Doc's Place: Reminiscences

Parallel Parking

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 06:39:34 GMT

As an exception to my usual rule, the title of this post actually has a relationship to the content that follows. Perhaps it is not exactly what you might expect, but it is accurate, nonetheless. The general nature of my driving is known to long time readers of this blog, but may be succinctly summarized for new readers as; "I have no idea whatsoever why I am still alive." More astounding still, (aside from the tractor thing) is that I cannot recall ever having been injured or killed. There were a few times I was airborne or hanging upside-down from a seatbelt, but those don’t count because I wasn’t driving.

When I first learned to parallel park in high school drivers education class, it was easy. Our group of four male teens derived great pleasure from tormenting our instructor. We four gearhead country lads had been driving various motorized vehicles, from tractors to scooters, to racing go-karts, for several years. We had starting, moving forward rapidly, tuning engines, and even four wheel drifts down pretty well. It was the stopping and parking the vehicle in a designated spot that somewhat eluded us. We learned well and quickly, however, and were passed from the class as rapidly as the teacher could possibly manage, as he was in fear for his life anytime he was in the driver’s ed car with us. Considering that the car we learned in was a 383 tri-power Plymouth a three speed that had been loaned to the school for the class, he had reason to be.

About a year or so after completing driver’s training, an unrelated event called a “Road-E-O,” was held in a neighboring town to test the driving skills of the area’s youth. It involved awarding points for checking one’s rearview mirror, starting, turning, completing a pylon course without knocking them over, braking, and assorted other tasks, including parallel parking. I believe that the only error the contest organizers made was to award points for completing some tasks in the shortest time. I will simply state that I both won and lost the contest. I treated it as a gymkhana, rather than pretending to “compete” at a level I believed to be beneath me. A rule was made on the spot which applied only to me. I had clearly won on points and time, but I was adjudged to have had “a bad attitude.” Points were then deducted for bad attitudes. The officials were quite correct. I rapidly developed an extremely bad attitude as I watched the trophy being awarded to the second place contestant who fit the image of “All American Boy.”

So far, this tale has been prologue to the single occasion wherein parallel parking was quite important to me. One morning I was driving out of town on a wide left sweeping turn that led into a straight and open road to the next larger town which had a machine shop. In my usual manner, I accelerated continuously through the curve and well onto the straight section. Also as usual, I was exceeding the speed suggestion when I saw a car stopped on the road where two roads intersected it. It had no signals blinking, but it appeared clear that the driver had the intention of turning. From experience, over 90% of traffic at that spot turned left. Also from experience, nearly all cars that stop at a crossroad actually turn. As I was approaching rapidly and the car ahead hadn’t moved, I based a decision on the 90% left turn postulate. I both slowed (relatively speaking, I approached the speed limit from above) and prepared to pass on the right to avoid what I thought would be driving into the path of his turn. I was mistaken. The older couple in the car turned slowly to the right, directly into my path. Ooh! What to do? I was already committed to a course of action, so while putting myself into a hard left drift, tires screeching, raising clouds of dust and gravel, and having just enough time for three bad words, I parked exactly parallel beside them. They had apparently stopped their turn when they heard the commotion behind them. I did not hit them, but slid to a halt perfectly aligned beside them with a distance of at least six inches (possibly seven) between vehicles. When the dust cleared enough to see each other, I waved to them. There didn’t seem to be much else to do. There was no accident as the cars never touched each other, and for once, I was at a loss for words. As they slowly drove over the railroad track, I sat there trembling, thinking about trajectories, tire grip on various surfaces, that possibly I had made an error, and trying not to soil myself. This was most definitely not the sort of parallel parking taught in driver’s ed, but somehow I seemed to have passed the pop quiz.

