Yes, it’s a sidestroke
So there I was, swimming my laps when one of the lifeguards asked, “Excuse me, is that a sidestroke?”
Like what, I’m doing something wrong … after sixty years of this?
Uh, no. Turns out he didn’t know how to do one. A butterfly stroke, yes. But this essential way of swimming?
So I ask, “Didn’t you need it with a reverse kick to pass lifesaving?”
Turns out, no, they’ve changed the requirements. No more cross-chest carry, either.
Huh?
No, they use a backstroke to keep the victim’s neck and back more secure.
Wow, times have changed.
At least he’d heard the sidestroke was great for swimming distances, as in the ocean. I gave him a few tips.
But, jeez, I hate feeling old. I remember when CPR was the new thing, and it was much, much gentler than what they’re teaching these kids. I can expect a few broken bones if they go for it, and I’ll be grateful.
Yes, even with that, I trust them with my life.
A stent? Seems everybody has one
Get to a certain age and the conversation often shifts to personal health issues. (Sorry ’bout that.)
I am surprised by the number of people who tell me about their stents, for instance. This matter of running a probe from your wrist and up your arm into your heart is surprisingly commonplace. It’s also amazing what relatively small community hospitals are doing nowadays. (OK, ours is now a subsidiary of Mass General Hospital in Boston … like the best. Not that I really considered that at the time I was being wheeled off to God knows what.)
But that leads to other things like learning that my clerk at the hardware store and I have the same cardiologist, or did till said doc moved to Florida. (Well, that has to be a hot market for cardiac work!)
It also brings up others who say that they, too, felt no pain … thought it was a breathing issue rather than a pending heart attack.
Or that their cholesterol levels, like mine, had been normal.
As a factor, I’m convinced stress was a major component in my case. Seventeen years between marriages, with all of the relationship uncertainty, along with working under relentless deadlines as I did at the newspaper must have taken a toll. Besides, I wasn’t getting regular exercise in that period, other than dashing to and from the composing room.
As one buddy said, if you lined up a hundred guys our age, he would have been the first to be tagged for this problem and I would have been the last.
Well, he’s had a few health issues, but cardio hasn’t been one of them.
For you younger readers, take warning.
Cheers! And good luck …
Ten once-exotic foods that have become commonplace
Americans’ food choices expanded unbelievably in the generation between the events told in Daffodil Uprising and What’s Left. Admittedly, Cassia’s mother had grown up with a wider awareness of dietary options than had her father – her mother’s Greek heritage relied on olive oil rather than Crisco, for starters, and running a restaurant meant keeping an eye open for new options. Roasting a lamb for Easter would have been in her mother’s background but probably made her father’s side cringe. Still, it’s mindboggling to think how exotic some of today’s common dishes were just a half-century ago.
Here are ten:
- Broccoli. And zucchini and summer squash, which show up on a lot of national chain restaurant plates. Hey, even fresh parsley.
- Yogurt. Seriously, even before you add granola, another upstart.
- Tacos. For that matter, anything Mexican like burritos or quesadillas or margaritas. We’ve even added a holiday every May just to celebrate this development.
- Salsa. And sriracha and any of those Texas hot sauces. Whatever happened to ketchup?
- Sushi. I still can’t believe you can get it at the grocery.
- Thai. For that matter, anything Asian. You know, this extends to Vietnamese and Indian and even authentic Chinese. For me as a child, chop suey on top of wormy dried noodles, both out of a can, were as adventurous as it got for miles around.
- Pasta. Yes, any of those various Italian noodles. Our spaghetti used to come with sauce in a can. Seriously. And a spaghetti dinner was typically a fundraising event in a church. Oh, and it was still pronounced EYE-talian. Ouch!
- Espresso. The word itself conjured up images of beatniks. And now? Just think of all the gourmet coffee storefronts and drive-throughs. Not just Starbucks, either. You no longer have to explain cappuccino or latte or café au lait apologetically, thank goodness. Many of us even make our own.
- Flatbreads. As in wraps, especially, though they can be the foundation of a good pizza. Well, speaking of breads, add baguettes and croutons to the list of advances. We’ve really come a long way, baby.
- Real cheese. Not the processed stuff. We now have so many glorious choices we could do another Tendril on just this one item. Hallelujah!
History? Pizza had recently entered the mainstream. And wine was still a daunting frontier.
What would you add to the list?
