Notes from the Home - February 10, 2013

   Shorty has been living at Covenant Woods for two weeks. There is something familiar about his thick, tousled white hair and horn-rimmed glasses, which led me to ask: “Has anyone ever told you, you look like Spencer Tracey?”

   His face answered with a look that said, “I’m going to throttle the next person who tells me that.” Fortunately, in true Spencer Tracey fashion, he decided that discretion was the better part of valor and said, “But I don’t believe them.”

   Shorty, who uses a walker, said he was stiff all over. He had spent the day at his house with a friend and a real estate agent.

   “I got rid of everything. The house is completely empty,” he said. “There was nothing to sit on. I had to stand up for a couple hours. Now I’m stiff as a board”

   Being nosey, we asked how much he was asking for the house.

   “Not as much as it’s worth,” he said. “But I want to get it sold. I’m in the croaking place now, and I want to be rid of all that stuff. I’m here, and I’m waiting to croak.”

   Shorty may be clearing the decks, but he doesn’t act like a man who plans to go down with his ship any time soon.

  

   Brenda was our server at dinner, and she wasn’t her usual self. Her usual self is smiling and darn near excessively attentive. She was neither tonight. Eventually, Corrine asked her if something was bothering her.

   “I’ve been having a bad day,” she said. “Everybody at my house is sick, and there is a bunch of demanding people in my section.”

   Brenda’s real job is at Publix. She’s a sub at Covenant Woods. Corrine said she likes Brenda much more than she likes Kevin, our regular server. Kevin does have an attitude at times. Of course, Kevin’s attitude might be the result of facing the “demanding people” everyday instead of just once or twice a week.

  

   Saturday afternoon, I got started on The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt’s Darkest Journey by Candice Millard. It wasn’t long before I found some nits to pick. The first sentence of the first chapter reads: “The line outside Madison Square Garden started to form at 5:30 p.m., just as an orange autumn sun was setting in New York City on Halloween Eve, 1912.”

   “Now wait just one minute there, missy,” thought I, “even in Ashtabula, several hundred miles to the west, the ‘orange autumn sun’ is all but gone by 5:30 in the waning days of October.” Indulging my suddenly curious mind, I went to the U.S. Naval Observatory website via Google, and learned the sun had set over New York at 4:55 that afternoon.

   Then I wondered about “Halloween Eve.” Halloween is a contraction of All Hallows’ Eve, so October 30 would be All Hallows’ Eve Eve. And with that, I decided it was time to get out of the apartment. In the hallway, I stopped to talk to Al, who was on his way to his mailbox. A few minutes later, Louise, who was on her way back with her mail, joined us.

   “What are you doing?” she asked Al.

   “I’m going to see if I got any mail.”

   “After that?”

   “Well, I’m going to go back upstairs,” Al said. “Then I’ll go out on the porch and smoke me a cigar. Then I’ll have a glass of wine, and then I’ll get my pipe and have toke.”

   “After that?” Louise asked.

   “Oh, I’ll probably eat some chocolate.”

   “That’s when you call me,” Louise said. “I don’t care about the rest of that stuff, but I do love chocolate.”

   Now that I have a recorder, Al has been reluctant to talk while it’s on. But, ever since I gave him the newspaper article about the Battle of Song Be, he has been writing to and talking with several men who served with him in Viet Nam. The other night, he was trying to draw a map of the area around the compound at Song Be based on a letter he’d received from one of the men who was there.

   “This stuff is driving me crazy,” Al said. “And, god damn it, Tom, it’s all your fault. You’re the one who got all this started.”

   I guess I was. And I believe there are three or four old men who are delighted that I did.

  

   The piped-in music at Covenant Woods has undergone a generational shift. Henry Mancini, Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Andy Williams have been sent packing. Now the music of the Beatles and Beach Boys fills the hallways.

   Alas, when elevator music is the music of your youth, it can only mean one thing: You’re old.

Political IOUS

   Who knows? I suppose it could be erroneous

   To say all politicians are felonious.

   Although, they never want to be harmonious,

   And are always happy to seem parsimonious

   And they really like being sanctimonious

   And they hate to do things unceremonious.

  

   There’s no fame in being unceremonious.

   Heck, they’re more newsworthy being erroneous,

   And on FOX it’s best to be sanctimonious.

   And a politician who is felonious

   Is OK as long as he’s parsimonious

   With those in need. But he can’t harmonious.

  

   No one cares about a pol who is harmonious,

   Who doesn’t huff and swear unceremonious.

   To be belligerently parsimonious

   Makes it acceptable to be erroneous

   And even quite astoundingly felonious

   So long as the pol remains sanctimonious.

  

   Big donors really like the sanctimonious

   And shun all those who want to be harmonious.