Peace, Doc

“Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?” - George Carlin

The Real Easter Bunny

Sun, 23 Mar 2008 16:55:00 GMT

People on other blogs have mentioned the Easter Bunny, and it brought up a memory that has lain dormant for many years, just waiting to be a relevant association to a current thought. The event took place in the Nolan's back yard, a magical place in my childhood and no less so when Firstborn was just old enough to be interested in an Easter Egg hunt. The yard itself was a perfect setting for such an adventure, with a row of flowers along one side, an apple orchard, a walnut tree, and a weeping willow behind it, and a fence row of flowering shrubs on the other side. A detached garage added interest to the possible placement of eggs for the great hunt.

The eggs were hidden early in the morning in easy to find spots, and a few in not so evident places. When the sun had dried the lawn sufficiently and we had built Firstborn's enthusiasm to an optimum level (awake,) we ventured forth in search of magic eggs. There was one totally unplanned part of the festivities, however, that did not occur until several eggs had been found and placed in the official egg repository.

As she reached for one of the "difficult" eggs, hidden in the flowers, she startled a wild rabbit. Her first shriek was of surprise and possibly terror. The second was of complete delight. "The Easter Bunny! The real Easter Bunny!" as said bunny made its rapid escape along the flower row and around the lilac bush. I wish I had planned that, or even could have planned that. It was more of a surprise to the adult who didn't believe in the Easter Bunny than it was to the child who was willing to. I think that there is a profound lesson in there, somewhere. I began to be able to admit the possibility of the "facts" that I knew, either not being true or not being the complete truth. That was my Easter gift.

May the spirit of renewal, new growth, and fresh ideas be a gift to us all today.

Peace, Doc

Sometimes I Wonder

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 14:02:04 GMT

March forth, or my fourth March? Why am I still here? My first Spaces post was on March 19th 2005. It stated, in its entirety:

"Hello out there,

I'll figure out something worth saying to the world in the next year or so.

Peace,

Doc"

Since that initial post, I have released a lot of words, emotions, pictures, bits of my life, panic tips, links, rants, possibly useful information, poetry, opinions, and a great deal of myself into cyber-space for anyone to view. I have made at least two errors that ended up hurting people, and I hope that I have atoned for those, in some measure, both by public apology and by helping as many others as I could.

I first began blogging three years ago as a sort of "basket weaving" therapy for my grief and depression less than two months after the death of my wife. It helped by giving me something to do that would at least force me to think about something positive rather than obsess upon the really morbid thoughts that were predominant at that time. I am fairly certain that I was not totally sane then, with the combination of depression and grief. Although I was not at all new to the Internet, I was a total novice to the social aspect of it. The web was for email, downloading programs, and as an advertising medium for my private practice. I had never been in a chatroom, on a bulletin board, or gamed with others. Having "a real dot com" was a hoot. It was my own techno-toy on which to promote my practice and on which to give free suggestions and links to psychological resources.

Why in the world did I not comprehend that social life on the net is much like life in a large city, (only worse) with the same anonymity, isolation, and quasi-immunity from the direct consequences of most of one's statements and actions? I do not think I was merely stupid or naive. I was so needy that I did not recognize in myself, that which I would have been sure to recognize in another.

I used Spaces to mourn and grieve, seeking solace from whoever might give it. I hadn't thought out clearly that others might have exactly the same needs and feelings or that words on the web are forever. It was at that time, of course, that MSN/MSNBC chose to feature me for the first time. I'm sure that I was their "demented shrink, dog and pony show" for the week, but getting over 200,000 hits in one week was heady stuff and I continued to blog. When I realized how many people might potentially be reading what I wrote, however, I exercised a bit more self-censorship. I certainly didn't want everyone reading my private journal, after all.

The same general themes continue today, though. The basic "Doc" comes through pretty clearly. I have learned to suppress some of my more outrageous notions and my less than prize winning Haiku, though I have also learned about writing even the strongest convictions for publication. I have made a number of good friends on, or because of, Spaces Live. I have been fortunate enough to understand the lessons that were there, and to become a part of a like-minded community of bloggers who interact lovingly and really do care about each other.

