Carol and Bob arrived for Band Fest weekend, and we had some time to make a few Gallery Hop stops. All the posters from the 16-year history of the Festival were on display, including the four that I designed. Sheldon signed 50 copies of the 2005 edition, and half of them were already gone at $35 a pop. Thanks to Aunt Carol, I found the courage to approach Chuck about his unreciprocal mode (in our long-standing barter deal). I hung out at Paul’s and wondered why I was getting myself into another trade, since I’m the unresponsive party in my similar agreement with Ginny.
Archive for the ‘Friends’ Category
At the hop
Friday, June 10th, 2005Hope for the dawn
Thursday, June 9th, 2005I saw Dr L at the Whitehouse opening, and he told me that he’s seen patients with two normal kidneys lose all renal function dealing with hemorrhagic pancreatitis. So I guess I can’t be too discouraged about
Bruce’s ongoing struggle. Tomorrow adds up to 12 weeks, and that’s enough to test anyone to their core. Danny D loaned me his copy of Dark Night of the Soul. If he thinks I need to better understand this level of suffering, he’s right.
Everybody needs a Yorkie
Wednesday, June 8th, 2005As I continue to crank away at solving another batch of Website perplexities, Lee and David sent a picture from our recent cabin time. I was able to pause and revisit a relaxing moment with my pup.
Vinyl hair rush vs sable hair brush
Monday, June 6th, 2005As if getting one step closer to being in the Plastic Mullet Series wasn’t treat enough, I got an early look at the Speed’s Berthe Morisot exhibition, and since I tend to possess that “painterly eye” for 24 hours or so after visiting the finest museums, it was fortuitous to have packed my Karat pencils and sketchbook so I could study a sunny treetop during our brief stay at Simpson Knob.
Various & Sundry, part sixteen
Sunday, May 22nd, 2005— BCA’s Frisco
makes me want to draw it as a comic strip, as Lisa did with Fortado. A while back I realized I’d have a difficult time creating a comic strip as a solo enterprise because, even though I could draw it, I knew I didn’t have the mind to develop dramatic or humorous ideas at the same level. And so I would require a partner, if I ever chose to fulfill the dream. It makes me think of some of the great collaborative efforts, like the strips created by Lee Falk (Mandrake the Magician, The Phantom) and, of course, Parker and Hart’s The Wizard of Id.
— Spent Friday morning compensating for the substandard transparency of the Tapley painting being featured within our Brass Band Festival poster design. It was a relief to know my teamwork with the printer’s pre-press technician achieved the anticipated result. All along, my goal has been to showcase a fabulous work of art without messing up, and having to take possession of the original and haul it around added a bit more stress to the process. Then we had lunch in Louisville with Bob the photographer and he pointed out that shooting a high-res digital could have avoided the entire ordeal of fixing a donated scan. No doubt, but that’s the sort of thing you get pulled into with a freebie project. There’s always time to salvage a botched plan, but never any money to do it correctly from the beginning.
— Within almost every “mandala” of friends there’s the individual or two who act as the “glue.” For a group that’s met twice a month for over a decade to experience “shared silence,” that primary person has been my friend Milton. He’s retiring from his long tenure at Centre College, and it was fun to “toast and roast” him at the cabin this morning. His energy, compassion, and “brutal” honesty has always been an inspiration. One of the harsh realizations of middle age has been to understand that one doesn’t know quite as much about quite as many subjects as it seems in youth. And special care should be taken when claiming any authority in the areas in which one has gained some depth of knowledge and expertise. For the most part, I learned this from Milton, a true scholar who knows how to keep things in perspective—that even though we all have our limitations as students of life, it need not inhibit our enthusiasm for learning, nor deter our quest for illumination.
— The remarkable recovery by Bruce continues as he enters his tenth week in the hospital. He had more surgery on Friday to take out tubes and is down to a single drain (which may come out tomorrow) and a line that delivers nutrition directly to the small intestine. Dana and I spent the afternoon with him yesterday. He did some hall walking and powered his own wheelchair for a while on a visit to the rose garden. He’s off antibiotics, keeps gaining strength, and can now concentrate on a little reading, which is one of the good signs I’ve been looking for. Nobody loved to read more than Bruce, and he’s surely on his way back to his former avocations. And yet I sense that the perilous chasm he traversed this spring is his portal to a new and different life that can be unlocked only by monumental perseverance.
