Tomorrow is canceled

Tonight's snow storm reminds of my days in radio.  When I first started working at a radio station, I was assigned to the 6pm to 2am shift on Saturdays and Sundays.  One Saturday I came to work in a snow storm.  Back then, snow accumulation was pretty much predicted after the storm ended.  It snowed all during my shift and I started getting calls about canceled church services the next day.  It got to be pretty busy, taking messages and then setting aside time to read them.  I felt I was doing a good thing, even if I didn't really know what I was doing.

2 o'clock came and, try as I might, I couldn't get out of the building.  All doors opened out and so much snow had fallen that all the doors were blocked.  I didn't know what else to do, so I slept on the couch for a couple of hours until the phone started ringing and ringing and ringing.  I was not allowed to turn on the transmitter, but the Sunday morning guy couldn't get out of his driveway and the chief engineer was also stranded.  The chief talked me through turning on the transmitter.  And then the reading began.  I think I read the name of every church in eastern Lancaster County.

Sundays were sold to churches.  They paid for 15, 30, or 60 minutes and the time was theirs.  They did their own recordings and the quality of the recordings was amazingly awful.  Schools started calling with cancellations for Monday.  Fortunately, there were no commercials on Sundays.  To the church-going public, it seemed like a very altruistic thing to do.  From management's perspective, they were already raking in the dough from the church tapes.  I read as many cancellations as I could between sermons.

By noon, I was pretty much exhausted, starving, and hoarse.  Several of my co-workers called in to give me encouragement and good reviews.  I'd never had to do Sunday mornings before.  At noon was a scheduled newscast, so I spent part of the morning trying to put that together.  Naturally, most of the news was about the blizzard.  I did not fall asleep on the air, despite the sermons, and I felt like a one-person staff keeping the community up-to-date.  At some point, the police and highways folks called reports on roads that were open but with the request to please stay home unless travel was absolutely necessary.

Late in the afternoon I'd resigned myself to going until 2 Monday morning, because it seemed as if the world had stopped and no one was going anywhere.  The church tapes ended at 3, so I had to find "Sunday suitable" music to play to the AM station's sign-off.  I just finished an into to a song when the studio door burst open.  A snow-covered chief engineer stood in the doorway and told me to go home.  The program director was right behind him and he told me to go home, too.  And they thanked me for everything I did.  I reminded them that I was supposed to be on from 6 until 2.  The program director said that's why he was there.  The chief engineer cleaned out the parking lot and even cleaned off my car.  I felt very good about what I'd done...I felt that was what radio was all about, that I got thrown into it, and that I did it right.

So ever after for the next nearly 40 years when the forecast was for snow, I packed up a change of clothes, made sure I had food or money for vending machines, a blanket and I was set for doing public service.  At times it was just me, but after 1995, a newsman also came in, making things infinitely easier.  I would try to get some sleep until the regular evening announcer's shift ended and then took over, giving occasional cancellations each hour.  It became a given...my husband didn't particularly like it, but he understood why I felt I had to be there.

The last time I did it was in a blizzard of Weather Channel proportions.  By then, we were 24 hours and the overnight programming was on satellite and computer.  The huge satellite dishes were at the bottom of a steep hill, steep enough to make you tired on a nice day.  The de-icing mechanism on the dishes couldn't keep up with the snow, so I had to go down the hill, get the broom with the incredible long handle, scrape off the snow so we could receive the feed, and then I'd trek up the hill.  I did it because the news guy took the phone calls.  The first time I did it, I was breathing very heavily by the time I got to the top of the hill.  It was a powdery show, so you didn't walk on it so much as through it, and pushing all that snow uphill was a trial.

The signal disappeared a second time and I went down to do the honors.  As I reached the top of the hill, the snowplow finished clearing the parking lot.  I could not get over the piles of snow.  In fact, I collapsed and I don't know how long it took me to get back up on my feet and negotiate my way back onto the parking lot and back into the building.

I thought maybe when I left radio I'd get a twinge when it started snowing, a nagging feeling that I should go into the station and help out with the snow emergency.  It's never happened.  As much as I felt I was providing a service to the community during a snow emergency, I don't miss it.  Best wishes to all those who have to work tonight, who may get snowed in and have to work a couple of shifts, I'm on your side, but I'm also at home.