I have not posted anything for nearly a week, both because I was at a temporary loss for anything I felt like writing, and because I had been giving some serious thought to leaving Spaces Live. My other blogs could be tended to more frequently, hopefully bringing a little more Google AdSense cash. I could possibly develop the online business, which I have been working at sporadically, into something that would produce both another small supplementary income, and be a service, or at least a bit of fun, for readers.

Following due contemplation, I have decided that I both want and need to continue to continue the role of sole proprietor of Doc's Place. I have several projects going on simultaneously, but if I lose the fun part of writing on the web, much more is lost than a few hundred dollars a year. Future posts may contain bits and pieces of other projects as the subject matter, but hopefully it will be interesting, useful, or oddly refreshing. Alternatively, it may be cranky and strange. Whatever. Most importantly, I know that I will remain among friends. Thank you all.

Peace, Doc

"A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked” - Bernard Meltzer

O, ... Um, ... Tannenbaum?

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 18:26:03 GMT

Some of my readers may recall my previous mention of "the mutant toilet bowl brush." When I moved I couldn't not take it with me. Yes, I know that was an awkwardly constructed sentence, but it says what I mean. I didn't have to move it. I did not even really want to move it, considering all the other things that had to be moved. It was musty smelling and bedraggled from being stored in a damp part of the basement. No sane person would have given me a penny for it. But the fake tree and I have history, and that history is what I really moved. I believe this is the image that "O Tannenbaum" is meant to bring to mind:

Although I would likely be better off tossing some tinsel on the remaining unpacked boxes, I will decorate the tree. I tell myself I'm doing it for the cats. I lie. They do seem to like it enough to bite it, to chew the cheap plastic "needles," and to knock it off the small table upon which it sits. I'll put some blinking lights and a few cat-safe ornaments on it and we'll all enjoy it in our own ways. This is the physical reality of what I moved and the response I hoped for. A single child-made ornament and Stinky couldn't resist:

The "tree" came to have significance to me as the trigger of a memory, really. My current situation, in my mind and emotions at least, closely resembles the one I was experiencing over 20 years ago. I was living alone in a small apartment and seeing my offspring on Wednesdays and alternate weekends. I was not in a festive, holiday state of mind then, either. Firstborn and Number One Son were totally aghast, however, that we did not have a Christmas tree. Rather begrudgingly, I gave in and we all marched across the street to the local K-Mart where I purchased the cheapest object resembling a tree that they had in stock. Its "limbs" are made of wire, spirally wrapped to hold the cheap plastic "needles" in place. If you can picture in your mind the older type of toilet bowl brush that resembles this description, you partially understand how it acquired its name. I was grumbling loudly enough when I described it as a mutant toilet bowl brush that the kids heard me and loved the name. How could a kid not like a name like that? For that matter, how could I resist it? It is a nearly perfect description and I believe it became a family tradition on the spot.

The Grinch is working toward regaining some holiday spirit, even if it is (mostly) to please The Boys. I'll try to include an "after" picture of this venture, as I know how important it is to all. *snort*

Peace, Doc

"... I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons they teach. ..." - E. Scrooge, Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol.

Thanksgiving Re-Past

Sat, 24 Nov 2007 13:56:09 GMT

It is about 6:00 a.m. Saturday and I seem to still be up sorting "stuff." In part I am reverting to a sleep pattern that I have tended toward since I was a kid - up as late as possible and sleep in as long as possible. In part, the nature of the sorting task is very different than I had planned it to be. Plans are like that.

The Boys and I had a peaceful Thanksgiving and an elegant repast of Fancy Feast chicken and egg souffle, a turkey sandwich, and if one was not too full, catnip. Bittle overdid dessert a little bit and became a possessed beast, writhing, scratching, biting, and glaring suspiciously at anything that moved for several minutes. Then he took a nap. Overall it was a quiet and subdued day during which we appreciated our new surroundings. There were no interrupting telephone calls from relatives and no visitors to disturb our sorting routine. I texted holiday wishes to the offspring and spoke to one friend. 1960's Golden Oldies were playing. It was calm. I liked that.