   They do not mind a guy who is felonious

   If he agrees to be unceremonious

   While he’s being purposefully erroneous

   To help make it seem like his parsimonious

  

   Stance is justified, and his parsimonious

   Votes are much more than just some sanctimonious

   Claptrap. Oh, his reasons might be erroneous,

   But so long as he doesn’t get harmonious

   And is really very unceremonious

   In making accusations of felonious

  

   Actions by others, he can be felonious

   Himself. The goal is to be parsimonious

   With all but his pals. Then, unceremonious

   Harrumphing and being quite sanctimonious

   And refusing to be at all harmonious

   Pleases those who pay him to be erroneous.

  

   Pols, unceremonious and felonious,

   Ever erroneous, always parsimonious

   And sanctimonious, detest the harmonious.

  

  

  

  

Notes from the Home - February 3, 2013

   After returning from a meander in the noonday sun, which was too cool for mad dogs and Englishmen, I was surprised to find the hallway full of women. Sara, who lived across the hall, died Thursday, and I thought they might me planning to do something for Lloyd, her husband. Perhaps they were, but the issue before the house at that moment was Inez’s television.

   “My TV won’t turn off,” she said.

   I followed Inez through the throng and into her apartment. She pointed to the offending Sanyo, and the phone rang.

   “Hello,” she said, waited for the caller to reply and then added, “I’ve got a man in here.”

   The caller was her son-in-law, who offered to come over should the man she had not be up to the task.

   “They left this,” Inez told me, pointing to a piece of paper taped to the TV stand. “It says, ‘Push Red Button,’ but I don’t see a red button.”

   With a lightning quickness it has seldom exhibited, my mind analyzed the problem.

   “Where’s the remote?” I asked.

   “Uh? Oh, there it is; on the recliner,” she said as she scooped it up and handed it to me.

   “Here’s the red button,” I said. Then, expertly pressing it, I silenced the yakking and turned the screen black.

   “Men understand these things so much better than women,” Inez said.

   And that’s how a man stuck in the 20th Century explained the secrets of a 21st Century television to a woman mired in the attitudes of the 19th.

  

   I am at that age now when I occasionally look at those younger than I and shake my head. Whatever happened, I wonder, to decency, courtesy and respect. “Why can’t they be like we were, /Perfect in every way?” the parents in Bye Bye Birdie asked. And often, so do I. Well, I used to. Now I’m a fogey living among fogeys, and my generational pride has to face reality. And reality is neither pretty nor reassuring.

   Corrine is in her early seventies, diabetic and in a wheelchair. She appears to be in possession of all her marbles, is alert, has a wry sense of humor and is very much aware of the world around here. She is also loath to utter phrases such as “I’m sorry” or “excuse me.”

   Friday at dinner, while attempting a pirouette in her wheelchair, she knocked a tray of cups off a table. Saturday, she gave a repeat performance at the salad bar, and all the packets of salad dressing ended up on the floor. Her reaction both nights was to put on her why-are-you-looking-at-me-like-that face. She didn’t even bother to say, “Oops,” and she never apologized to the staff that had to clean up her mess, and she never thanked them for their help.

  

   Generation X and Generation Y – no one seems to know where one begins and the other ends – did much better in my eyes this week. Arissa was over Friday for another interview. The topic this time was family and friends. And given the opportunity, I bragged mightily. I showed her Russ’ cartoon in the Readers’ Digest Humor Collection, and I showed her A Ledge, a Pie and Hazel the Fly, the book Russ and Debbie collaborated on.

   And then we moved on to Beth, Ken and Hayden. I told her about Hayden being born three months premature. I told her about the little guy being in the hospital for several months before he could go home, and how he has blossomed into a very, very bright and active little boy. And I bragged about Ken and Bethany going into business for themselves.

   Then we switched roles, and I asked her a few questions. I found out she’s twenty-nine and a single mother of two, and that she works and will graduate this spring. She must be doing well in school; she said they had a test earlier in the week, and she was terribly disappointed that she only got a B. I was always elated when I got a B.

   “I’m crazy busy,” Arissa said. “It’s overwhelming at times, but for some reason I haven’t quit. I’ve surprised myself.”

   And after bragging about Beth and Russ and listening to Arissa, I decided it’s time I set about surprising myself. God knows, unlike them, I’ve got time on my hands

Notes from the Home - February 1, 2013

     Suzanne’s assignment – with the standard proviso: “Should you wish to do it.” –   was to pluck a winter weed, write about it and perhaps sketch it. There are weeds in Georgia, even here at Covenant Woods, where the landscapers serenade us with their leaf blowers every Thursday. They haven’t eradicated the weeds, but they do keep them confined to areas not easily accessible to the halt and the lame. But I don’t suppose they get many requests from anyone for easier access to weed infested spots.

      Besides, a plucky weed is unimpressive next to pansies blooming in January. The pansies were blooming when I arrived in March. That wasn’t impressive; that was a sign that spring was here a few weeks ahead of its long anticipated arrival in northeast Ohio. They bloomed throughout the summer, too, which I assumed was the result of the daily doses of water from the Covenant Woods’ sprinkler system.