Splitsville
Friday, May 13th, 2005Dana heads north to Indiana, while I head south to a rare meeting of “The Wood Duck Society” at a not-so-secret location between Bradfordsville and Gravel Switch. Nothing at all sinister. Just some cabin time with friends… relaxing, talking, drawing, shooting, reading, and throwing together some good chow. And there’s nothing quite like watching thundershowers from a porch rocker as the low clouds drag themselves through the knobs.
Cool competitor vs gawking geezer
Saturday, May 7th, 2005Missed my Saturday dawn run again, to which I paid religious adherence for years. The last time I was this out of shape I attended local races as a spectator and put together a photo essay
for friends.
Now that I think about it, I wasn’t nearly this out of shape.
Sigh…
Goats Do Roam
Tuesday, May 3rd, 2005Dana and I enjoyed a splendid dinner and evening of conversation at Lee and David’s, hearing all about their recent trip to South Africa. They shared stories and photos of Durban, Capetown, and their stay at a private reserve in the bush. As if that wasn’t hospitable enough, they sent us home with an unusual red vintage.
Listen; partake not of quotations ye disdaineth, but believe
Monday, April 25th, 2005“Every noble work is at first impossible.” —Carlyle
His transplanted kidney declared a loss, Bruce nevertheless takes up the fight.
“An enterprise, when fairly once begun, should not be left till all that ought is won.” —Shakespeare
Branches of prayer extend as the roots of the faithful deepen.
“A good intention clothes itself with power.” —Emerson
Thirty-eight days later, when renal function is restored, doctors are heard to use the word “miracle.”
“The divine insanity of noble minds, that never falters nor abates, but labors, endures, and waits, till all that it foresees it finds, or what cannot find, creates.” —Longfellow
And to top it all off, a lost hat is restored!
Saturday in the sun
Saturday, April 16th, 2005Marty and I agreed—it was a “satisfying” day. It began for me with the “Repair Affair,” Boyle County’s annual day of exterior house chores on behalf of those who can’t physically do them. Danville Rotary Club took primary responsibility for it this year and that’s how I got involved. We couldn’t have pulled it off without all the volunteers from Centre College (those students are something else). It was a good deed sort of thing for me and a welcome change of scenery. My friend Scott was there and said he was planning to attend the 30th birthday cookout for the Governor’s son at the Mansion in Frankfort. I told him to give Ernie and Ben my warm regards. I don’t get to hobnob much with Fletcher any more, now that he’s hit the political big time.
After lunch I picked up Marty and we went to the Blue Bank Farm to work in the orchard, which also happens to be our family cemetery. I’m late with the pruning this year, but we got through it all and had time for a hike up Horse Lick hollow for Marty’s first adventure to the Pine Forest, which we both speculate was near the sawmill settlement that used to be located back there. We saw a spot that looked as though a small twister had touched down and leveled a few pines, all in precisely the same direction. Also had a chance to confirm that the back edge of the hollow had been unintelligently logged. What a waste! We came back to the valley by way of Blue Bank’s ridge and the Buddha Trail, probably the most peaceful spot in Casey County.
It was good to see members of my Clan after a month of turmoil. I spent a few moments at Joe’s grave with my sister and learned the sad news that her pet Pookie had just died. Throughout the day, Bruce was never far from my thoughts. Dana called from Indianapolis and my heart went out to her.