Black Friday was avoided as fervently as the Black Plague. I only ventured out as far as the dumpster to dispose of some more of the useless detritus of my life. Sorting is slow, sometimes bizarre, and often bittersweet. One box contained a hand sized sledge hammer, a pamphlet on saliva, a drawing that a patient had made for me telling me how not to worry (partially in Polish,) a tennis ball, two dinner napkins, an X-acto knife, a spray can of Kilz primer white paint, and a crystal candle holder made in Indiana, USA, of all places. Other times, like overnight and this morning, have had more substance. I found (and read nearly cover to cover) the first yearbook published by Hebron High School in 1914. Of the four people that raised me, Mayme and Helen (fraternal twins) appeared as seniors. Gertrude appeared in her sophomore year. Tom, being the baby of the family, born in 1900, did not appear as he would have been in eighth or ninth grade. He did appear in a 1917 picture, in his Hebron High School basketball uniform.

I found my grandfather R. P. Blood, MD's stethoscope and printed glass bottles from his drug store (Telephones: Office 27-b, Res. 27-a.) Trip diaries that Mayme Nolan wrote were also read, especially the one from 1963 when I was sharing driving duties with Pop. I remember that one quite well because I got to drive through Dallas-Fort Worth. I think Pop was a bit intimidated by so many lanes and exits on a highway. This worked out well because at that age I knew everything and drove through with no problem.

Other less pleasant memories and feelings emerged as I leafed through many medical bill receipts, funeral arrangements for four (all the same style of casket, arranged in advance) the crucifixes for each, and even the very insistent demand I made that Pop damn well would have a Fourth Degree K of C honor guard at his funeral, and I didn't much care who had to take off work for as many years as he was a dedicated member.

These were just part of this morning's memories. There remains a great deal of sorting out to be done. This may take longer than I initially thought. I don't let go of the past easily.

Peace, Doc

"I have more memories than if I were a thousand years old." - Charles Baudelaire

In My Room

Thu, 05 Apr 2007 03:34:29 GMT

Yes, that's a reference to the Brian Wilson song, but this story is about my own rooms of 45 years ago and presently. The song and the memories have much in common. This, and so many other Beach Boys songs were played on a home-built "hi-fi", through triaxial speakers, in enclosures I had also built in shop class, in my room. Please understand if I am not completely coherent in this post. I have become somewhat unstuck in time at the moment, and am traveling back and forth between then and now. A single thought about that room (and my life) has opened floodgates. So many memories vied for attention that I am literally overwhelmed.

Theres a world where I can go and tell my secrets to
In my room, in my room
In this world I lock out all my worries and my fears
In my room, in my room
Do my dreaming and my scheming
Lie awake and pray
Do my crying and my sighing
Laugh at yesterday
Now its dark and Im alone
But I wont be afraid
In my room, in my room
In my room, in my room
In my room, in my room

About the time I was 10, it was decided that there were simply not enough rooms in the home to accommodate all of us. I had been sleeping in a bedroom with two of my folks until that time. The house was "U" shaped if viewed from above, so the logical place for an addition was to fill up the U. It was during the discussion about how this could be afforded and accomplished that I heard agitated, raised voices for the first and only time in my entire life with my folks. A basement, two bedrooms on the first floor, a bathroom remodeling, and a single bedroom on the second floor were built. I was given the only room on the second floor, a veritable penthouse. Everyone gained room, storage space, a new bathroom, and looked forward to less cramped slumber.

I was allowed to help design my room and was quite enthusiastic about choosing tile for the floor, paneling for the walls (African Samara wood, if I recall correctly,) and in describing a built-in desk and bookshelf area facing west. Chuck, the carpenter, was quite willing to please and made the whole wall into a closet, a desk-workspace-bookshelf unit, and a storage area. He even built "secret" storage or hiding places into the structure that he knew a kid would love. The desk faced a picture window which overlooked our back yard, Uncle Barney's apple orchard, the fields in the farther distance, and was a magical place to sit and watch a thunderstorm approach. I did that many times, from the first visible lightning stroke many miles away to the arrival of the storm itself. I always felt so safe with my folks, that the potential danger of the storms simply did not occur to me.