Jesus' Yeller

Jesus’ yeller was at the bus stop this morning.  Pity.  I hadn't hoped he’d died, but it was kind of nice when I realized I hadn't heard him brow beating us sinners for a long time.  I’d hoped maybe he’d seen the light and converted to Zoroastrianism or Rastafarianism or Satanism or maybe found Truth through the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

And then this morning our usual blasé surroundings echoed with the threats of hell, our relentless giving in to the pleasures of the flesh, and on and on and on.  He sometimes zeros in on someone, particularly someone who’s smoking, and harasses him or her.  He doesn’t much care for young women of fashion, what with the lack of modesty and all.  He doesn't seem to mind young men with their pants held up only by their baskets.

I was told he was hit by lightening when he was young.  When he miraculously survived, he decided to give his life to Jesus and thus found his calling to preach the gospel to the masses.  And where are the masses?  Unfortunately, we’re at the transfer center on Market Square.

Oddly, Christmas and the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ weren't part of his rap.  But I suspect that he doesn't have Christmas in his repertoire.  What he yells are repetitive phrases with minor variations.  He may or may not be aware of the season, but it’s definitely part of his spiel.  Too much love, not enough anger.

He wears earmuffs or a headset or something over his ears.  I've toyed with idea of asking him, should he approach me, if he wears them so he doesn't have to listen to himself.  I don’t think he’d get the joke or appreciate the comment.  I would be mocking him and, by extension, the Lord our God.  I’d get yelled at, and I’m not sure how much of that I could take. 

Yes, I know I’m supposed to give him his space, despite the fact that he intrudes on mine.  Naturally, everyone has to believe what he believes, and we have to hearken unto his every word.  And there are some people who “amen” him and nod in agreement.  It makes me understand where some of the prophets came from. 

Jesus’ yeller returned to the bus stop this morning after a long, welcomed absence.  One wonders where he was.  Was I simply fortunate enough not to be there when he was?  Perhaps he was a guest of the commonwealth in one facility or another.  Every city, every town, every community has its characters.  They are best appreciated from a distance.  There are others who are best appreciated by their absence, Jesus’ yeller among them.

67 or 45 or something

One thing I was not prepared for, aside from retirement, when I reached my alleged Golden Years was not feeling like I'm 67.  I don't know what it's supposed to feel like, but I don't feel like it.  Oh, most assuredly I have aches and pains.  The arthritis isn't going away anytime soon.  Forgetfulness has become infuriating.  I don't like having to walk more slowly or scoring lower points on video games I once scored many thousands more points.  I'm tired of age jokes and age discrimination (no matter what anyone says, it's real and it happens).  After nearly 40 years in broadcasting, it seems the best I can do now is prepare Big Macs and such.  The lack of hair where I used to be furry and the thinning at the top are not among my favorite things.  I'm 67.

The bitch is, I find it difficult to act my age...mostly because I don't know how 67-year-olds are supposed to act.  Finding a role model is difficult enough; finding a role model for a gay 67-year-old man is damn-near impossible.  But the really weird thing is that, despite the aches and pains and balding and forgetfulness, I don't feel like I'm 67.  My brain, when it's not busy forgetting things and registering aches and pains, thinks I'm still in my 40s.

That may not be a bad thing, but it is strange.  I see fellow old people and wonder if they feel the same, if they've accepted that they're now old and this is the way it's done.  I'm kind of afraid to ask.  "Well, yes.  Get over yourself.  You're old."  I see younger people who don't even look at me, let alone know what I think about something.  God forbid they should ask me a question.

In a way, I deserve it.  The way I treated old people when I was young was pretty shameful and not at all unlike the way I feel I'm being regarded now.  Although I'm no longer in their way as far as career advancement goes, I feel like I'm taking up space, breathing too much air, eating food that should go to others.  Of course, I was convinced I'd never see my 30th birthday, so imagine my surprise.  Still, I feel as if I have something to share, that if I were asked a question I could answer and be helpful, and none of us knows how to talk to the other.

I especially think I could be helpful with young gay people, but here any support groups are at night, we don't have shelters for any young people (that don't require confessing your sins), and I don't have any social work degrees.  Professional staff only, thank you very much.  So, I feel kind of wasted...in a bad way.