Oldenday III
Friday, April 15th, 2005I don’t know if I really liked school as a kid, but rather accepted it as my fate. It did have one nice thing going for it—ample opportunity to draw. Because we were Catholics, we went to school six days a week, although the Saturday religious instruction (catechism) was only in the morning, which wasn’t so bad because we were used to it, and we got to hang out with our top chums, the Vagedes boys. But maybe the best thing about Saturday mornings was that we got a comic book. I didn’t know that Treasure Chest wasn’t “cool.” I looked forward to the wholesomely didactic magazine (given out one per family before we went home each Saturday morning) because it was a comic book. Super heroes would come later. “Treasure Chest” introduced me to the longer pictorial narrative form and the art of the visual cliffhanger. Looking back on it, the staff that produced it was clearly packed with talent. I never saw another issue of it after 1964. With the move to a new town, a few dimes to spend, and the proximity of my junior high school to a retail rack of Superman, Batman, and Aquaman, I made the seismic shift to the world of DC Comics. Other than being shown how to use pastel chalk by family friend Mr. Smalley, I still had received no direct exposure to fine arts instruction. I was almost a teen, and I’d had no educator who could demonstrate to me genuine artistic technique, even though I’d had a series of teachers who rather negligently but wholeheartedly supported my effort to become self-taught. And so I continued with my own strange mix of preferred influences: Reed Crandall, Doug Wildey, Bob Clampett, Alfred Andriola, Curt Swan, Bob Kane, and Frank Frazetta. Actually, I could have chosen much worse…
Don’t ask why
Wednesday, April 13th, 2005When you’re going through a rough time, there’s always someone else who is or has gone through a worse situation. Today Dana and I had lunch with our friend Sherron, whose son was in a fiery accident and spent over a 100 days in a burn unit before he expired. She told me she asked God, “Why my son?” and the answer she received was, “Why not yours?”
At times like this
Tuesday, April 12th, 2005My wife Dana and I want to thank each of you—individually, in person, if we could—for your many messages of support. For now, please know that they are much appreciated.
Bruce was able to sit up and talk on Friday, but seemed tired on Saturday. Since we’d arrived in Indianapolis the previous Saturday with clothes for only two days, we needed to get home. We got back to Danville late Saturday, but didn’t get much sleep that night.
Since we hadn’t seen Marty during his spring break, we took him out for dinner on Sunday. During the meal we got the call that Bruce was failing (high temperature, growing infection, pneumonia out of control). We packed up and headed back to Indy. The message we’d received was so alarming that Marty and his mom Terie came with us, despite the fact that school would be back in session on Monday. This time we grabbed our dog, too.
Bruce was stable by the time we arrived, back on a ventilator, but blood pressure and pulse were erratic. By early afternoon, he was resting fairly well and went into surgery to remove a temporary stint (a possible source of the continuing infection) that is used for dialysis, and replace it with a different type. A permanent fistula was considered, but it was decided that he’s too ill to go under anesthesia.
He was sleeping comfortably last night with better vital signs. He’s still under heavy sedation, but he does react to his mother’s voice and can respond to questions with a slight nod. He’s receiving nutrition through a nose tube that goes directly into the small intestine, bypassing the stomach and pancreas. His nurse told Dana that patients with pancreatitis this severe sometimes remain in the ICU three months or more and in the hospital for months longer–a true test of endurance. Regular drives back and forth to Indiana will seem easy by comparison. On Sunday I got to talk to a friend who reminded me that a local acquaintance spent six months in the hospital with pancreatitis, and that it was two years before he was totally his old self. Bruce has the will to undergo a long recuperation if his situation can just stabilize, but I honestly don’t know if his mate has the stamina for what lies ahead.
It is at times like this that Dana and I are reminded how much we value our family (powerful, quiet support) and our friends (an amazing outpouring of affection).
We’re truly grateful for the positive thoughts and prayers. We’ll need them for some time to come…
(Dana helped with this entry.)
Various & Sundry, part thirteen
Friday, April 1st, 2005— Month of March workout totals: Swim-7; Bike-3; Run-3; Lift-7.
— Time to boost my running and cycling mileage. Plenty of mild weather ahead; no more excuses for the recent pitiful stats.
— Today at my Rotary luncheon I sat next to a retired English professor who’d served on a nearby ship during the battle for Iwo Jima. It caused me to think of Josh, with the profound hope that in 60 years, he, too, might be enjoying a pleasant meal with his friends.
— We’ll be heading back to Indiana tomorrow to visit Bruce. His ongoing exhaustion remains a concern to us. We can’t overlook the steady improvement, though, even if the pace has been tortuous.
— Stalin supposedly scoffed, “How many divisions does the Pope have?” More than adequate, as we’ve come to see, with the collapse of Soviet Communism in the 1980s, due in part to the bold stand for human freedom taken by this Polish priest turned world leader.
Seeing Danny
Thursday, March 31st, 2005March goes out
like a lamb (he pronounces too smugly).
