I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

For any who want more, complete list of all posts by month since 2011

  • Is It Time for a Tune-up?


    My grandfather told me many times that he never understood why my daddy avoided regular maintenance on any of his automobiles.  At least change the oil, I heard him say to my dad a thousand times. Now I’m not sure why my dad who was scrupulous about his shirts and ties that he wore every day to work at the school  and who was fastidious about having not one smear on his eyeglasses in the morning had such a total disregard for getting the oil changed in his car, but I will say I remember we changed Chevrolets more frequently than the oil.

    With that in mind, I try to make sure we maintain our 2006 Toyota 4-Runner we’ve had for eight years and our “new” 2007 Dodge Dakota that replaced the old 2004 Dodge Dakota which finally gave up recently after eight years, umpteen thousand-mile trips back and forth to Texas and almost 200,000 miles. Now, that was a truck I loved…and maintained.

    Next week on the 21st of April I will be 70 years old.  I can’t tell you how old that makes me feel, but I can tell you I never thought I’d live to see 30.  And here I am forty years longer and wondering if I’ve had enough maintenance during the past seven decades from 1946 to 2016 to keep me running for a little while longer. My  Medicine Men (and Women) – the doctors, dentists, dermatologists, psychiatrists and ophthalmologists who faithfully prescribed my Magic Meds for the past forty years and the pharmacists who faithfully dispensed them have certainly done their part.  As my longest-serving doctor Frank Martin, Jr., says, “You are the healthiest person I know considering the terrible shape you’re in.” Now that’s a compliment to be proud of.  Thanks, Frank.

    So at 70 I am very happy to be able to negotiate the activities of daily living, as we say in the jargon of post-retirement life and in the language of the long-term care insurance policies I sold in a time long ago but not so far away. I may congratulate myself and  think  “cleared it” when I step out of the bathtub these days, but at least I have taken one small step for mankind when I don’t have to call T for help to make that step. My attitude toward bathing has undergone a kind of metamorphosis over the past few years from “daily” really means “daily” to “gosh, did I take a shower yesterday?” to “Hey, T, are we seeing anybody today?” I love a shower after I take it, but I consider that time to be one of the most boring activities of daily living ever created.

    I have more fears as I approach 70.  My grandmother suffered from severe depression in her late sixties and early seventies and was supposed to be taking Librium in addition to the electroshock treatments she received at various mental hospitals in the 1960s.  My mother always assumed and accused her of deliberately refusing to take her meds, but now I wonder if she didn’t take them because she couldn’t afford to pay for them. Medicines have always been expensive, and my grandmother lived on a very small Social Security pension since she had been paid a pittance for her years as a clerk in the general store. So did she refuse to take them, or was she unable to pay for them…a mystery I will never solve.

    Fast forward one generation and my mother’s dementia that became the thief who robbed her of her memories and dignity began in her early seventies and finally ended  shortly after her 85th. birthday. Needless to say, heavy, heavy hangs the dread of dementia in this daughter.  I am hoping that somehow in the genetic mishmash that belongs to me the genes of my father will swoop in, take over and beat back  the bad ones of my mother; of course, there’s that little heart problem on his side of the family. Sigh.

    I belong to the Baby Boomer generation, a name derived from the overwhelming population increase in the years immediately following WWII. I have read about our excesses and expectations ad nauseam and can best describe my cohorts and me as a hot mess. Our importance has not necessarily been marked so much by our achievements but by the collective influences of our sheer numbers on society as we blundered along from one century to the next. We trampled all over ourselves and did it right out there in front of God and everybody. We have adapted to and embraced technological changes reluctantly but have commandeered entire communication systems for our personal advancement and entertainment.  Think Facebook. We have preached self-reliance all our lives but now most of us rely on Social Security programs as the main source of our retirement income and medical safety net.

    At 70 I am dealing with feelings of invisibility and incompetence. In a social gathering it’s best for me to be seen and not heard, which is part of my problem. Last night I was at a small get-together at a friend’s house for a birthday party. The group of eight was sitting outdoors on a deck overlooking a beautiful Columbia yard in the springtime at dusk. The weather was perfect – the champagne excellent and the conversation lively.  Two of the women had just gotten back from vacation and were talking about their cruise in the Cayman Islands. There was a lull, and I asked them what a “Dizzy Cruise” was – that was a new one on me. The entire group stopped talking and stared at me. Teresa said “Disney Cruise, Disney Cruise” and I was rescued. But clearly I don’t hear like I used to.

