If These Old Walls Could Speak

A house is nothing more than a bunch of wood and concrete and other stuff thrown together in some semblance of order to form a shelter. A home, though, is the place where life happens. One day in the not too distant future, Diane and I will begin the process of packing up our home. Packing the "things," while no small feat, is meaningless when compared to the packing up the memories of the last 30 years.

In some ways, it still seems like just yesterday that I cleared areas of the heavily wooded lot for the house and septic system. We broke ground in early 1994 and I was sent to Japan to work for two weeks (on very short notice) just days after the basement was poured. Diane powered on in my absence; raising two active little boys and keeping things moving with the builder.

Diane, the boys and I invested much blood, sweat and tears as the house grew from that hole in the ground and somehow transformed into the home where our family grew up. The memories started even before we moved in in September of that year.

The excavator put the boys on his lap as he drove his big machinery around the lot; digging and moving dirt. 

Those walls saw two little boys spending many hours pounding nails through various walls' bottom plate into the subfloor as Diane and I worked on other construction projects. I'm sure the hundreds of nails holding some of the walls to the subfloor would keep the wall standing in the fiercest tornado.

Those walls saw two little homeschooled boys grow into godly young men.

Those walls saw an addition built to move Diane's parents in when they needed extra care, and they saw us grieve as her Dad passed away in their home within our home. They saw Diane sacrifice much as she cared for her Mom for 20 years until she simply couldn't provide the care she needed anymore, all while still caring for her boys and me.

Those walls saw Diane fiercely battle cancer; refusing to give in even a little as she pressed on with all of the responsibilities of being a wife, mom and educator.

Those walls saw the boys head off to college and begin families of their own.

Those walls saw joy and sorrow, arguments and reconciliation, victories and loss.

Soon, those walls will be seeing memories being made by a new family, but all they have seen over the last 30 years will somehow still be there - still a part of the fabric of that house that will no longer be our home.

Lola's Last Words

Lola died Thursday. Lola wasn't her real name, but that's what I called her. Lola was Loretta Gorski, Diane's Mom. The very first time I met her some 34 plus years ago, she told me she had grown up wanting to be a Radio City Rockette with the stage name of Lola. She would have been the first and only sub-five foot tall Rockette, but the name stuck and she was Lola until the end.

Lola lived with us for 20 years in a connected apartment we built by converting the garage into living space. She lived there with Diane as her primary caregiver until, after taking a fall in December, 2019, she needed more care than Diane could give. We moved Lola into an assisted living facility about fifteen minutes from home on March 6, 2020. One week later, the facility was put into COVID lockdown, and for over a year the only real contact Diane had with her Mom was phone calls and waving to her as she stood at the window of her third floor apartment while Diane stood in the parking lot. She was so happy when the facility reopened for Diane to visit her, to hug her again. 

Lola lived in her assisted living apartment until Memorial Day weekend when she took another fall that sent her to the hospital. From there, she was sent to a rehab facility with the hope of getting her strong enough to go back to the apartment that had become her home. 

On Wednesday, June 30th, Diane brought her outside to meet Asaph, her first great-grandchild, who was visiting from Florida. She was ecstatic and he was happy to sit on her lap. 

That night, everything changed.

The nurse called Diane early Thursday morning to tell her Lola was becoming very lethargic and confused. They were sending her to the hospital. Diane called from the ER to tell us Lola was out of it. They ran a battery of tests to determine that she had infections of several organs and systems. She handed the phone to the doctor so he could discuss his findings and find out what we wanted to do. As her Healthcare POA, I made the decision to begin comfort care and allow the infections to run their course in her body. 

We met her back at the care, now hospice, facility, but Lola really wasn't there. She slept virtually all of the time and was not really lucid during her wakeful periods. We called Matthew during her last (and really only) lucid moment and put the phone by her so they could talk a final time. After Matthew tearfully told her that he loved her for the last time, Lola said, "I'm glad you're not here." She didn't want his last memory of her to be seeing her in her current condition. After that call, she went back to sleep.

