Buffalo Gal

 I started my week off in a determined way, if not a nice way.  I put on my gardening outfit (heavy denim jeans, old T-shirt, long sleeved denim shirt, mens’ black work socks, old gardening shoes and most importantly, in the last few days, my mosquito helmet/hood. The skeeters are legendary and when they buzz your head and face even though it is covered with mosquito netting, you get the feeling that they are going to pick you up and carry you off to their nesting places, if there is such a place for mosquitos.

My original garden spot (the first of many I have planted over the years) had a jungle-like look about it due to a forest of Canadian thistles….huge, tall, tree-like weeds with roots that go about a mile into the earth once they get a foothold. The soil was too wet for rototilling so I got the bush clipper out and started to clip thistles in the raspberry patch. They were taller than the raspberry plants…. having benefitted greatly from all the recent rains.  The raspberries are going to bring forth an abundant crop but so would the thistles if I had not clipped them off…I know I am going to have to do it again and perhaps again before the gardening season ends.(groan)

It is a lovely summer day but when you get into the garden wearing all your skeeter-protective clothing, the sun gives way to making you terribly hot and sweaty. (I took my garden towel along  to mop my brow every 10 minutes or so, requiring a lifting of the skeeter net helmet.  I was saying my usual mantra at this time of the summer: "Oh why did I plant all those tomatoes? peppers? pumpkins and squash? the raspberry patch?  Why,oh Why,did I do it again?"     This happens each summer when the weeds overpower the garden plants, the mosquitos have hatched by the zillions, the gnats are ever-present and the summer heat is upon us.  Planting the seeds and small plants is one thing…taking care of them in the heat and humidity of July and August is another thing.   I did stay with it long enough to clip all the thistle trees in the raspberries.  Other parts of the thistle jungle got mowed, waiting for the soil to dry enough for the rototiller to finish the job.  Then—if theheavens will allow it, I am finally going to roll out my black garden cloth in the places I do not want to weed again this summer.  Rain, rain, stay away—-even for just a few day (s)!!!

Happier Note: I got the nicest gift from our neighbor’s mom and dad.  Neighbor Jane is like our daughter and we cluck over her like mother hens, helping her when she needs help and coming to her rescue when things go really bad—like the night she needed to take one of her pets to the 24 hour animal hospital in Fargo.  Her parents sent us a wonderful letter plus a gift certificate to our local supermarket.  What a thoughtful gift!    It led me to think about what one of our sons and his wife are doing with their tax return/rebate.  They are sinking the entire amount into a gift card from one of their locally owned grocery chain stores (Cashwise originates in St Cloud).  I think that is a marvelous way to use tax rebate monies for American businesses and not use it in a way that will reward foreign companies that do not benefit our economy one bit.   When our ship comes in (the tax rebate) we plan to do the same thing—-use it for groceries from a locally owned business.  I refuse to pay  my  rebate American tax dollars for foreign oil products (which we need) but this is a matter of principle…..use the U.S. tax rebate on American products like food that we need on a day to day basis.  

Time to recover from the thistles and get enough energy back for some laundry to hang out in the fresh air and light breezes of the day.   I like saving the energy an electric dryer takes…especially when the days are so good for drying clothes on clotheslines.  Too bad so many have not got clotheslines any longer.

Today’s FORUM (June 29) had an article about Linda Coates and her many charitable activities. She certainly is a woman of remarkable abilities and talents.  I wonder if she ever gets to stay at home for a day?  She is probably so efficient she can do it all and still spend time in her home.

