Rain, rain, go away—but be prepared if it doesn’t

 

              Be prepared, they say. Think ahead, they say. During last week’s Memorial Day weekend, meteorologists said to stay away from the rivers, that they were running high and fast. The geologists said to be prepared for an earthquake. The weather people told us how to survive a tornado. Doctors always tell us to either eat right and exercise, or be prepared to live a shorter life.

            I’m prepared if the world DOES explode, implode, burn or however it ceases to be. And, for the first time, I wrote out an earthquake survival guide for each room in my house.

Living room: lie under the piano and hold on to one of the legs. Dining room: crawl under the table and hold on to a leg. Kitchen or the three-windowed breakfast room: brace myself in the narrow space between the fridge and the washer/ dryer. Middle hall area: up against any inside wall, the free-standing mirror perhaps covering my upper body. Maybe not. Pulling glass out of my skull might not be easy—or pleasant.  My bedroom: under the bed.  Billy’s bedroom, ditto. The four-windowed back sitting room with half bath: run for the windowless bathroom.

Sometimes one can be prepared and it’s not enough. Think of the sandbagged houses and businesses that were still ruined during the recent rains and flooding.

 How can row-crop farmers be prepared for unusual weather events? With insurance, I would imagine. And prayer, probably. Even though it seemed the crops might thrive, too much water is as deadly as too little.

A few years back, the Boy Scout troop from out-of-state experienced what they’d been prepared for. One of the rivers spilled over its banks and stranded the group. Over and over, it was reported, they were prepared for survival, even without cell phone reception. And they were.

Many people, including myself, have prepared for our own deaths by purchasing a burial plan with a funeral home, a plot in a cemetery—for which an extra twenty-five dollars is due upon opening the grave. (Can’t you just see the deceased rising up during the final words and holding up the bills for the grave digger?)

True story: After Mom died, a cemetery trustee came by the house and asked the family for the money. Mom had prepared for everything but that.

“He may hope for the best that’s prepared for the worst.” (Treasury of Proverbs and Epigrams, p 101.)

One fellow would not prepare sandbags in front of his house, so it flooded. Another saw no use in boarding up his windows when a Category 3, 4, or 5 hurricane was predicted. “Those guys are never right,” he said. He likely applied for aid when his home was demolished.

Let's hope the rain lessens, but be prepared for whatever is up the road, down the river, or in the air.

Blogging: A literary quote spawns reflections

Google Image

 

                A quote written in my journal on March 30 said this: “Graham Greene felt life was lived in the first twenty years and the remainder was just reflection.” It was written by the late neurosurgeon, P. Kalanithi in an Arkansas Democrat-Gazette article. He died at age 37.

                That sentence was brought into play on May 5, 2015. I wrote, “5.5.15” and thought:

                When the date read “5.5.’55,” I would have been 19 and finishing my first year in college at what was then Arkansas State Teachers College at Conway. The “reflections,” as Graham Greene put it, came upon me fully these 60 years later.

                I had been rushed by the Tri-Delts because (I’m almost positive) older music majors were members—Joyce McClanahan for one-- and I was a freshman music major with both an academic and music scholarship--$90 each. I refused, but it was an honor to be asked. I knew I couldn’t afford the costs, nor did I deem myself sorority material. I joined the Independents.

                My first roommate was Bobbie-something. If I see her name somewhere/ sometime, I’ll remember it. Dorm was McAlister Hall, still standing. Friends were Mary Ann Ritchey Smith (Benton, now of Kentucky), Glenda Martin (deceased) of Concord, Mary Wanda Windham Root, now of Arkadelphia. We are still friends, those of us still alive.

                Classes: English. Mrs. Roberta Clay (deceased) was, in my then-narrow view, a typical old-maid school marm. (She was probably young. She loved Arthur and gave us a piece of frilly-rimmed  pink Fentonware as a wedding gift.) I remember having to write essays and must have done well: I made all A’s.