No doubt feeling my age will catch up with me.  If I can remember, I'll let you know what it's like.  Until then, I guess I'll just wander around being 67, feeling 45, and looking like shit.

She Never Rides That Bus

Normally I see her on the afternoon bus, when I see her at all.  She goes to the church where I used to be choral director.  I was essentially fired from the place a few years ago, but she keeps me informed.  I was especially happy to hear the news that the minister who got rid of me had so divided the congregation through the years that he left before he was drummed out.  She always takes an earlier bus in the morning.

Monday morning, she was on the 8:05.  She always takes an earlier bus.  The seat beside her was vacant and she asked me to sit with her.  She'd had an upset stomach and missed the bus she usually rode.  We made the usual small talk, with me being sympathetic about her tummy problem.  She got a strange look on her face, reached into her bag and pulled out a program from a church service a couple of weeks earlier.  She said she'd been keeping it for me.  She opened it and at first I didn't understand what it had to do with me.

I noticed a familiar title for the offertory.  It was a rag I wrote a long time ago, back when I was living the ragtime life.  I noticed at the bottom of the program that the offertory was dedicated to the pianist's grandparents and it was explained that the rag was written by "the much loved former director" of the church choir.

At first, I was startled.  I had assumed I was formally excised from church history, an unmentionable.  Then it hit me later in the morning that a piece I'd written many years before was played (and I knew the pianist, so I knew it had been played well) for people who had no idea who I was.  And it hit me that I actually was a composer and strangers heard my work...certainly not an established composer, but a good pianist took the black dots off the page and turned them into music I'd created and people heard it.  I'm far more prolific as an arranger.  I was used to conducting my arrangements.  Arrangements take imagination; it's difficult for me to come up with an original melody (let alone the 3 or 4 required in a rag).  But there I was, absent but entertaining people for just under 4 minutes.

I sent an email to the person who was my supervisor at the church and is the mother of the pianist.  I told her I was surprised and delighted that her daughter played the rag and happy that I was a footnote in the church's history.  I'd figured my 22 years as choir director had been deleted.  I asked that she forward my thanks to her daughter.  She replied that I was much more than a footnote and that I was dearly loved.

What bothers me is that I can't relate this to my partner.  He was as surprised as I that I'd been told to resign (my resignation was written in pencil on yellow legal paper and said only "I quit" and my signature, which I figured was all they deserved) and almost immediately turned it into him no longer having a place to sing.  He's an only child so everything tends to be about him.  Unfortunately, he was raised in an atmosphere of never forgiving someone who's wronged you and to nurse that grudge 'til the end of time.  Mentioning the church would aggravate him.  To mention the names of either or both of the women who set him into a rage.  I'm tired of that.  I'm also tired that everything centering on him.  I'd much prefer him to be happy for me, but I know that's not possible.

He would not understand the joy of the serendipity of the bus ride.  He wouldn't understand that I was delighted that the pianist picked one of my compositions to play.  He would excuse the audience as members of "that" congregation and all of them are, if not evil incarnate, at least despicable.  He would instead think that he hadn't been asked to sing, that they had taken that from him, and fuck them anyway, they deserved to be deprived of his talent.

Odd that I can put this out there for the world to see but can't tell my partner about how happy I feel.  I hope you understand.  I had to share it.  You chose to read this.  Thank you.

First Flakes

When I see the first snowflakes of the season, I always get a little excited.  If I looked in the record books, I could find out if snows were heavier in the '50s and '60s.  Of course, in the '50s I was young, ergo short.  I grew up in the country.  It could have been a farm, but we let it go fallow.  The border between our land and the neighbor's land made a natural snow fence, creating drifts that I remember being a million stories high.

Of course, I was short.

But the drifts truly were high.  Several feet anyway.  My siblings back me up on this.  We had our own dogs...they were the family's dogs, but the cocker spaniel was my sister's dog and a large mutt whose mother was a German shepherd and whose father was a golden something or other favored me.  Rusty, the cocker spaniel, would get weighed down in snowballs.  She was close to the ground and had longish fur, fur that snow loved.

George, my mutt, loved snow.  George loved everything, even baths, but he really loved snow.  He'd try to catch snowballs.  If he did, he didn't act as if he were fooled.  No, he was ready for the next.  If you poked a hole in the snow, he'd drive his nose into it and give it a good search before he gave up.

