means it is still out for 100 families.  The administrations $2 trillion infrastructure proposal includes $100 billion to give every American access to affordable, reliable, and high-speed broadband.  Virtual schooling during the pandemic has highlighted the disparity between wealthy urban areas and poor and rural area’s access to broadband.  Some in congress are decrying the proposal, saying Wi-Fi is not infrastructure.  I guess you can say that if you have access.  Having been on the other side, it seems more essential when it is out.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 06, 2021

I mentioned how the bullfrogs have begun to flourish with the addition of our accidental pond.  There has also been a plethora of treefrogs at the house since Melissa had it built in 1995.  That is in part because of the poorly drained field behind and house providing standing water for at least part of the spring-summer breading season.  This is accompanied by the belt of trees that divide our property from the businesses next door.   That means the conditions are right for the amphibious frogs to live and breed in the trees and then lay their eggs in the standing water.  Except for the constant calls, the frogs keep the mosquito population in check.

When I looked online the Cope’s Gray Treefrog (Dryophytes chrysoscelis) is also called the southern gray treefrog.  It is almost indistinguishable from the Gray Treefrog (Dryophytes versicolor) and shares much of the same geographic range.  Both species are variable in color, ranging from mottled gray to gray-green and therefore resembling the bark of trees.  These are treefrogs of woodland habitats, though they will sometimes travel into more open areas to reach a breeding pond.  The only readily noticeable difference between the two species is the mating call.  The Cope’s has a faster-paced and slightly higher-pitched call than the Gray.  In addition, the Cope’s is reported to be slightly smaller, more arboreal, and more tolerant of dry conditions than D. versicolor.

After the storms we got some water damage on our kitchen ceiling.  I called the insurance agent, and he provided a roofer to check the damage.  When the roofer went up on the roof, he found a PVC vent pipe had come loose and dropped into the attic, as well as other damage that is still being researched.  The interesting thing was, when he looked down the vent pipe, he saw a treefrog had decided this was the perfect place for his new home.  He took pictures for me and all you can make out are the two eyes looking up from about a foot into the pipe (it did not reproduce).  When I asked him about the treefrog, he said it happens all the time.  Good thing this pipe did not vent the furnace.

Thoughts:  After finding how difficult it is to determine between the two treefrogs common in Arkansas, I checked around for more identification possibilities.  I found a secondary site online which identified the mating calls of the frogs and toads of Arkansas.  The Cope’s Gray and the Gray do have different mating calls.  The calls begin the same, but the Gray has a secondary trill that makes it distinguishable.  That is how I know ours are the Cope’s Gray Treefrog.  I have found when trying to identify treefrogs, when identifying my birds, that even subtle differences begin to stand out when you take the time to learn the differences.  I have also found the same is true with people.  Once you take the time to get to know people the similarities fade into the background.  Instead, each person’s uniqueness is readily evident.  That is when them can become us.  Do the work.  Change is coming and it starts with you.

May 05, 2021

I had mentioned that while most of my plants survived the hard freeze we had two weeks ago, one of the peppers did not appear to make it.  Not only did all the leaves turn brown and fall off, so did the branches, leaving only a stub of a stem.  It took several days of procrastination before I finally bought another plant.  I believed the dead plant to be a tomato plant so that was what I bought.  I left the new plant inside since we have had severe storms and tornado warning the last days.  The last thing I wanted was to put the plant in the container and have it wiped out by a hailstorm.  When I went out to plant the tomato yesterday, I found two things.  One, the plant that froze was a pepper and not a tomato.  Two, the stem now had leaves beginning to grow off the end of the stub.  It seems to have revived.

I came across an article online that addressed how the American economy could be revived.  It had three points that need to be taken into consideration, and all revolve around learning from crises we have overcome in the past.  Successful government responses to previous crises have worked when they first prioritize people.  We need to focus on human welfare and human capital.  Second, a crisis tends to accelerate preexisting economic trends, and government responses are effective when they take that into account and plan long-term policy accordingly.  Third, the most effective planning for long-term economic recovery starts early, often alongside acute crisis-relief efforts.  We denied the crisis existed and then delayed any response and missed the early intervention window.  I guess that means plan B.

One of the problems faced during a crisis is the pressure on policy makers to focus on the short term rather than long term solutions that could create real change.  A long-term solution would be to begin to build and expand public and private sector innovation through education, research and development grants, and providing publicly available data.  This also means taking steps to facilitate transition to the post-pandemic economy by investing in programs that including job matching and reskilling that would be crucial for building the workforce of the future.  As always, for our economy to be revived it will rely on a combination of past action and present response based on the result of those actions.     

Thoughts:  When I looked up “revived” in the online Free Dictionary it stated this was a variant of the word “re·vive (rĭ-vīv′)”.  As most know, revived means “to bring back to life or consciousness, or to resuscitate.”  It can also mean “to restore” or “to return to use” or “to regain health, vigor, or good spirits.”  Certainly, that is what happened to my pepper plant.  We are told this is also what is needed for our economy.  Several types of service and industry jobs will likely never return.  This is an opportunity to retrain and retool for a new workforce.  The old ways do not be revived.  What they need is to be transformed.  Do the work.  Follow the science.  Change is coming and it starts with you.