What a glorious day to walk to campus and swim my first laps since making the decision to switch from the Wellness Center pool. I saw a friend on the way, so we chatted, although I should correct myself and point out that a conversation with Danny can hardly be called a “chat.” In 10 to 15 minutes we touched on Bruce’s ordeal, prayer, grace, the soul, despair, suicide, Socrates, Hunter S. Thompson, Hemingway, St John of the Cross, the death of Terri Schiavo, eternity, Thomas à Kempis, and the origins of monastic life. There’s never been time for “small talk” when Danny and I see each other, which isn’t often enough. When I got to Centre the water temperature and chlorine level were just right. The sun was pouring through the skylights. Even the shower-head couldn’t have been in more satisfactory adjustment. When I tested the speed of my freestyle stroke, I matched my personal-best, single-lap sprint time. Perfection.
September, 1997
Tuesday, March 29th, 2005I was just thinking back to a Labor Day weekend, seven and a half years ago. I’d just completed an annual event called the “Pound & Pedal” (which has a bit of a reputation in Central Kentucky), and was faced with a trivial choice: should I stick around to enjoy the post-race festivities or go home with my wife Dana?
Permit me to back up a little. In the P&P, two partners compete with other teams by alternating running and cycling— four five-mile legs for a race total of 20 miles. It’s fun if you get in shape for it. The guy who starts out on the bike drops it at the five-mile mark for his teammate, who picks it up and cranks it to the half-way point before his running cohort arrives. It works out best to have the stronger athlete start out on foot (similar to one of those mathematical story problems on an IQ test). With the exertion behind us for the day, my chum Roger had the blender fired up for the cactus juice, and the hot tub was being uncovered.
It was just about that time when we got the phone call. Bruce was going immediately into surgery. A matching kidney had become available. He’d made the nontrivial choice of accepting the sudden donation.
We dropped what we were doing and headed toward Lexington, with the full realization that another decision even more intense had been made at the same time. We found out later that the parents of a 13-year-old child (who’d reached the end of a life that was undeniably too short) had just given the difficult go-ahead to the ever-waiting organ harvesters…
Various & Sundry, part twelve
Friday, March 25th, 2005— I woke up this morning with a distinct phrase in my mind: magnesium fusion triggers. Look, I don’t drive the thing. I’m just ridin’ shotgun…
— Marty called last night and we talked about a subject that’s totally captured his excitement, the new Sony PS Portable. Hey, you’re allowed to get excited about something like this when you’re thirteen. For me, at that age, it was probably Art Linkletter’s “The Game of Life,” or something like that. However, I can’t help but think of this quote from Ben Stein: “I tremble for the day that the next generation has to provide for themselves with what they have learned from their video games.” Relax, Ben. They’ve probably learned more than I ever learned from watching too many hours of “The Avengers,” “The Prisoner,” “Hawaii Five-0” and “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.”
— From what I can discern through the Associated Press, Josh and his 623rd Field Artillery unit was with the convoy that came under attack on Sunday morning, but it stayed with the trucks during the battle and sustained no casualties (from a Bruce Schreiner byline story).
— The new brochure we created for the Brass Band Festival is a major hit, according to our friend who’s retiring as director of the Visitor’s Bureau. I told her I hoped our work makes a good impression with her successor. She said she thought it would and will put in a good word for us. Sounds promising, but the new person brings strong connections to her former employer, a previous client of ours turned competitor. All I can do is stay positive and make my case at the appropriate time. I’d insert a link to the Festival, but the site is just too ugly. Wait a second! This is a job for Website Makeover™ Man!
— Dana and I are heading back up to Indy today to check on Bruce. Normally I have my Rotary Club meeting, but we’re dismissed for Good Friday, so we’ll deal with any urgent matters in the studio and then hit the road before it gets too late.
— I decided to google for “magnesium fusion triggers” and found myself reading an overview at GlobalSecurity.org about special weapons facilities on the Indian subcontinent. OK, so what am I supposed to be more scared of, the metastasis of the World Wide Web, unchecked nuclear proliferation in South Asia, or my own dadburn subconscious?
It’s the new splendid lady come to call
Monday, March 7th, 2005Had a good phone conversation last night with Foot, my old chum from Tipp City. What’s happening with him is stark proof that good things can come out of nowhere to transform your life.