                Psychology: A real eye-opener, both in the subject matter and as regards the professor, Dr. Gale. He was (as I remember) a tall, pencil-thin man who, again from my small-world outlook, was the oddest man I’d ever seen. Or heard. (Thus began my education.)

                Piano. Having studied piano with Lorene Houston, and with enough theory on the side (one-on-one) to count as a high school credit, I thought I was good. I soon learned that “good” is relative and that I had much more to learn. Chopin’s “Fantasie Impromptu” nearly killed me with its difficulty. Dr. Milton Trusler, (again, one whom I considered old) a wiry little man who looked like pictures I see now of T. S. Eliot, even offered a room in their home if I needed it.

                Theory. Sight-singing and ear-training was one of my favorite courses. I can “see” the band guys in the class, tho’ I can’t name them. I taught my school choirs sight-singing when region Festivals began that practice, and we always made a First Division. Funny, I don’t remember who taught the college course.

                Music History. Dr. Carl Forsberg (deceased) must have taught the class, as well as directed the Conway Little Symphony. It met on our campus, and accompanying it must have been part of my scholarship. During one rehearsal (hard job for me at that stage/age), I got lost and quit playing. Ooh, did I get a chewing out--bad enough to cause tears. But it was a good lesson. Later, working on my Masters, I took a private course in Composition from him.

                So, do I agree with Graham Greene’s purported statement? No. There’s too much life to live beyond the first 20 years. Just ask anyone who’s lived to be 80. Or 90.



My third mission trip to south Louisiana -- to the UMCOR depot

Bayou Teche - Google images.

This is one boundary of the UMCOR Sager-Brown campus

 

                Once again, the missioners from Jacksonville United Methodist Church asked me to be one of their 12 to travel to Baldwin, Louisiana, the home of the Sager-Brown UMCOR (United Methodist Committee on Relief) Depot. It is one of two such depots; the other is located in Salt Lake City. Imagine the largest metal warehouse you can, and add more space to it.

                After an 8-hour drive from Jacksonville (AR) UMC on a Sunday, we arrived safely, were assigned rooms, attended an orientation meeting, then enjoyed a team meal of Italian soup, French bread, salad, lemonade and cookies—all brought on the trip by our very industrious and well-organized team leader, Joyce White. (Each of the 12 had paid $300+ to “volunteer” and to pay for gas and food down there and back.)

 

                Monday morning after meeting the other teams and the staff and eating a sumptuous breakfast, we adjourned to Jubilee Hall for a Safe Sanctuary presentation. While we were there, the sky darkened to pitch black. Thunder rumbled and lightning flashed and it rained. We weren’t in danger, no sirens were heard, but it was an eerie feeling to look through the blinds at 9 a.m. and see nothing.
 

                We stayed in that room until the storm had moved east toward New Orleans. Then we proceeded to our reasons for being there—our work stations.
 

              Our work schedule at the UMCOR depot was from 8:15 – 11:30, and from 1 – 3:30. The country of Jordan had asked for 7,000 health kits for refugees. That’s what five 6-person tables worked on all week in the large, large area of the depot.
 

            People in the sewing room were busy attaching handles to school bags and cutting/sewing baby gowns for layette kits.
 

          Another group was emptying moldy cleaning buckets (formerly “flood buckets”) where something had leaked while in storage. They were refilled with items having a more stable shelf life.

I worked on health kits that had been sent from local churches. Many of them, however, failed to follow the directions, OR the directions had been changed since they were packed.

          Our job was to open each kit, check on the correctness of the items, change them out where needed, then repack. The kits were to include a hand towel, washcloth, comb (with at least 6 inches of teeth), either nail file or clippers (no toenail clippers, no emery boards),a bar of soap (except for Ivory and Jergens, which had too much moisture and sometimes melted), a toothbrush, and six regular-sized band-aids. Wrapped tightly in the towel, these items were pushed into a gallon freezer bag, the air squeezed out to a near-vacuum, then sealed and placed in a laundry basket to be taken to the packers by runners.