Another article that caught my eye today is a letter from a person named ………rats! I cannot find the paper now. Someone who is very closely related to me by marriage has taken it out to the summer "hytte"/cabin/sunporch/sunroom.  Oh well, the letter was a great send-up or spoof on the worthy cause of many Fargoans recently in getting a smoking ban passed by the voters so that no smoking can now take place, even in bars and taverns. There has been much moaning and groaning from the other side of that issue lately in the form of letters to the editor telling how bad for business and other bad side effects this smoking ban is going to have.  Today’s letter writer, using considerable satire/irony/sarcasm… & similar literary devices, took on these complaints by suggesting a "new worthy cause"……that of getting deep fat fryers eliminated from all Fargo restaurants.    The writer’s rationale is that deep fat fryers cook food in a way that is likely to clog one’s arteries with the ever-lurking plaque that causes heart attacks and since heart disease is the number 1 killer of all the diseases of our modern culture—–such cooking devices should be banned.  He even reasoned that those who work near deep fat fryers are badly affected, just as those who work in smoking places.   Because the restaurant owners offer discounts to their workers for food, naturally the workers will choose the deep-fat fried food to save money on what they eat while working…thereby taking them down the road to certain heart disease…..and death (eventually)

It was a letter that made me chuckle deeply but we need to go even farther with "worthy causes" in order to protect people’s health.   Why is alcohol (not the rubbing type but the drinking type) being left alone by health- worriers and watchers-out- for- others’ health??? Alcohol is a proven dangerous, even poisonous, substance being served everywhere a liquor license is possessed.   Think of the young people in the FM area who have died due to alcohol poisoning….like those who went to a bar with their buddies to consume 21 drinks as fast as they could get them down on their 21st birthdays?  There have been more than one of those tragedies.  How about the recent death of a young man from Hebron ND who went to Wahpeton Science College to celebrate graduations with his pals?  He drank too much alcohol  and fell off some structure, banged his head and died from the head injury.  He should have been protected by alcohol police committees similar to the ones who got the smoking ban.  How about all the stats. about the effects of alcohol on unborn babies? (fetal alcohol syndrome)  Those pregnant women need to be stopped from consuming alcohol. Think of the annual statistics of alcohol-related traffic accidents.  The numbers there surpass both death tolls per year of military people in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Korea, Germany—-anywhere we have military stationed and we are EVERYWHERE!!!!    How many cases of heart disease, cancer, or liver disease are directly related to alcohol consumption?

I have made my case but think of the uproar if such a ban on alcohol were able to be put into place with no prohibition- type of cheating being done by runners of rum from Canada, etc. as occured in the 1920s when alcohol actually was banned for a time period.  Think of the treacherous makers of bathtub gin and the speakeasys that cropped up all over the nation.  Think of the uproar by bar owners then…or owners of liquor stores or grocery stores that are licensed to sell alcohol in many states.   It would be deafening to hear the outcries. 

 But…it IS a worthy cause because alcohol is a bad effector of one’s health and well being. Think of all the women and children beaten by drunken husbands and boyfriends!  That could be eliminated with the banning of alcohol.

Come to think of it…there are a lot of health hazards lurking even in grocery stores.  Fat meat (porkchops, sausages, lunch meats, hot dogs ) ought to be banned as well.  Anything containing sugar should be banned because sugar turns to fat in bodies and that affects one’s heart health in a big way.  I can envsion empty baking supplies shelves, especially the sugars…brown, white and powdered.  Candy shelves would be as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard.   Say, how about all products made with white flour?  That is bad for our health too.  Get rid of all white bread, rolls, all pies, cakes, and similar baking goods.  Bye-Bye bakeshops and pastry shops. (Oh I will miss Cynthia’s a lot,even though I know it has a new name)  I will miss my white Hornbacher’s bread as morning toast.  Never another Nut Goodie… (sob)I cannot bear the thought.

Maybe I am going to far with my banning……..but those who did not want the smoking ban are feeling the same way (going too far) at losing their pet vice—the deep satisfying inhalations of cigarette, pipe, or cigar smoke.    All the fun is being taken out of our lives.

Think of living under a Liberal Democratic congress and perhaps a Liberal President!  We could be learning to  know the true loss of happiness and the right to kill ourselves by smoking, drinking or eating.   The Liberal Poliezi will be on our cases and taxing us to death to boot.

Prepare for a grim future, my fellow citizens.

(How did I get here?)

Serendipity is defined as "finding something you weren’t really looking for" and also as "making unexpected and fortunate discoveries".  I have experienced "serendipity" today.