    And in the middle of the health, social and financial issues we Baby Boomers are experiencing as we turn 70, we also have to worry about our legacies. How will we be remembered? Will we be remembered? Why should we be remembered? Yikes. Enough already. If 70 isn’t a year for a tune-up, I’d be shocked with the plugs my daddy never replaced. In fact,  I think I’ll keep a maintenance journal  this year – so stay tuned in for more tune-ups.

     

     

     

     

  • Politics and Happiness


    The American author Jodi Picoult has this to say about happiness. “There are two ways to be happy: improve your reality or lower your expectations.”

    As I stand perilously close to my 70th. birthday – let’s say on the brink – I can truthfully say I’ve employed both those recipes for happiness at different stages of my past 69 years.  The younger to middle age years and “early” senior years were most often marked by trying to improve my reality… at work and in my personal and community life.  Was failure a possibility? Certainly, but if I worked hard enough, if I loved deeply enough, if I cared passionately enough – failure to improve my reality was unlikely.

    Alas, at the turn of the century I think, I began to believe failure was a possibility and that sometimes my reality was suspect. What I thought I wanted wasn’t what brought me happiness at all. In fact, it brought me just the opposite.  And I began a course of lowering my expectations in my work life that spilled over into the other areas of my reality as well.

    Of course this is to be expected as we age, isn’t it.  We have permission to grow more cantankerous, more outrageous and yes, more cynical as our hairs whiten and our skin sags. My friend Linda Ketner accuses me of “settling” when I mention she would be happier if she just lowered her expectations of people and their ability to create sweeping social changes. My partner Teresa is equally incapable of expecting less than the best from the people she works with and frequently the woman she lives with.

    I give this background to say that I have low, very low expectations about the political landscape of my country these days. When I read about the daily killings of innocent people in our streets, schools, churches and other places of worship and watch local, state and federal government officials that I help to elect do nothing to intervene and in fact even write laws to permit guns to be carried into classrooms – my expectations are lowered. When I have to think twice about going to a movie on a Sunday afternoon with the gnawing image of people being shot in a movie theater in the back of my mind, I have to lower my expectations for safety.  And I’m an old white woman. My personal fears rank low on the totem pole of universal fears for crimes of hate perpetrated on younger people of color on a regular basis.

    All of which brings me to the current state of politics in this election cycle for President of the United States in November of 2016.  I had low, very low expectations for what I anticipated would be a long, long, LONG season of debates, speeches, TV commercials interrupting my favorite shows, countless signs cluttering up any possible unobstructed open common space in an otherwise gorgeous panorama of azaleas and dogwood trees and seas of bluebonnets, obnoxious bumper stickers on the car in front of me whenever I drove to the grocery store, etc.  I had low, very low expectations for this political process that we Americans watch every four years to elect the most recognized leader in the whole planet.

    But I can tell you my expectations weren’t nearly low enough for the spectacles I have seen and heard over the past few weeks from the candidates vying for the nominations of the two major political parties in my country.  Nastiness. Name-calling. Rudeness.  Offensive TV commercials.  The candidates look like bullies on a playground when they weren’t chosen to play with others. These are the norm for campaigning these days and we have a media that not only feeds on the norm but pours chum in the sea to encourage the sharks to circle and attack each other.

    So much for lowering expectations.

    I am not happy. As a matter of fact, I am very unhappy with the violence now taking place at political rallies for one of the candidates. Unhappy – but not surprised. When a candidate chooses to emphasize his vision of an America that is isolationist and embraces the legitimacy of intolerance and bigotry  and a culture of violence as a solution for disagreements, it is no small wonder his rallies have become a scene of chaos, confusion and collateral damage. I am not only unhappy, I am horrified and ashamed.

    I want to change my reality as I hope the American people will refuse to be happy with what has become a dangerously low series of expectations. We deserve better – we should expect better. We must demand better.

     

  • In Memoriam: Carole Stoneking


     

    Not All Pioneers Rode in Covered Wagons

    One of my favorite shows on television when I was young was Wagon Train starring Ward Bond as the wagon train master and Robert Horton as the scout.  I was eleven years old when the show started and used to watch it on a TV set that was in a short wooden cabinet  which held a tiny screen the size of an iPad.  Black and white shows on a very small TV.  Wagons Ho.

    Each week the episode typically involved an obstacle to smooth passage on the seventeen hundred mile trek from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, California. Someone was ill or one of the wagons lost a wheel and ran amok hurtling down a steep hill or there was the constant threat of unfriendly Native Americans who for some reason didn’t like the idea of strangers taking over their homelands or constant bickering between the wagon master and his support staff about which way was the safest route for the next day’s journey.  Always something, as Roseanne Roseannadanna would say.