They see a plate of them and weep
Friday, March 4th, 2005Spent three hours today in front of a hot griddle at Kentucky School for the Deaf making pancakes for the Danville Rotary Club. Once a year I adopt my little-known identity as the greatest fried-foods artist since Neolithic times. Usually this annual fundraising event is scheduled around the middle of February, which enables me to show off by making heart-shaped pancakes. This year the timing was off, but did that stop me?
Modesty eludes me when it comes to my Rotary pancakes. I suppose they can only be described as perfect. Just ask any of my numerous pupils (the community’s best and brightest). That they hold me in total, ring-kissing awe on this particular day allows them to act like they don’t know me the rest of the year.
As far as Dana is concerned, it just makes me smell like grease.
Ah, the sorrow of genius…
Everything almost works
Saturday, February 19th, 2005The Bluegrass Pike Gang was back at it again this morning. The sky is
now light when we start running. John H asked me how my spinning class
with Susan L was going and I told him it was getting a bit easier. Donna
A smiled and added that it all depended on how far you turned the knob on the stationary bike. “I just do what she tells me to do,” was my reply. John looked at me and
said, “Sounds like marriage.”
I maintained my pace over eight miles, but I could tell that I’d missed
my recent lap swims, thanks to the stubborn computer problems we’ve been
having. I’ve been convinced I should adopt a new motto: “Technology
sucks.” But then I realized that what actually sucks is our propensity
to become so dependent on technology that we’re thrust to the edge of
panic when it breaks down. And that’s where Bob Dixon’s more dignified
and appropriate motto applies: “Everything almost works.”
Yes, I got desperate enough to call Bob. He did his best to calm me down
and get me back on a problem-solving track. Together we uncovered enough
information to re-establish a functional Macintosh, but the true source
of the temporary limbo state is still unknown and I’m back to the
difficulties that bogged us down in the studio all week. At the end of
our last conversation before bedtime (for a night’s rest that almost
didn’t happen), he shared another computing maxim having to do with troubleshooting, “Everything you learned by solving the current problem
you’ll never use again.” Perhaps so. But I took away at least one
valuable thing from the experience. Being able to rely on family is a
genuine blessing, and my Uncle Bob always has and always will be a fine
and helpful man.
Various & Sundry, part six
Monday, February 14th, 2005— Since last week, Dana and I’ve been so tied up preparing for tomorrow’s major presentation that we reluctantly acknowledged to each other over coffee this morning that Valentine’s Day would surely slip away without adequate observation. Million Dollar Baby will have to wait.
— Some guy was on the tube today lambasting authors who come up with another gimmick just to get their diet book on the New York Times best seller list. What was he promoting? A new book about diets that will probably get on the best seller list.
— When our friends Jeannette and Betty were in D.C. for the inauguration, they had a chance to get a picture taken with Ben Stein at one of the gala events. They loaned me the snapshot to scan for them and I think my smile, while sitting here doing the favor, is as big as theirs in the photo. It would be so cool to meet Ben and then score a picture with him in his tuxedo. He has to be one of the most desirable media personalities a non-celebrity could hope to encounter. There’s nothing about Ben not to like, and he genuinely appreciates people. I became convinced of that when I read excerpts from his diary. Anyone who likes to document life’s ordinary experiences can learn so much from how Ben does it. Someday his journals will undoubtedly become one of the most valuable accounts of contemporary American life produced at the turn of the century. He has an extraordinary insight into what makes the world go round. It’s never too late to learn new skills for living, because it’s never too late to screw up your life. There aren’t too many books that everyone should read. Ben’s book is one of them!
After the silence
Sunday, February 13th, 2005The rhythm of raindrops striking metal roofing punctuated each heartfelt expression rendered within the old cabin. Over the weeks, our group had moved from stunned disbelief to analytical precision. Every legal doctrine, ethical nuance, or metaphysical possibility was now open to full scrutiny. Lord, what has Mack set in motion with his generosity of spirit? I stopped to look around the room and was grateful beyond measure for such a circle of incredibly bright and deeply caring friends.
Man, that might sound sappy, but I felt it, I wrote it, and I’m sticking with it…