You Try It

I took Peter's birthday present up to Brae Mere, left it with Paul, and stopped at DK Donuts on the way home. It's been years, YEARS, I tell you, since I've been there. The story below is probably why I decided I could have a glazed buttermilk bar today.

 
Elisabeth watches TV. Daytime. It's not a crime; it's just the back story. She's Dutch. So is Toos.

Toos and I visited Elisabeth today, and she told us about what the doctor said. "Dr Oz?" asked Toos. "No. Another doctor who came on his show," explained Elisabeth ("with a s," she says).  Elisabeth's accent is very thick. But that's irrelevant.

What this doctor says is that we--I guess that means all of us--should eat nothing after 3 p.m. 

"Then what?" I asked. 
"Drink water," said Elisabeth. "Then you--[meaning we]--will lose weight." And I said, "I might lose my mind, too."

Toos said, "That's what we had to do during the war (WWII). We had no food, so we drank a lot of water." I was thinking, "Yes, but the war is over" when Toos said, "The war is over." Then she said, "I cannot go to bed hungry. I just can't."

I ate the buttermilk bar right around 3 p.m. and am considering calling it a day, so to speak, for eating. You know, just to see. Yes, we shall see.

Later:
It occurs to me, at 5:20 p.m., (and it may be obvious why) that this kind of regimen does not make good sense. I mean are we really to go from 3 in the afternoon until the morning, like 7 or even 8, without food? Every day? And then, the question arises, when do we begin eating? Is it 7 or 8 or is it 5 or 6? And how much do we shove in before 3 pops up again?

Who is this doctor, anyway?

Today's WikiHow, or Funny How Annoying a Phone Book Can Be

How to Train for Ripping a Phone Book in Half

Believe me, I'm tempted to do the training, especially now, after having handed Paul his new directory and having brought my own into my house and set it on the kitchen table.

The thing/book is smaller, but that's not better. It's thicker, seems heavier, and the print is tinier, getting harder for me to read. And that's not all the fault of my eyes. I mean, we're talking small.

Paul knew what to do with his immediately. He dropped it in the recycle bin. Mine is still on the table. But, since I have none of the above training, I believe I'll just plop mine into the blue bin, too.

Thin skin

There is this spot on my forehead, right next to where I had the last surgery for skin cancer. I mean very close to it, so close that Steve, the PA, said to Kareen, "This may be a recurrence." To which I replied, "Yes, I thought the same thing. So should I sue?" They laughed, of course.

This was today. Because I called early this a.m. to see if I could get in to see Dr Burr (you know, he calls me kid), thinking that this spot on my forehead was suspicious--cancer or precancer--because it has been there for three+ weeks. Dr Burr is in Canada, fishing, but they could get me in to see Steve Frelli, the Physician's Assistant. I took it, even though I was supposed to meet the Curves rebels for lunch at the very same time. I call them rebels because they quit Curves because our owner is kind of a talk police person and because the place is austere.

Steve told me, because I asked, that his dad changed the name when he came to this country from Frelliaski (I am not sure of the spelling), which is Polish, to Frelli.

Do you understand that I had never met Steve before? I hope you do.

He's a toucher. He touched my arm and a bit later kind of tickled my shoulder. Then he left the room. When he came back in to do the biopsy, he patted my bare leg (I was wearing capri pants).

I said, "Steve, I do not want to offend you." He said, "Go ahead. I'm not easily offended." I knew he had no idea what I was about to say. I said, "No, I do not want to offend you, but would you please not pat me?"

Could have knocked him over with one finger. He turned red, said, "Oh."

I said, "See, you are offended. I'm sorry."

"No," he said. "I'm just a touchy person. I won't pat you."

"Thanks."

He said, "When you grow up to be 6'3" and have red hair [before he went bald, of course] you don't get offended."

Then I told him about my six-year-old redheaded grandson. That helped.

Back to my head. He did a biopsy because he thinks it's cancer. I hope he's wrong, but I think he's right.

I'm kind of bummed about it.

What do you think of this?

In the book Stealing Glances: Three Interviews with Wallace Stegner by James R. Hepworth, Wallace described his wife as central to his life and success.

"She has had no role in my life except to keep me sane, fed, housed, amused, and protected from unwanted telephone calls, also to restrain me fairly frequently from making a horse's ass of myself in public, to force me to attend to books and ideas from which she knows I will learn something, also to mend my wounds when I am misused by the world, to implant ideas in my head and stir the soil around them, to keep me from falling into a comfortable torpor, to agitate my sleeping hours with problems that I would not otherwise attend to; also to remind me constatnly (not by precept but by example) how fortunate I have been to live for fifty-three years with a woman that bright, alert, charming, and supportive."

I am awe-struck by this statement, and envious, too. And just so you know, Wallace Stegner said this of his wife, Mary, during her lifetime. Of course, he could not say it after her death. She outlived him by 19 years, dying at age 99.

I have probably written here before of Wallace Stegner. I loved him, love his novels and appreciate his non-fiction writing, all of which I find instructive and spell-binding. I don't have to agree 100% with his political views to appreciate him. His death in 1993, soon after a terrible automobile accident, left me sad and sorry. 

If you have never read Angle of Repose, his Pulitzer Prize winner, read it. Then you could read Crossing to Safety; All the Little Live Things; Spectator Bird; Big Rock Candy Mountain. And so on. But if you read only one of his novels, make it Angle of Repose.

Just Thinking

I once heard an interview with Tim O'Brien, veteran of the Vietnam War and author of The Things They Carried.  He was at My Lai the year after the massacre in 1968. He said they did not know what had happened there and wondered why it was such a hostile place.
 

Anyway, the interviewer asked what I think was a question she had not given much thought to. "Why do you always write about the past?" O'Brien said, politely, "Because that's where the stories are." He didn't then say, "Duh." But he could have. 

Or he could have said, "Because I don't write science fiction," which is what I think you do when you write about the future. Certainly fiction. But even so, I insist that any writer--that's any writer--draws upon what he knows from the past, whether it's his own experience or something he knows very well. We can make up stories, but we always draw from the bank of memory. (Is that a cliche?) 

And how about writing the present? 

Can't be done, strictly speaking, because as soon a thing happens, it's past; you can't get it on paper before it's the past. So there.

Of cars and my car and does this mean I need a new one?

Okay. About my car. It starts.

AAA guy said something is draining on the battery. Firestone said it's a new battery. (Duh.) Their diagnostic said everything's perfect. But I can hardly believe that. After all. The thing would not start. I couldn't even use my remote to unlock the door.

I went over to ask my neighbor Ron what he thought. He who spent a good hour last May helping me without success, when this happened before. My neighbor Ron said a bunch of things, but when he said, "Do you have anything plugged in to a power outlet?"

Ding dong. Hello.

I have always left my phone charger plugged in. It is now unplugged. And I hope to goodness that makes everything perfect, indeed.

Guess I'll find out the next time I go away for a few days and leave my car behind, which will be mid-September.

Song of the Day

Today's music in my head, I Stand All Amazed, a hymn about the Savior.

Yesterday's, Honesty, by Billy Joel. He laments:
Honesty is such a lonely word.
Everyone is so untrue.
Honesty is hardly ever heard,
Mostly what I need from you.

And both songs have had sway in my head through the day.

Is there some reason I wake with songs running around my brain? Not that it's like a plague or anything like.