Lola had a few wakeful episodes after that, but she was never really lucid. In one of those times, she told us (about 50 times in a ten minute period) that she loved hot, black coffee. She had another wakeful, but not lucid, moment during our final visit with her Wednesday evening. She looked over at me with a blank stare and said, "Bye." 

Diane said, "Mom, that's Scott." 

She just looked over at me again and said, "Bye." 

Diane asked her if she wanted me to leave and she said, "Yes," then she looked at Diane and said, "Bye."

Diane asked if she wanted her to leave, too, and she said, "Yes." Diane asked why and she said, "I'm going to sleep."

She was snoring away within a minute, so we kissed her forehead, said goodbye and headed to the car. 

Diane got a call from the hospice nurse at around 7:45 Thursday morning to tell us that Lola had died. She was sleeping comfortably during the nursing checks through the night and sometime after the last check she had simply, peacefully stopped breathing. 

Lola loved our yard and had asked that we scatter her ashes in our wooded backyard, so sometime in the coming weeks we will head into the yard and tearfully say our final goodbye.

Lola was 98.

Not Just A Dog

Sadie Mae died quickly and peacefully on Saturday, October 3rd. The doctor suspected that she had developed a brain tumor that led to some sudden and significant issues. She was only happy if both Diane and I were home with her. She was agitated a bit if only one of us was home and was inconsolable if she was left alone. She would go crazy when we got home; racing around and panting until enough time had passed for her to settle back in. She also started sleeping a lot more over the last couple of weeks. 

She was unable to settle down even with people with her when we gave her a trial run at the doggy daycare in preparation for our trip to Florida to meet our new grandson, Asaph. After consulting with her doctor, we made the gut wrenching decision to euthanize her before we left on our trip. I pretty much spent the last five hours of her life stroking her as she mostly slept contentedly; the pain building in my heart along with the lump in my throat with every passing minute. The first thing Dr. Svang said when she walked into the room was, "You're doing the right thing." 

It sure didn't feel like it.

The week away was a salve for my aching heart, but coming home to an empty house is a punch in the gut.

Sadie Mae was so much more than "just a dog." She was a special companion to me through good times and bad. I work next door to the Elmbrook Humane Society. One of their volunteers was walking Sadie (they called her Blackie) past our building while we were outside at break enjoying an unseasonably warm January day. Diane and I went over to meet her that afternoon and just knew that she needed us as much as we needed her. 

She had a really rough start in her life and came with some issues as many rescues do. She transformed into my perfect canine companion after multiple visits with her doctor and several sessions with the doggy shrink at the Waukesha County Humane Animal Welfare Society.

Sadie Mae was quite sure that I couldn't eat an entire apple by myself, so she stood by staring at me knowing that I would bite off a small piece and give it to her as the first bite, another one in the middle and she always got the last bite. She also determined that Diane couldn't eat lunch without having some baby carrots on her plate destined for her. She somehow knew anytime Diane was boiling water to make noodles because she always raced in no matter how deeply she had been sleeping to eat the noodles Diane had used to test for doneness. 

No matter where she was in the house, or how deeply she was sleeping, all it took was for me to call out, "Sadie Mae come help Daddy...," with whatever task I was headed out to do. She loved things as simple as backing the truck into the garage or going out to light the grill or flip the meat. She was also an invaluable helper whenever Diane needed to fill the bird feeders or pull weeds in the garden. She just wanted to be with us whenever we did anything. 

Sadie was my constant companion during the three and a half months that Diane lived in Pennsylvania to help Matthew and Shelley during his Lymphoma treatment. She went to work with me everyday and either followed me around or sat in a spot where she could monitor my location the entire day. She slept at my feet in bed every night. 

Sadie Mae was terrified of my woodshop in the basement. She would run to the furthest reaches of the house and hide when she saw me changing into my shop shoes. During the last couple of weeks of her life, though, her need to be near me seemed to supersede her fear of the shop. Maybe that should have been a clue that things had changed for her. She even spent several hours in the shop with me a few days before she died; leaving me with a wonderful memory of our time together. 