In April, at the local art show, I bought a painting by a lady from Moorhead whose first name is Sherbanoo and I knew that was not an "English" name in the sense that the Amish consider "the English".   Sure enough, when I met her today, I learned that she had been born and spend her earlier life in India.  She brought along her friend, named Tanmayi, who is also a native of India.    What a delightful time we had today.  I invited my friend Fran to come also to meet the two ladies and we spend a good length of time talking, admiring the painting I bought, taking pictures of it for a website, and reading some of Fran’s wonderful poetry.  It was definitely a day for the Fine Arts!!!

Our conversation led to many things;  the two ladies really enjoyed the rural setting in which I live; they loved the trees in our wooded land, the open skies, the fresh breezes, and also decided that they were ready to move into my little cabin ("Hytte") as soon as they could transport their possessions out there!    Now, this is a good reason to get electricity and water hooked up to the little sunporch/cabin!!!   I have people ready to occupy it.

We enjoyed having an old fashioned "whipped cream" cake with raspberry topping, tea, coffee and lemonade.  We had to go easy as one of the ladies had a dinner appointent at 5:30 and we could not ruin her appetite completely.  The two ladies also offered to make a complete dinner of Indian cooking and that prospect is one that I am eager to see through to the day we do it.  I have always wanted to eat Indian cuisine and here is an opportunity not only to taste that style of cooking but to have it homemade and delivered to my own home for an evening of more delight and serendipity!!!

I love meeting new people and making new friends.  I think this has been accomplished today with the serendipitous meeting…. via a lovely watercolor painting I bought at an art show in April.  The talented artist contacted me soon after and after e- mailing each other for a couple of months, we finally arranged a day to meet and talk and enjoy each others’ company along with two of our good friends as well.   Another good friend, "Dorothy" who is well into her 80s could not come along today, so we have planned a meeting to have lunch together at one of the many F-M restaurants as soon as we possibly can arrange that.

Friends are wonderful!  New friends are wonderful!   Life is good!

I read an amazing bit of news from THE HINDU.COM newssite.  It seems that Obama is a cinch now since he will soon be getting help from……Lord Hannuman, a Hindu god.  If I recall correctly, Hannuman is the sacred monkey god of the Hindu religion.

Anyway, a man named Briij Mohan Bhama has organized an 11 day religious ceremony at Karol Bagh (a site in India) for the success of Obama’s election in the U.S. elections in November.    From THE HINDU site:  "The idea of sending an idol of Hannuman dawned on him (Mr. Bhama) after friends in the United States mentioned a ‘prominent American politician who carried a miniature Hannuman idol in his pocket for luck’ Mr. Bhama said speaking on the first day of the ceremony on Tuesday." (June 24)

It seems that the first day ceremony was attended by Carolyn Sauvage, a Democrats Abroad India chairperson.  The ceremony included "pranapratishta", or the infusion of life into an idol and was performed by dozens of priests reciting mantras in tandem.

The life-infused idol of Hannuman will be kept in secusion for 10 days.  Shortly thereafter the idol will be shipped to Senator Obama to assure that he receives this helpful boost toward his election before the August 24 beginning of the Democratic convention in Denver, CO.

With such powerful aid from India, John McCain might just as well hang it up and let the good times roll for Hannuman the monkey god and Senator Obama….our next president.

If only other presidential candidates prior to this election had known about this, the presidential elections could have turned out quite differently.  Poor hapless John Kerry, Al Gore and Bob Dole could have been aided in their sought-after elections if only they had known about this "monkey business" that is now available to Barack Obama.

Woe is them!

Well well, Meritcare CEO Roger Gilbertson has announced (on Monday) up to 100 positions being cut at the Meritcare Medical System.  The cuts are actually more like 300 positions lost, "by attrition" said Dr. Bruce Pitts.  So in sum total, patients of the Meritcare system are going to be in further jeopardy due to the missing 300 jobs.

However, CEO Gilbertson had the audactity to declare this:  "Care will be taken to make sure that the reductions do not undermine patient safety."     Say what?