      It wasn’t until the end of October, when the days grew short and the air cooled, that the pansies began to impress. Fall eased into what the Georgia natives call winter, and still the pansies bloomed. There were days when they were beaten down by the pounding rain; and there were mornings when they teetered on the verge of a frosty death. But a little sunshine and a little warmth always followed, and that was all it took to bring back their springtime freshness.

    And so I wonder: Will spring seem as glorious this year? Will the crocuses and daffodils bring the same delight when the pansies have never ceased looking spring-like? Spring is a time of rebirth. And there is much to be reborn here: trees to get leaves and blossoms; grass to become green and lush; flowers to burst open and brighten the world with all the colors of Nature’s palette. Spring will be beautiful, it always is. But will the magic of spring be as magical after a winter that wasn’t so wintery?

     

      In another January surprise: there were two guys here working on my air conditioner. In the spirit of full-disclosure, they replaced the heat pump’s compressor. But it was the air conditioner malfunctioning that got my attention. It was stuffy in the room Tuesday evening, and I turned on the AC to make it a little less so. It worked its magic quickly, the room stayed comfortable and I went to bed. When I awoke in the early but-not-yet bright, the air conditioner was running.

      OK, I thought, I’ll get dressed, open the porch door and turn off the air conditioner. Now, I still dress as shabbily as ever, but it takes longer. When I finished tying my shoes, the air conditioner was still running and the apartment wasn’t a bit cooler. I took a peek at the thermostat. It was set at seventy-three; the room temperature was seventy-six. Something was amiss.

      After working for almost two hours, one of the repairmen said all was in order. I’ll have to take his word for it. If the ten-day forecast holds, there won’t be much need for the either the air conditioner or the furnace until Valentine’s Day or so.

     

      I began my career as a bingo caller, Wednesday afternoon. Annie said the afternoon game attracts a tougher crowd than the evening game. The ten or twelve women who played were nice enough, but none of them seemed to be having fun. There wasn’t much banter, and I could hear every sigh, groan and “damn it” of disappointment when the number I called was not the number desired. When it was over, however, they said they enjoyed having me and hoped I’d be back. I was back Thursday and survived.

      How many more times I’ll be back is another question. After two days on the job, I have discovered that there is a skirmish in progress between Eddie, the territorial and controlling resident, who has been running the afternoon game for longer than I’ve been here, and Penelope, the activities director.

      Penelope flagged me down as I was leaving the dining room Thursday and led me to a quiet corner of the lobby. She asked me if Eddie had been bossy at bingo. Given Eddie’s reputation for bossiness, there was use denying that she had been. I hastened to add, however, that I had never had more than a few short conversations with Eddie, and perhaps Thursday, Eddie was just being Eddie.

      “Four people have told me how bossy Eddie was today,” Penelope said. “I’m going to talk to her and tell her, when Tom is calling, it’s his game. I wanted to let you know what’s going on, because Eddie is going to be mad.”

      All of which brings to mind an article that was on the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette website earlier in the week.

      “We're accustomed to stories about childhood bullies, but similar behaviors are occurring among seniors in independent retirement communities, assisted living facilities, nursing homes and community centers,” Sally Kalson wrote under the headline, “Hostilities in the nursing home: Bullying tied to loss of independence and inhibition.”

      The article brought to mind a conversation Catherine and I had at dinner several months ago.

      “Sometimes this place is an awful lot like high school,” I said.

      “High school?” Catherine said. “It’s more like first grade.”

      Andrea Fox, a gerontologist and medical director of the Squirrel Hill Health Center, split the difference in the K-12 analogy. “One of my patients described it as junior high all over again,” she said.

     

      “I sat out on the porch this afternoon,” Al said. “I smoked a cigar, took a marinol and had a glass of wine. It took me somewhere. I don’t know where. I think I’m turning into a damn addict. Then after an hour-and-a-half, I was back.”

      And he talked about the frustrations of being an old guy in a community of old people.

      “All I want to do is help people,” he said. “But these people don’t want help. They want to do it themselves for as long as they can.” He thought for a moment before adding, “I’m the same way.”

      That realization explains why Al is not among the bullies of Covenant Woods.

     

      I came across the transcript of an All Things Considered interview from 2006. Robert Siegel spoke with William Labov, a linguist at the University of Pennsylvania, in a piece titled “American Accent Undergoing Great Vowel Shift.”

      “Half of this country has a merger of the word classes, cot, caught, don, dawn, hock, hawk. You can hear the difference as I'm saying it,” Labov said, to illustrate a point.

      Siegel said he could hear the difference. I didn’t hear the interview, but I said the words to myself over and over, and I couldn’t hear any difference between cot and caught, don and dawn or hock and hawk. Then it all became clear.

      “But if you came from Los Angeles or Pittsburgh, those words sound pretty much the same,” Labov said.

      After all these years, I’m still fluent in Pittsburghese.