      The week’s kits--repacked, boxed, taped, labeled and sealed into shrink-wrapped containers added up to 6500—not bad for 30 folks’ work in four days—an average of 216 kits per person. In addition, we became friends with other UMs from western Oklahoma, Plano and Wylie, Texas, and our own colleagues from El Dorado.

                This is my only volunteer activity. But I’ll go as often as I get the chance. I consider raising a grandson to age 25 my long-range and life-long volunteer work. 

 



Home again, home again... and May is here

amyvolk.com - Google images

 

 

After being gone for two weeks with only 24 hours at home between trips, I have settled in to my previous routine. Not having seen but a few Arkansas Democrat-Gazette North Arkansas editions while in Eureka Springs, I did not hold a newspaper in my hand during the Louisiana week.

So, one morning after returning, I spent five hours in the porch swing reading the Sunday paper. Only coffee refills and hunger pangs took me away, but not for long.

 

Then there was two weeks’ mail to go through and set aside for later or tend to immediately—like the credit card bill payment due in two days! Personal, stamped mail included a note of reply from a California haikuist whose book I’d re-read, a brochure from the Southern Literary Alliance meeting in Chattanooga that my cousin sent, thinking I might be interested in the next one, and a hand-written submission for the poetry column of Calliope.

 

There was junk mail from several credit card and insurance companies, three weeks of the Standard newspaper, three copies of the latest issue of Calliope, with a short story of mine inside plus an anthology I’d ordered from Amazon: Old Broads Waxing Poetic.

 

A manila envelope sent from my BFF held a requested section of newspaper that contained the obituary of a dear and great man, Joel Cooper, pastor of Conway’s First UMC during my years at Hendrix. In fact, I was organist there my final year (1958).

 

When it was published, I ordered his book, No Price I Bring, and reviewed it in the denomination’s state newspaper. We corresponded for a while and he sent me his booklet of “Poms.” (poems)

 

Other items included three tax returns: two for Kid Billy, and one for me. Because I counted KB as a dependent, and because the online form asked if anyone in my family was uninsured, I had to admit that, yes, there was. So, even though I had insurance, they charged me with his nearly $400 penalty, while he got a hefty refund. Guess who got her money back from him?

 

Only after returning home, did I get the full account about Baltimore. It was on TV in the UMCOR “family” room, but I couldn’t make it out. Reading about it later, I jotted down a stark sentence. “A riot is the language of the unheard.”—Martin Luther King, cited by D. Brazile in the Saline Courier.

 

Another quote about discontented persons: “Graffiti art is an honest voice of a dissatisfied soul—it’s a political act.” – K. Ockerman, 43, Los Angeles graffiti artist, in an article about such artists defacing national parks.

 

Jazzman B.B. King (“The Thrill is Gone”), 89, is in hospice care at his home.

 

More than 43 million subsidized [meals] are served [in schools] daily. The feeding program began in 1946 by a Congress alarmed that vast numbers of young men were malnourished, ergo ineligible to serve in WW II. Today, nearly 25% of recruits are too obese to serve, according to Mission: Readiness, made up of 500 retired military officials. – E. Halper, Tribune News Service, AD-G.

As always, there’s good news and bad news in the world: Nepal, Nigeria, Baltimore, Syria, et al. And in the words of Pete Seeger, “When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn?”



Owning cats means arranging for their care while I'm away

 Annamarie Parker, my volunteer cat/plant/yard "girl" while I'm away

 

Spring is not a good time to be away from home for two weeks at a time.

 

Grasses grow, flowers bloom, indoor and porch plants dry out, litter boxes fill up, cat food and water disappear.

 

Lights need changing every night or two. Doors to the bedroom area need "locking" against paws that want to investigate and knead--as they did before new carpet was laid.

This acre of yard needs mowing fairly often, especially when it rains often.

 

Grandson Billy's mother--my daughter--lives five miles away and insists that she will tend to these matters for me. For that I am grateful.

 

And so are Greye and Bibbs. They should be: while I'm gone, they get the best seat in the house.