I beg to differ with Gilbertson.  Apparently the Meritcare CEO does not spend much time on the hospital floors at Meritcare, where, even before the cuts were announced, patients are receiving a  lack of care by the staff of RNs, CPNs and other staff who do the hard work caring for hospitalized patients.  These "underlings" on the Meritcare Staff are forced to work long shifts up to 12 hours long. The staff has also been cut back to a bare minimum making it difficult for those who work these killer shifts having more work to do and more to keep track of (drug dosages, highly technical equipment, critical oxygen equipment, et.al.) with hospitalized patients.     This has been standard practice in way too many hospitals over the past decade.  How can any medical staffer, especially those involved in critical care of patients who are in ICUs,  Cardio Intensive Care or Surgerical Critical Care   give the kind of care patients need when the staff of nurses and other support staff are forced to work such long hours?    They cannot possibly be at their best, especially at the end of a shift.  

 I think you could bet your bottom dollar, the highly-paid MDs would not subject themselves to such long hours on duty.  But, in order  NOT  to cut back their more- than- generous salaries in the system, guess who takes the brunt of the cuts?    The RNs and CPNs and other support staff, that’s who….the one’s who are the MOST involved in patient care and the day- to – day running of the hospital and medical clinic.     To say that the Mucky-Mucks do not want the big cuts "to undermine patient care" is ludicrous, if not an outright lie!!!!   It has already been happening for a decade or longer with the ridiculous 12 hour shifts in all areas of the hospital.

I just talked with a woman this morning who has a family member who was hospitalized at Meritcare recently and received very  "slim pickin’s" when it came to patient care on a weekend. This person was recovering from surgery and came out of the hospital with this advice for those who are so concerned about not "undermining patient safety" and I quote the patient:  "If you are going to have your hospital open on the weekend, try staffing it so patients receive the care they need!!"

I have a few questions I would like to put to CEO Gilbertson and Dr. Pitts who described the past year as "not as profitable a year" for Meritcare.    One question would be this one:  Do you think that all the building of new buildings in various areas of Fargo and elsewhere has  anything to do with your "not profitable year?"         Is there a connection between wanting to gobble up every medical venue in the FM area (in a most piggish way ) among allmedical providers partly responsible for your lower profits???      And then, how much are you going to raise the costs of your "alleged" care of patients" in order to cover your "not so profitable year"  ????  

Merticare’s actions in cutting back on their medical staffers is another sign of very bad management and very bad judgement.  I think this is a long-term problem and it is driven by a word that most MD’s would not want spoken aloud…..GREED.    I bet there are no MDs in the system who are taking pay cuts.

This is another way of just begging  for a nationalized healthcare system.  Any medical system who  refuses to suffer a "not so profitable" year at the expense of their critical support staffers …..and their patients…..is in need  of a major "fix" and perhaps the future national government will give them exactly what they deserve.

I have been through several major phases concerning family and friends.  First, it was baptisms of babies …of family and friends.  That was later followed by Confirmations  and then a 25th wedding anniversary of the couples who had produced the babies and growing teenagers.  Then is was attending graduation receptions for the same babies we had watched grow up.  Now a new phase is here….this weekend we attended two Golden Anniversaries for two couples who have been our friends for many years. It is a lovely way to round out many years of friendships.  

The remarkable thing about the Golden Anniversaries of friends is that so few couples make it that far nowadays.  Early deaths have  broken many faithful partnerships.  And the specter of the growing divorce rate since most of us of the same age were married—late 1950s and early 1960s…has arisen to haunt many couples and many families.  Divorce affects way more than the couple who splits up….even grown children and grandchildren suffer from such an action but it continues to happen more often than I’d like to see.

So when friends of ours have a Golden Anniversary celebration, it is important to celebratewith them.  To see their grown- up children…the little ones we remember so well…with their often-grown or nearly- grown children is a thing of joy.  