From the completion of construction, I loved that room and played and worked in it with total satisfaction. There was a single problem that lasted for a few months. I wouldn't sleep in it. I am certain that my family, individually and as a group, muttered silent equivalents of "Aww, Shit!" to themselves. They would never have admitted it to me, much less have used those words to express it. I was simply so conditioned to sleeping in my crib and then my youth bed, close to them, that being alone at night was frightening to me. As I made friends with the room, however, sleeping there became a better and better idea until I made the complete transition. I believe that two people calling out to me, from below, to "knock it off with the noise" (again, phrased more gently) reassured me that I wasn't alone after all.

My room served many purposes; study hall, music room, "meditation" place, recovery room from broken arms, recreation room, very large phone booth, receiving room for visiting friends, main office of my first business ("Tee's Customodels" - plastic model cars built to match the owners' real ones, and buying/selling collectibles,) place to design and save for a racing go-kart, place to laugh or cry during my stormy teens, safe repository for an entire Chevy 327 racing engine, privacy with my fiancee, and so many other uses. For a place with a "lived in" life of only 11 years it contained so many memories under high pressure that when I started thinking about it, it exploded and released far too many memories and emotions to process at one time. So why am I crying? Because it is gone.

I realized, in writing this, how much my present existence resembles a photo negative of that time. Coincidentally, a tiny part of the story came full circle a few years back when Brian Wilson moved, for a time, into a house less than five miles away from this one. I live alone in a large house that I can neither afford much longer nor remodel sufficiently to get a good sale price for when I do sell. I live, essentially, in one room of it, occasionally venturing into the others when the need arises. The music, TV, and laptop are here, along with my ongoing nemesis, "the facilities." I sleep, dream, cry, plan, and occasionally laugh here. For two years I have lived in it as a prisoner of my own making. That is double edged. I have come to understand what is really necessary in my life and what I only want, or think I want at the moment. It is surprising, really, how little one really needs to exist. To live requires significantly more. I'm working on that now.

Peace, Doc

"Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose." - Kevin Arnold

Horses and Pre-Shrinks

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 08:31:10 GMT

Blue Girl was the first and only horse I ever attempted to ride. I am relatively perceptive in knowing when I am outclassed versus times when there is some possibility of success. To begin with, she was the oldest, calmest mare in the barn. My fiancée and her sister put on all the tack and saddles and metal things and such with which I was totally unfamiliar, and then essentially shamed me into riding with them, if that is what one could call it.

Don't get me wrong here. I grew up in a tiny rural town in Indiana, so I was familiar with such things as raising beef cattle, hogs (of both kinds,) turkey farms where one could start a wave of gobbling across the sea of birds simply by making a gobbling noise oneself, and even had a brief career as a successful chicken rancher in my younger days. So I had a love of animals from the time I was a child, but it included a healthy respect for any that were bigger than me, made louder and more intimidating noises than I could, or had dangerous looking teeth, claws, or other body parts. I simply felt that large animals were best appreciated from an appropriate distance.

Allow me to digress for a moment to state that I was not a total wimp. Anything mechanical, powered with one or more engines, that could be steered, accelerated and braked by one's own actions were absolutely fine with me. A Norton or a Harley knucklehead chop, anything vaguely automotive, tri-engined racing karts, my Model A Ford B/Gasser, the start of a fuel rail - all totally acceptable to get on or in without hesitation. I had an innate, though possibly mistaken, belief that I was in control of them.

At the farm, it was much worse. While my girlfriend saddled Jaunty Justin, a champion Morgan stallion, I was given what was supposedly the oldest, most docile being in the barn. That was fine with me. I hadn't a clue as to what one did to aim her, start her, or stop her. The plan was formulated that all I would have to do is sit on her while the girls led the way through the trail and Blue Girl and I, purely as an uncertain passenger, would follow them. Despite my reservations, I agreed. That was my second mistake. Either driving to the barn or trusting them had been the first. I was given some apples or carrots or something to feed her to make friends. My memory of the events of the following episode begins to get a bit spotty at this point. I know I wanted a beer and I believe Blue Girl would have preferred a handful of Mary Jane. Anyway, I do not think it worked. Blue Girl was older and wilier than I by a fair margin.