I wake up early; even on the weekends when most people relish the chance to sleep in. Not me. I'm still typically awake and up sometime between 3:45 and 4:15. To avoid waking Diane, I would get up and go downstairs to pass the time watching some woodworkers I follow on YouTube. Sadie Mae always went with me. She curled up on her bed beside my spot on the sofa or up on the sofa and we would pass the hours until Diane got up with one hand stroking her as we watched the videos together.

Sadie couldn't easily jump onto the bed anymore so she slept on her bed on the floor beside our bed. I gave her a few treats and some petting just before getting into bed each night. I would stroke her ears as I looked into her eyes and told her that I loved her. Her eyes seemed to convey that she wanted to tell me that she loved me, too.

We got home from Florida Saturday afternoon. I cried as I watched videos alone yesterday morning; longing for the chance to stroke her soft ears and scratch her belly just one more time. 

We had Sadie Mae cremated. Her ashes are supposed to come back today. I am going to make a  dovetailed box from some beautifully figured cherry to hold her cremains. 

She was not just a dog and I will miss her always and forever.

It's Going To Be A While

Everyone is talking about when things will "get back to normal." Based on their context, they seem to be talking about social distancing being eliminated or "non-essential" businesses reopening. Unfortunately, those aren't even close to what's required for us to get back to normal. In fact, we may never return to the normal we used to know.

People are anxious to return to their life the way it was before this crisis. Unfortunately, merely ending the restrictions isn't going to make that happen. Many people are out of work. The government's stimulus plan isn't going to replace the income they are losing - not even close if this continues for another month or more. The damage done to some companies is going to be too much for them to overcome and they will either never reopen or won't return to their pre-COVID-19 status. Many of their employees won't have jobs to go back to.

Also, just because restaurants and movie theaters and stores reopen doesn't mean their customer base can afford to jump back to the level of discretionary spending they enjoyed before the crisis hit. Those businesses won't be able to afford to keep the same staffing levels they had before if their customers can't afford what they are offering. Unemployment numbers are likely to be affected for a long time.

We can't forget that the $2,000,000,000,000 (let all those zeros sink in for a moment) government stimulus plan isn't free. We're going to be paying for that for a very long time, even without the pork that our elected leaders allowed to bloat the bill. Ultimately, the only way the government generates revenue is to tax its people. That "free money" is going to cost a whole lot for a very long time. The interest alone on that money could cripple an economy already reeling from the effects of the pandemic. We are all going to pay for it eventually.

I'm one of the "lucky" ones. My company is considered essential so I still go to work each day and collect a paycheck every two weeks. That could change in a heartbeat, though, if I or one of my co-workers get sick. Having one or two people quarantined out of a company of eight people could quickly bring us to our knees.

Until then, I just keep praying for those people searching for effective treatments and vaccines. I will keep praying for the healthy to stay healthy and the sick to recover.

Like the ripples emanating from a stone hitting the water, the ripples from the Corona Virus are going to continue spreading over a great area until they eventually weaken and largely disappear. There are going to be a lot of businesses; small, medium and large, that are impacted for a very, very long time.

Maybe forever.

Whatever happened to civil discourse???

The political division in our country is quite possibly as bad as it has ever been. It seems impossible to disagree with someone without being accused of hate. Where did we lose touch???

A prime example of this problem was glaringly obvious in a recent social media post featuring a photograph of four of our surviving past presidents with their surviving spouses. It was a very nice photo of a nicely posed group of smiling people. Now I don't really agree with any of the four men on everything, and I strongly disagree with the policies of two of them. Those who know me know which I would tend to support and which I wouldn't, but that's irrelevant to this discussion. My problem is with the vitriolic and hateful comments people on both sides of the political spectrum posted.

Really, people????

There were hateful posts directed at one party's presidents or the other. There were hateful posts directed at the people who support one party's presidents or the other. There were posts spewing disgust and hate that their guys would be photographed with the other guys - and that they'd all be smiling.

Where did we go off the rails? Since when is it somehow implied or worse, required, that we hate our opponents? All four of the men in the photograph had been duly elected President of The United States and, as such, deserve the respect due the office - whether you agree with their policies or not. Personally, I would consider it a privilege to meet and shake hands with a former U.S. President even if I strongly disagree with his policies. I'm guessing that we could even have a very polite conversation about our disagreements without any hateful speech, raised voices or vile language.