 Yesterday we traveled northeast of Detroit Lakes to Osage , MN to celebrate 50 faithful years of a couple we have known for over 30 years.  What fun to see them again since they moved to a lake home some years ago.  Their 3 grown children hosted the event and their 5 grandchildren, two of whom are settled with a spouse and have produced two great-grandbabies, were all there to help thier parents and grandparents make this transition to 50-plus years together. 

 We also celebrated the 50th anniversary of another couple of dear friends on Saturday and the reception for them was a testimony to many long- term friendships and relationships from a small town northwest of Fargo.  They had lived the majority of their lives in that small town til they retired and moved to Fargo (to be closer to all 4 of their children and many, many grandkids).  I think the entire town and countryside from McVille, ND came to honor the couple on their 50 years of faithfulness to each other.   Our other friend’s reception was a similar one…."lunch" served by the ladies of the church and many, many friends from the places they had lived for their 50 faithful years together. 

People are so delighted to celebrate 50 years of faithfulness….or 25, 30, 40, 45, 60 and even 70 in a few situations.  I love to read the "Celebrations" page of the FORUM on Sundays to track all these faithful couples—people I do not even know.  It is such a pleasure to see their wedding pictures when they were both so young and then see the picture taken to celebrate the significant number anniversary.  Everyone changes a great deal over the years but it is always so heart-warming to see in the faces of the older couple, the happiness and hopefulness you see in the wedding picture when they were so young, and in love, and at the threshold of their lives together.

A lot happens between the taking of those two pictures.  Nobody goes through the years of marriage without having troubles and trials.   Perhaps there have been many traumas…deaths, illnesses, surgeries, recoveries, losses of jobs, unexpected moves away from what they thought was "home"…crises with their children as they grew up….deaths of their own parents and siblings….we all go through it and do the best we can under the circumstances.  For each 50 years of faithfulness, there is a story that could be put into book form and read with tears and laughter on the part of the reader of such a story.

Yesterday at the reception in Osage, one of the couple’s daughters had put together one of those delightful, technologically-perfect picture shows that ran on a screen for the visitors to watch.  Starting with both of the couple as babies, their lives proceeded through their childhoods, their wedding and their growing family.  It came full circle at the end of the slide show with pictures taken just recently as the couple held their first great grandchild.  I really enjoy such presentations at anniversaries and even at funerals where I have seen the same picture history of the one who has died.  It is a way of making precious connections to many years of a life, or lives.

If we are blessed with longer lives, we shall be attending many of these celebrations of 50 years of faithfulness in the near future.  Fortunately, all the couples our own age that we know well, have stayed together for all the years of  their marriages.     All of us who have known each other for many years are about to cross that threshold ourselves.

I am shocked, along with others, at the recent news story out of Gloucester, Massachussets, a fishing town down on its economic luck, with 17 young teenagers (all are around 16 years of age) who have deliberately gotten themselves pregnant.  These girls made a "pact" that all of them would do everything they could to have babies during a one year period so they could "raise them together".  Some reacted to the news of their confirmed pregnancies with high fives and congratulations among the group of teenage girls.   If this weren’t such a sad situation for these girls, the pact could be compared to past girlish high-jinks such as I participated in….we made a pact one March to all show up at school on March 17 with green food coloring in our hair.  Or we might make a pact to all wear our white cords and our white bucks with colored anklets on the same day…..quite an innocent contrast to the pact the Gloucester teenagers made with each other.  Our only  consequences were that one mother was so mad when she saw her daughter’s green hair on March 17, 1955, she made the daughter wash it out before she allowed her out the door that morning.  There was no impact from the white cords/white bucks pacts unless your white cords were in the dirty clothes that day.

 Gloucester is described in news reports as a deeply Catholic community which has not been eager to allow the schools or other agencies to give out information about contraception.  It would not have done any good in this case, at any rate….these girls were DETERMINED to get pregnant in any way they could…one father of the 17 expected babies is a 24- year old homeless man.  The other fathers are varied and sundry boys of high school age who probably did not need too much coercion to cooperate with the girls who wanted to be pregant and have babies together in the coming year.