    Yet, in spite of a multitude of difficulties, the wagon train kept going and I kept going with them for eight seasons. The cast changed through the years, but the people continued to persevere in their westward adventures.  Today when I think of the term pioneers,  I have a mental image of the seemingly endless stream of men, women and children riding in covered wagons to become the first settlers in new territories west of the Mississippi River.  Webster’s dictionary definition of pioneers confirms that image partially as it calls pioneers  the”first to settle in a new territory.”

    But that’s not the only dictionary definition of the word pioneer. Webster also says that pioneers are “a person or group that originates or helps open up a new line of thought or activity…”.  Not all pioneers rode in covered wagons and not all new territories are limited to land.  For some, the goals of a journey involve the search for new lines of thought like equal treatment and fairness regardless of differences, and  the distances traveled in personal lives to defend diversity often seem as far as the miles between St. Joseph, Missouri and Sacramento, California.

    Carole Stoneking was a woman who fits that description of a pioneer. She was born in 1937, a time when the trains and automobiles made covered wagons obsolete. Her birthplace was the motor city: Detroit, Michigan.  She loved art and wanted to be a fine artist but was told at a very young age that was an impossible dream – no woman could really be a successful professional artist.  She loved women, too, in a time when homosexuality was considered to be a religious abomination as well as a mental illness – not to mention a criminal activity for which she could be thrown in jail.

    In spite of the dangers involved, Carole announced she was a lesbian in 1956 and began a long-term relationship with another woman in Detroit.  She was nineteen years old. (This was thirteen years before the Stonewall Riots which some historians consider to be the birth of the LGBT civil rights movement.) Her family contacted the police to try to have her arrested and removed from her girlfriend’s apartment, but the police advised them that wasn’t possible because she wasn’t being held against her will. The obstacles and adversaries Carole continued to face in her real life as a lesbian for the next sixty years were as difficult for her to overcome  as the ones faced by the Wagon Train pioneers, and yet, like them, she persevered.

    Her lifetime of advocacy for women’s rights and equal rights for the LGBT community began when she came out in 1956 and ended today with her death  in Lexington, South Carolina.  Carole was proud of her fight for equality and fairness that spanned six decades of sweeping cultural changes, and she embraced the groups that were formed to show “new lines of thought” about homosexuality.  While she never rode in a covered wagon, she also never missed an opportunity to ride on a float in a Pride Parade in Columbia.

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    The final Webster definition of a pioneer is one who “opens or prepares for others to follow.”  Every time Carole spoke up for equal treatment, every letter she wrote, every meeting she attended, every march she supported with her presence, every hour she spent recording her history – she was preparing for others to follow…and we have…and we will.

    When I think of a pioneer today, I will remember a fellow traveler who struggled with the imperfections we all have on a journey we all make – and of a woman who helped to open up new ways of thinking not just for herself but for those who will come after her.

    Rest in peace, Carole.

     

     

     

  • Ready – Set – Ho! Here Come the Holidays!


    We have put away our ghosts and goblins and all things orange at our casa and  turned our attention this weekend to the reds and greens of the ghosts of Christmas Past which Teresa has carefully preserved in boxes, drawers and various nooks and crannies in the garage and bodega. I am always impressed she can recover the same decorations year after year in the midst of chaos and confusion, but then she functions at her highest level under pressure.

    The tabletop silver tree appears intact with the tiny ornaments still in place from last year – which was my brilliant idea since I am responsible for all tree trimming to include the dozen or so miniature ornaments  that are the only decorations other than the lights for the small tree. I decided last year that  taking the ornaments off at the end of one season and then hanging them again at the beginning of the next holiday was a waste of my time and energy – much like my philosophy of dusting furniture – so I left them on the tree last year and here they are safe and sound with minimal casualties. Key word: minimal.

    I made the 21st. century switch to LED lights for the little tree last year and decided to leave them on the tree in the storage box, too. Hm. Not so brilliant. They seem a bit worse for the wear and not too interested in glowing red and white, but I told T they would be fine once I got new batteries. She looked skeptical and frowned, but I reminded her of the gazillion sets of lights we replaced every Christmas when we used the other lights that weren’t guaranteed to last a lifetime. These LED lights would last forever, according to the boxes. Okay. Sounds good. Did the fine print say anything about surviving being crushed…just wondering,

    The transition from Halloween to Christmas will be in full swing for us this week with a detour Thursday for Thanksgiving which happens to be my favorite holiday of the year. Yep, my personal best. I love Thanksgiving because the focus is on my favorite f-words: family, friends, food and football with a passing nod to decorations and gifts until the day after. T and I will make our traditional trip to the Upstate to be with her late mother’s Alverson family in the fellowship hall of the First Baptist Church of Fingerville, South Carolina late Thursday afternoon as the sun sets behind the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains. There’s not a prettier drive in the state or a more beautiful time of the year.