Kinisi 1
honesty / reliability / responsibility
Fresh snow in our driveway
When the author starts choking up
One of Kenzie’s lovers in Pit-a-Pat High Jinks had long puzzled me. In the earlier versions of the story, I pretty much ran with a set of details mirroring those I had encountered in real life. I refrained from speculating on what she wasn’t telling me – or, by extension, Kenzie.
In the latest set of revisions, though, I ventured beyond that self-imposed taboo. I had learned from two other girlfriends how devastating childhood abuse could be. Yes, in this fictional case, the hypothesis fit. Not that it had to be factually true, but rather that it was a plausible possibility – that was enough for a novelist. As I fleshed out that incident and its impact, I began weeping. If only I had known more of her at the time or more of all three, would the course of our relationships gone differently? The feeling of deep loss and grieving was pervasive, all these decades later.
Likewise, as I was reworked the text that morphed into Daffodil Uprising, the focus shifted from the lighthearted face of the hippie experience to a broader comprehension of its desperation and even destructive fringes – and that sensation also had me grieving. As a deep sense of loss regarding the promise we saw on the horizon but failed to reach and fulfill washed over me, I began seeing the novel as a requiem for the hippie dream.
With Kenzie’s daughter Cassia at my side, though, I started thinking about the way dreams work. They have one foot in the past and the other in the present. And then, even when she was looking at her father’s history, she had her own generation in mind. From where I stand, their situation looks even more confusing than ours had. What can we who did change so much of society, pro and con, offer them now in continuing that vision?
These are dire times, friends. Anyone else feeling some déjà vu and unease?
First anniversary of a big day
On this day a year ago, we woke up to a big snowfall – the biggest of the season, as it turned out. It was coming down like crazy, and I was even hoping to get out on my cross-country skis, at least do a few loops around our yard, unlike the previous year.
Thought I’d clean off my wife’s car first and the steps and walkway out front, just in case.
But that’s when I had to stop and try to catch my breath. I’d felt this sensation, something like what I’d heard asthma described like, several times in the past few months. I thought it was the aftermath of a nasty bug the previous fall, and several people in the know said it sounded like a walking pneumonia. Once, in particular, it hit me at the end of a length in the indoor swimming pool. Another time, while carrying a three-year-old down from Mount Agamenticus. After the third time, I went in to see my primary care physician, who said my lungs sounded fine, ordered an X-ray, and scheduled a stress test. Oh, yes, and if the symptoms returned, go straight to the emergency room.
Yeah, yeah. Just what I needed – more inconclusive tests.
So as the snow hit just two days before the stress test was scheduled and the symptoms returned, I figured I could ride it out until my appointment.
That’s when my elder daughter showed up. “My Prius is cleaned off and warmed up. Get in.” My wife seconded the motion, and reminded me they had my doctor in their corner.
OK, drop me off. I’ll give you a call when I’m done.
Remember, there was no pain. No chest pain, especially. This was a breathing problem.
You can join in ‘Pit-a-Pat High Jinks’
Pit-a-pat is the sound of hands drumming as well as rain on the roof. Both fit my newest novel, which is being released today at Smashwords.com.
The book continues Cassia’s discoveries about her future father’s mysterious adventures before he meets her mother and settles down into marriage.
Here he heads for the hills after graduating from college, moving into a dilapidated farmhouse he shares with a dozen or so other young rebels and recluses. He goes back-to-the-earth with his housemates and their dogs and cats and chickens as well as their fields and abandoned orchard plus the surrounding ponds and forests. Nude swimming, anyone? Off they go.
He’s also coming to grips with his first full-time job, working as a photographer at the local small-town newspaper, where his bohemian ways don’t always fit well. Still, a job’s a job.
His life really perks up through eccentric new friendships around the campus in the valley, especially a young dreamer known as Drummer.
Sometimes it all resembles a three-ring circus.
In his heart, though, he’s looking for love – along with healing after being jettisoned by his college sweetheart. Running through Pit-a-Pat High Jinks is a series of lovers and passionate encounters that ultimately advance his erotic experience and understanding. Please note that the story can be rather graphic. (You will need to set the adults-only button to find it at Smashwords.) The tale is set, after all, in an era of free love and recreational substance exploration.
It’s a poignant and timeless mix of youthful escapades and mayhem.
Be among the first to read my newest novel.
Another reason for gratitude having a studio in the attic of an old house
Just think of all the exercise I wouldn’t get if we had a ranch house.
Jnana's Red Barn 