Of course the community of Gloucester is in shock and the school is looking into statutory rape charges against the men/boys who impregated these teenagers….none of the girls are over 16 years old.  How do you charge a 15 or 16 or 17- year old underage boy with statutory rape when HE is not even "of age"???     It is no doubt, a most complicated mess that will not easily be solved and certainly not undone.    

What these girls have done is to change their young lives forever and they seem not to realize what they are getting into when they deliberately planned to get pregnant.   Most of the girls are described by Gloucester school officials as needy girls who are not getting much love from their homes, a.k.a. parents.  One outraged blogger asked  a definitely crude question…..her blog was titled "where the F – - – are the parents?"    From the description of these needy girls who were said to "have low self esteem" ,  the parents are obviously not very concerned about their daughters…probably they are embarassed now that the situation has developed and perhaps they are being chided by their Priests or other clergy for their being such AWOL parents.

It is a sad commentary on our culture.  Teen (unmarried)  pregancies are once again on the rise….birthrates in the 15-17 year old age group have risen by 3 % since 2006.  These "mothers" are still children, themselves.  They are not equipped to be raising a baby. They are from dysfunctional homes, themselves, and have probably learned the poorest of parenting skills from observing whoever is "raising" them.  Perhaps with the carelessness of their parents, they are raising themselves in a haphazard manner that only an uncared-for teenager can manage.  Teenage girls who have a baby in order to have someone to love them are not aware that a baby does not give out love but is a demanding, self-centered creature who needs much more than the young teenager can give to it.  They become disillusioned soon after the baby’s birth and horrible things have happened.  Remember  the teenager in Ottertail County a few years back who left her infant daughter in a freezing cold apartment while she pursued her habit for meth?   The infant was found nearly frozen in the cold apartment, hungry, with frozen unchanged diapers, probably too exhausted to cry any more.  Fortunately this baby lived but was taken away from her teenage mother.  We hear horror stories about babies who are killed or injured by those who gave birth to them or those who fathered them.  We hear  more horror stories about young girls who throw their newborns in  dumpsters and abandon them to die in the garbage.

Some adults are speculating on the possiblilty of the influence of movies and TV shows on these girls who must see this as a dreamy romantic idea—to all have babies together, to have baby showers for each other and all the other unrealistic glorifications of a teenage pregnancy that they have seen, in the person of Jamie Lynn Spears (the hapless Brittney’s sister who just gave birth as an unmarried young teenager herself).   The media has recently glorified unmarried teenage pregnancies.

Without good homes and good responsible, LOVING parents, teenage girls (and boys) are doomed to repeat the foolish errors we see in the Gloucester story.  Children having children is not the only problem.  When teenagers …or even younger children… are unloved or uncared for by their own mothers and fathers, what chance do they have of living normal productive lives as adults?     Only the strongest of them will overcome such odds and most of them will do destructive things to insure that their own lives are compromised in one way or another.  Until we can find ways to instill true parenting in mothers and fathers, we are doomed to see such destructive patterns continue to emerge in our society and culture.   The future does not bode well with such conditions existing in homes across the nation… as they exist among the 16- year old Gloucester girls who made a pregnancy pact togehter in their Massachussetts town.

It makes me heartsick.

The day is warm and sunny; the temperature is approaching 80 degrees F.    What a good day to hang freshly laundered clothes out to dry on a clothesline……….what is a clothesline you ask?   For the much younger among us, clotheslines were what clothes were dried upon for decades and decades…and before clotheslines I have heard that people spread freshly washed clothing on convenient bushes and shrubs to dry in the sun.  (Like at the Plimouth Plantation in Olde Massachussetts)