How could that possibly be? It's possible because I still believe in civil discourse with those with whom I disagree. Sure, the debate can be spirited at times, but we can have spirited debate without being hateful or mean. Having my picture taken shaking hands and chatting with a former President I may not support does not imply my endorsement any more than shaking hands and chatting with one of my competitors at a trade show or meeting implies that I back them and their products. It's just how we are supposed to interact with other people.

Disagreeing doesn't mean hating; despite what our current climate tries to portray.

Let's face it; you are not likely to change my mind and I'm not likely to change yours, but why don't we get back to an era of civil discourse, where we can disagree and still be friends.

Hannah Rose

There are two kinds of people in the world; those who see their pets as family and those who have no heart. I am clearly in the first camp. Cats and dogs have always been so much more than pets to me - they are family.

Hannah Rose was one of those family members. I had to put Tiffany down shortly before her twentieth birthday. She had been with me since she was a kitten. It took about a year, before I was ready for another cat; not one to replace Tiffany, of course, but one to be a new companion.

The Humane Society of Wisconsin was running a free adoption special on adult cats. I fell in love with a beautiful girl they had named Sparkle. The rest of the family fell in love with an adorable little black and white girl. The adoption counselor, of course, suggested that we could get two! I wasn't keen on getting two, but I knew without a doubt that "Sparkle" was my girl and Diane and the boys wanted the other one.

As you would expect, we left with two...

The people at the Humane Society really had no idea how old the girls were, but they were at least one year old that day they came to their new home.

Sparkle became Hannah Rose before we even got to the car. I don't remember the other cat's name at the shelter, but she became Haley; an appropriate name because she is like a comet!

Hannah was my girl, though.

My office was in our home at the time, and Hannah promptly claimed the back of my desk chair as her spot. She spent many hours there as I madly typed code. She was definitely "my" cat and I was wrapped around her little paw.

That was fourteen and a half years ago, and our relationship never wavered. She spent countless hours graciously allowing me to pet her as she sat on my lap. She grew a bit more restless in recent years and would jump up and down from my lap a dozen times as we watched hockey or baseball games, but she always preferred my lap over any other. I loved to feel her soft coat and hear her gentle purr as I stroked her.

Hannah was also our mouser. Even as recently as a week and a half or so ago, Diane went downstairs to find a dead mouse proudly displayed for all to see.

Hannah Rose was a big girl - until just a couple of weeks ago, that is. We noticed she was starting to lose weight and eating less of her hard food. We started offering soft food which she took readily at first, but even that was met with a less than enthusiastic response after a bit. We also noticed that she was starting to drool and it was a bit blood tinged at times.

Hannah Rose took a turn for the worse over the weekend. She began rejecting even soft food and was very restless. We knew we had to make the tough decision to let her go before she started suffering.

Diane called the vet's office as soon as they opened yesterday. They had several openings, but she chose the one in the afternoon that would allow me to leave work early so I could be with Hannah at the end.

We put Hannah Rose in a towel lined box to take her to the vet. She fought being in the box at first, but then it was almost as if she realized that this was best and settled. They took us right into a room and the doctor came in to check her. She knew immediately that Hannah had developed a very aggressive malignant tumor in her mouth. She said it was fairly common in cats and that it was reaching a point where it was hurting her. She reassured us that it was time.

We had a few minutes to stroke and snuggle Hannah as they went to prepare everything needed to compassionately euthanize her. Our tears flowed as we said goodbye to my precious Hannah Rose. She purred even as the medicine coursed through her veins and she peacefully fell asleep.

The vet's office made a clay plaque with her name and her paw print that now sits on my dresser - a permanent reminder of my precious girl.

The vet helped us wrap Hannah in the towel and put her back in the box for her final trip home.

We buried Hannah Rose next to Tiffany behind the pond in our backyard. Two rocks mark her grave.

I will never forget my sweet Hannah Rose.