"OK, we're ready. Get on her."

"Now?"

"Now!"

"What do you mean that's the wrong side? There are little stepladder things on both sides."

"@*&)@#%!"

"Oh. Doesn't matter with a bike. You just get on the side that’s leaning on the kickstand."

"Just do what we tell you."

"Yeah, OK. How do you start her?"

"Quit stalling!"

"You noticed that, eh?"

And so the journey began. The girls rode off toward the trail and Blue Girl and I headed for the highway. I didn't think things were going according to plan so I tried reasoning with her. That surely did not work. Her response was to try to scrape me off on the first tree we passed in the driveway. I then became either firm with her or panicky, depending upon which version of the memory I choose to recall. I remember trying things like saying "Whoa," pulling on random straps, coaxing, and screaming, "Stop, God Dammit!" These did not work and the Queen of the Stable proceeded to do exactly what she pleased, paying no attention to me whatsoever. She knew very well that she was in complete charge and that I had no clue whatever about what to do to gain some control. All of the actions that looked so easy in the Westerns on TV weren't.

Again, memory is a little spotty, here, but the next thing I recall was riding along the side of the well-traveled road away from the farm. I had no plan. I could not convince her to slow down (so I could jump off,) turn around, "be a nice horsey," or anything else. My salvation came in the form of a deus ex machina, an intervention by the gods. It freaking rained! Blue Girl did not like rain. She turned and headed for the barn at her top speed. I would estimate that to have been about seven miles per hour, but I was not about to quibble. We finally had the same goal, even if for very different reasons. Same end result, same operant.

We arrived back at the barn either five minutes or several hours from the time we started, depending upon which of us you asked. I "dismounted." That's my story and I'm sticking to it, even though dismounting does not usually connote leaping from the saddle to the top rail of a stall. Again, same end, same operant. I was simply pleased that I lived through it, that my dismount had not been seen, and that the girls returned shortly thereafter to fix things. They found a soggy pair, Blue Girl tied to a stall by the leather thingies and me trying to look calm and collected but seriously doubting that I was accomplishing it. The scene was more like two damp beings eyeing each other suspiciously, both hoping we never had to repeat the experience.

I may sound overly suspicious when I state this, but I still believe they planned it that way. I have no definitive evidence, but I still recall barely audible snickers from the time of their return to some hours thereafter.

Later I thought I would turn the tables by giving my girl friend "a ride" in my coupe. It was the same B/Gasser I had spent more money on the engine and drive train alone than a new midyear Corvette would have cost. It was the one that, if you started it in the small wooden garage where most of the work was done on it, it quickly rattled oilcans off shelves on the walls. It was the one that left your stomach three feet behind you coming off the line. She loved it.

Despite my singularly unfortunate experience with attempting to ride one, I am still enthralled with the beauty and power of horses. For a number of years I had a long lens frontal shot poster of Secretariat, muscles rippling and racing full speed, hanging on the wall of any workroom I had. I recognize that it was my own lack of knowledge about riding and the consequent lack of control that frightened me. However, until horses grow twist grip throttles and hand brakes, it is highly unlikely that I will again attempt riding except possibly at the urging of one person in the whole world. You may see her her website, which includes exquisite photographs, many of which are of horses. They should be. She loves horses, is an exceptional professional photographer, and is a woman of strength and depth.

Peace, Doc

“A horse is dangerous at both ends and uncomfortable in the middle.” -- Ian Fleming

“A daughter who won't lift a finger in the house is the same child who cycles madly off in the pouring rain to spend all morning mucking out stables.” -- Samantha Armstrong

“Whether you regard the horse with awe or love, it is impossible to escape the sheer power of his presence...” -- Mary Wanless