I know, clothes dryers have replaced clotheslines….but for Old Girls like I am, we love to revert to our clothelines in the summertime when the days are warm and fair and the breezes are blowing.  You have never smelled anything quite as fragrant as sheets or towelsthat have been line-dried in spring and summer breezes.  Oh well, occasionally a bird passes over the lines and may drop what we used to call a "bird-bomb"…. necessitating a re-washing of an item or two that ended up in the line of fire….which makes me take off on a rabbit trail about my friend, Jean, who told about her first crush when she was in high school…she was 14 and so was he, and one summer afternoon, the two of them were standing in the shelter of a leafy tree—-unseen by Jean’s watchful mother in the house.  Jean knew it was going to happen..she could just tell it…he was going to give her her first- kiss- ever and probably, right on the lips.  As they leaned toward each other, puckering up as they advanced forward til their noses were almost touching……splat!  The boyfriend got a birdbomb right on his cheek and thus ended Jean’s hoped for first kiss.  But I digress……back to clothes dried on clotheslines.

Today I hung out a complete load of white things to dry in the sun, pinned firmly to the clotheslines by the trusty wooden snap clothespins.  These can still be purchased in the laundry area of your local super-, K-, or Wal- marts or even at the exlusive French shoppe, known as "Tar-ghay" (Target) (Bullseye).   Right now I have a lot of white things flapping gaily in the afternoon’s gentle breezes and it will not be long before all of those things are dry and fragrant.

Clotheslines were useful for reasons other than drying clothes.  They were the foundation of many "clothesline tents" constructed by children of another era who did not have TV sets, computers or high- tech games that are played on computers or TV sets.  We actually had to be creative in the summertime in order to have fun together in our neighborhood play groups.  We built either a pup–tent style clothesline tent from blankets or a square -riggers  which took more blankets than the pup tent style.  Both required huge numbers of clothespins to hold them together and if a big wind came up, your clothesline tent was history in a big hurry.  It was no use trying to sleep overnight in them either; it was tried many times but mosquitos always drove the tent-sleepers into their homes by 10 o’clock p.m. at least.  I do remember hearing the 10 o’clock curfew whistle blowing once but I was usually in the house before 10 p.m. driven their by the pesky skeeters.

Clothelines were also helpful in  nabbing "Crabbers" on summer nights.   "Crabbing" was a favorite amusement of summertime’s teenagers.  Just as it got dark, sometimes not til after the ten o’clock curfew whistle had blown, a group of teens would say to each other, "let’s go crabbin’ " and that meant staging raids on crab apple trees in other people’s yards.  Somehow it was never equated with the sin of stealing…it was just…..crabbin’….taking large handfuls of the yet-green crabapples and eating a bite out of one and usually thowing the rest away in the lawns or streets (grownups did NOT like this, for some reason).  Often pursuit was given—with a dog or without a dog, and the "crabbers" would be dropping like ripe, heavy pumpkins, coming down  out of the crabapple trees (sometimes from amazing heights, if a dog were involved).  If you did not sprain or break your ankle you joined the others in flight in the totally dark yards and that is where the clotheslines came in;  you were likely to get tangled up in a clothelines, if you were tall, right at your neck and if you were not tall, you would fall over a tall teenager who had already been decked by the clothesline.    Many bumps, bruises, skinned shins, and awfully sore necks were the usual results of "goin’ crabbin’"  on soft summertime nights.

The other possiblility—–a bad case of diahrrhea from the green apples was always a bother the next day and would put you out of commission for the next evening’s forays into back yards with green apples still clinging to  the tree branches.

At my age, I am grateful to be able to hang out freshly washed clothing on clotheslines. My "crabbin’ days were over many years ago.  I have not had the urge to build a clothesline tent for years and years , either.

I have recently lost faith in yet another business I thought was trustworthy.  It is the siding company that has the well known duck in their commercials. The duck touts the advertising theme that their siding does not have the cracks (quacks) that other siding companies put on your home, making a way for mosisture, dirt and whatever to get inside your siding. Some years back, we had that brand (it has part of the alphabet in its name) side our home. That has been entirely satisfactory but because of what we deemed as quality and trustworthy work, we also had some windows and a deck door installed by the same company.  The deck door was improperly  installed from the get-go and proved that by leaking into our home and into the basement whenever there was a driving rain from the south.