The Empty Space

It's amazing how cavernous a space seems to be when it is empty. Even tiny spaces seemingly swell to great proportions when the contents disappear. The cavern may be real, or only a figment of our imagination. In a few cases; it is both.

There's an empty space tucked into the woods at the top of our driveway. For nearly two decades, that space has been filled with an amazing little fourteen foot aluminum fishing boat on a simple trailer. It had always been my dream to own a little fishing boat, but we weren't in a position to really do it. That all changed when we got a small inheritance after Nana died. We decided that we would take that money and buy the fishing boat I had always wanted.

I searched the newspapers diligently until I found a 1965 Lone aluminum boat. She had been painted in a rough camo pattern that had long ago faded into subtle shades of gray. She sat on a rather decrepit old homemade trailer.

She was beautiful.

I still remember the day we hooked her up to the back of the car and took her home.

We christened her, "That's Nice," because it was something Nana commonly said. Whether you told her about your day or you shared your thoughts and dreams, her standard reply was, "That's nice." Nana never said a bad word about anyone. Her response to things she wasn't all that excited about was typically her standard, "That's Nice."

We all agreed that naming our boat That's Nice was an appropriate way to remember and honor Nana.

That's Nice was so much more than a simple fishing boat. It was a memory making machine.

I bought an old, small outboard and our family began making deposits in the bank of memories. We'd fish and we'd ride around in our beautiful little boat. The boys were ecstatic when we'd buzz across the lake and I'd suddenly spin in a tight circle to pop us back over our own wake and make the boat rock and jump. It doesn't take much to make a 14 foot aluminum boat rock and jump.

Sometimes, we would tie a rope onto the back of the boys' life jackets and they would jump (or be thrown) overboard and swim around until it came time to drag them back inside and head for shore.

Through the years, we upgraded the outboard and trailer and equipped her with a locator and other accessories. No matter what we did with everything around the boat, though, the old aluminum hull was a constant.

The boys interests changed as they grew older. Joseph would go fishing with me once or twice a season. He was only happy when we put the boat over a large school of tiny panfish that would immediately bite on virtually anything he threw out there. He would catch dozens of fish in a short time. While Joseph did some fishing, our time in the boat was mostly spent just talking. Once the bite tapered off, it was time to go home.

Matthew, on the other hand, would spend hours in the boat; casting and retrieving with the hope and expectation that the next cast would catch the big one. We drifted down rivers and motored around lakes in pursuit of bass, walleye, northerns or perch. It didn't really matter if the fish were biting or not; we were in the boat and we were together.

I hoped that those days would last forever.

I knew, of course, that they couldn't and they wouldn't.

The boys grew up. Their lives moved on and they moved away.

I would look at That's Nice as I came up the drive; thinking I should get her out again, but there were always other things that needed my time and attention.

So she sat.

I knew I should just sell her since I wasn't using her, but I couldn't bring myself to let her go. There were just too many memories piled up in that old aluminum hull. Too many hours of laughter and joy.

Last week, my seemingly rational thoughts took over and I listed her on Craigslist and the Facebook Marketplace. I had several inquiries almost immediately, but they wanted to split her up and buy the outboard only.

Then came THE EMAIL.

Hello,

I saw your boat posted on Craigslist. I am interested in seeing it. I am in Mukwonago and can stop by before noon today (5/16), before 10am tomorrow (5/17) or Friday morning.

Please let me know if any of those times work for you.

Thank you.

Andy

That started a string of emails that led to me taking the boat to the launch at Phantom Lake so he could see her running. 

He told me about his family, and how his kids were so excited to get a fishing boat. He told me he'd been looking for about a year but couldn't find one in their price range with an engine nearly as new and nice as hers.

He made an offer.

We shook hands and agreed to meet Friday afternoon at the bank to complete the transaction.

Part of me regretted it right away, but I honored our deal.

I got all of the paperwork together and marked up some lake maps for some of our favorite fishing spots.

I fought back tears as I hooked her up to the back of my truck for one last time and headed to the bank. We went over everything and I unhooked her and drove away.

A new family is making memories with her now.

So now there is an empty spot tucked into the woods at the top of our driveway and a cavernous hole in my heart.