    This Thanksgiving I am particularly grateful for my best buddy and faithful companion , Red, who has celebrated not only fifteen of these with me but has also been with me for the entire 21st century of my life – a century I never dreamed I’d live to see but one I wouldn’t trade for anything… except maybe the 1950s. Red may not be here for the next Thanksgiving, and I’m trying to figure out how I’m ever going to take a shower without his lying on the bath mat next to me waiting for me to finish. Red Man, I am thankful for you.

    For Chelsea who also will probably not be with us next Thanksgiving and Spike who probably will, I am equally grateful. For Teresa who functions at her highest level under stress, I am so very thankful. I love and adore her beyond any degree of reason, and I know I would be lost without her. I do not function well under stress unless I am prepared for it. Even then, it’s iffy.

    Finally, I am grateful for all of my friends and family in my virtual reality as well as those who surround me up close and personal in living color.  My blogging friends in other countries and other states have become another kind of family for me, and I treasure our shared experiences via words and images. I’ve grown accustomed to our posts.

    Ready – set – ho!  The holidays are upon us. Celebrate the ones you choose to celebrate in whatever fashion you choose to celebrate them in, but take time to be thankful this Thanksgiving.

    Teresa and I send our warmest wishes to all of you for a Happy Thanksgiving and wondrous holiday season. We are thankful for you.

     

  • Valor Above and Beyond the Call of Duty


    The Medal of Honor is the highest military honor awarded for “personal acts of valor above and beyond the call of duty.” It is awarded by the President of the United States in the name of the US Congress and so it is often known as the Congressional Medal of Honor.  The Navy began the award in 1861 during the American Civil War with the Army following suit a year later. Since the establishment of the award, more than 3,500 have been presented – 1,523 to honorees of the Civil War.

    One Medal of Honor recipient is a woman. One. Out of more than 2.2 million women veterans since the creation of the Medal of Honor, the solo female recipient is Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, a physician from New York,  who volunteered for and served in the Union Army as an Army Surgeon during many battles of the Civil War from the First Battle of Bull Run in 1862  to the Battle of Atlanta in 1864.

    Dr. Walker was captured by Confederate forces in April of 1864 after crossing enemy lines to treat wounded civilians in areas her fellow male surgeons refused to go. She was arrested as a spy and sent as a prisoner of war to a Confederate prison in Richmond, Virginia.  When she was released in a prisoner exchange in August, 1864, she suffered from partial muscle atrophy that disabled her for the rest of her life. At the end of the War in 1865, President Andrew Johnson presented her with the newly created Medal of Honor.

    Dr. Walker became a writer and lecturer following her service in the Army.  She wrote two books that discussed women’s rights including their right to dress as they chose, a cause she embraced personally as she was frequently arrested for wearing men’s clothing. She had grown up working on her family’s farm and had little use for the skirts and corsets women wore routinely in the late nineteenth century.

    In 1871 she registered to vote along with many other women who believed they  had the right to vote already guaranteed in the Constitution. This was the prevailing strategy for suffragettes initially in this country. Later on in the Suffragette Movement, the strategy changed to push for a Constitutional Amendment which would irrevocably provide women the right to vote. Dr. Walker didn’t embrace the new strategy and distanced herself from this new wave of feminists which was ultimately successful in helping to secure the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment that granted women the right to vote in 1918.

    In 1917 the Medal of Honor Board deleted 910 awards, including Dr. Walker’s, and the recipients were ordered to return their medals. Dr. Walker refused to return hers and continued to wear it every day as she had since the day she received it. She wore it until the day of her death on February 21, 1919 at the age of 87 – one year after the passage of the 19th. Amendment.

    On this Veteran’s Day in 2015, I salute Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, a soldier who showed personal acts of  valor above and beyond the call of duty in both her military service as a doctor during the Civil War which has been called one of the bloodiest wars in history and as a civilian who displayed the same courage in the battles for equal rights for women in the country she helped to unite.

    I also salute the more than 2 million women veterans who have served – and are serving in the US military today. The personal sacrifices you make – and have made- are acts of valor and deserve recognition above and beyond what you receive.  I find it shameful that only one of you has been awarded the Medal of Honor. Surely history will rectify this oversight at some point. Until then, you have my admiration, respect and gratitude.

    P.S. President Jimmy Carter restored the Medal of Honor to Dr. Mary Edwards Walker in 1977.