We have fruitlessly tried for a long time to get the company to re-do the door or install one properly…but to not avail.  That is why I say "Buyer Beware" when dealing with this company.   Once a product of theirs is installed, it seems they will take no responsibility forimproper workmanship and even go to the length of denying that they are responsible. This does not influence customers in a positive way if it happens to others like it has happened to us.

I sent a letter to the headquarters of this alphabetical- duck company and have not even received an acknowledgement of its receipt.  In my opinion, that is a sign of a most incompetent and customer-UNFRIENDLY business.  I am deeply disappointed but then I remembered that we had trouble getting the same company to stand by the contract we signed for the siding nearly 10 years ago.  A salesman from the company offered us a very good deal on a sale on the steel siding and that was a key factor in our choosing that company.    But when push came to shove on that reduced-sale price that had been guaranteed to us by the sales representative, there was a loooooooo—nnnnng period of foot dragging before we finally got the siding installed.   It took way too many phone calls and other reminders to make (force) them to honor the contract that had been signed and sealed by the sales rep.  I also now recall that after the late- fall (barely in time for winter) installation of the siding), we had to pick up a lot of cigarette butts and nails that had been left by the workers (who should have picked up their own messes).  We should have taken that as a warning of future dealings and skipped the deck door but we did not.

Now we are forced to buy another deck door from another company( at considerable expense for retired people) after becoming totally disillusioned with the ( you know who) company.  This time we have chosen another company who has installed new windows in our home already—with our complete and total satisfaction guaranteed and no problems in dealing with any adjustments.  I do not think we needed any—the installation was done PROPERLY in the first place, but in our previous experience with this business, we have not feared that we would be left hung out to dry if we had problems.  What a difference INTEGRITY makes!!!!

BUYERS, BEWARE!!!!!

Today is national "Flag Day".  It is always held on June 14 and with the exception of Michigan, it is not a holiday where people get the day off.  They do in Michigan, however.

I always remember Flag Day because it is my parents’ anniversary day. They were married on June 14 way back in 1933 and even took a "honeymoon" in my Dad’s almost-spanking new 1932 Ford Model-A coupe.  Those were the days of the Depression and they were unusual in that they had a wedding in church, my mother had a real wedding gown (white satin) and a bridal veil.  They had two attendants each and the ladies wore formals.  The men wore their best suits. They even had a ringbearer and a flower girl (my Dad’s niece and nephew who were just the right age.)

When I was growing up, my little hometown always had many flags out for Flag Day….they still do and I am proud that the day is remembered.   It was June 14 in 1777 that the flag with its stars and stripes was officially adopted as the United States flag.    In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation making June 14 the official observance of Flag Day.  Then in August of 1949, the U.S. Congress passed an act making June 14 Flag Day (as an Act of Congress).   

 You have noticed that all this official recognition took place quite a few years ago and maybe that is why Flag Day is another of the United States (almost) forgotten  official days.  Sometimes it seems like a few other national days are given short shrift also—-even November 11..the traditionally called "Armistice Day" was going by the wayside til Veterans’ groups revived it.  Many people give little notice of Memorial Day except to kick off the "lake" and "camping" season….have a cookout or picnic, but never bother to attend ceremonies marking the day of remembrance for those who died in our wars over our history.  Just a few loyal veterans and others who were in actual wars make their way to town cemeteries or town halls on Memorial Day.

More recently, it has become more "main-stream" to ignore the Flag, or to neglect attendance at remembrances of patriotic days and holidays.   Those of a certain political persuasion are more likely to think that the flag, the national anthem, the pledge of allegiance are vestiges of something that is naive or overly patriotic or even—-stupid.   I am sorry to know about these sorts of people.  They are not the kind of citizens I want to live beside in  this great nation of ours.  To truly love one’s country and to have repsect for its symbols might pass away eventually, if things keep going the way we have observed in recent decades….probably starting with the 60′s when flag-burning erupted on the scene and protesting college students began to unravel the fabric of traditional patriotic customs.

Would we be better off without a Flag Day or a Fourth of July or a Veteran’s Day or a Memorial Day?