Because the drifts were so tall, we shoveled steps to the top.  Usually the snow was deep enough to hold all of us.  George ran around, perhaps to make sure it was safe for us, perhaps just because he could.  He knew how to play King of the Drift and would try very hard to keep us -- me in particular -- from getting to the top.  Concentrating on one of us made it possible for another of us to sneak up the drift and then he'd try to attack the other kid.  Not attack...just try to keep them from taking his place...as Top Dog.

He also loved to chase after us when we'd sled on our property.  We had a couple of pretty good, long runs.  He'd take off beside us and run alongside.  He loved it when we fell off the sled.  He knew we weren't hurt and would grab hold of a coat sleeve or glove and start shaking his head like crazy.  All we could do was stay on the snow while he was shaking us and try to get up when he'd had enough.

I wonder if we'll ever have winters of snows like that.  Back then, we didn't have built-in snow days, so we'd have to make up time.  One winter we had so much snow we had school on two Saturdays.  Another year we went to mid-June.

We lived just outside Gap, a small town in Lancaster County.  Maybe 600 people lived there.  In the '50s, people weren't as rushed, didn't feel they had to brave storms to get somewhere.  Snow meant the regular world stopped.  When a certain amount of snow fell, we'd get our sleds and take to the streets.  Gap is on a hill.  If there wasn't a lot of snow, parents would be on the look-out for cars, and drivers knew kids would probably be sledding; if there was a lot of snow, nobody was going anywhere anyway, so the streets were ours.  We had three streets to choose from.  One ran from the top of the hill where the lane to our place began and which then ran into town.  A second started at the lumber yard and picked up the same street in town, and that involved making a turn, which added to the fun.  The third was Gap's main drag, and the hill was long and amazingly steep.  And not just because I was short.  I've looked at it as an adult and it's a steep hill.  We'd start at the top, at the hardware store, and zoom downhill for two blocks and then hit the level part, but the built-up speed let us coast for maybe another half block.  Plus there was the added thrill of going over a really small bridge...up the ramp, coast for a microsecond, and then fly for a bit until the sled hit the street again.

Now, the snow plows and salt trucks are out at the sight of the first flake.  The world does not go on hold because of a snow storm. And it's a shame.  Sledding on park hills is fine, but the space is limited.  It's safe, it's fun and it's legal.  (Gap had no government and the only police were state police, and they came in only by complaint.)  And it's wholesome and pasteurized and programmed.  A little daring can be a good thing.

The Chair Is Sometimes The Answer

He was 22, tops.  Probably not even that.  His dyed-black hair was tied back into a respectably long ponytail.  His thin mustache and wisp of a goatee gave the illusion he was just getting into his twenties.  His solid physique wasn't overdone.  In fact, he didn't speak highly of gyms.  Was he gay?  Maybe.  There was something to the way he carried himself when he walked that put a "maybe" on my gaydar.  If so, he would be a good addition to our side.  It was just that anger thing, the desire to fight.  Almost a need to fight.  He could be our pit bull, I thought.

When we walked the halls in the psychiatric facility, he'd often talk about fighting, how alive he felt punching, jabbing, hitting someone, how he respected the blows that came to him.  I once remarked that it looked like he didn't get hit in the face much; he was rather to quick to correct me.  At least nothing left scars.

We were in several group sessions together.  One featured a woman maybe in her late twenties, maybe in her early thirties, who wasn't particularly good at leading.  Pretty much, she didn't have a clue.  She seemed hopelessly naive in the ways of leading a group.  She reminded me of a few professors I'd had in college, the ones who read their notes in a monotone and expected you to be fascinated by the information presented.  It's one thing in college; it's another thing to drone on and on, reading your notes in a monotone, to a room full of medicated people.  She was there to develop our coping skills.  Most coped by falling asleep or leaving.

After lights out on the night before one session, one of the women went into a rage about being kept in the facility and argued loud and long with one of the staff.  All of us could hear it (and were pretty much in favor of letting her go, although no vote was offered) and she was finally appeased or restrained...at least it got quiet.  I didn't know at the time, but the fracas took place in front of my young friend's room.  We'd talked a bit about it at breakfast and I could tell he was still very agitated.  He mentioned he had given thought to breaking a chair in his room and clubbing her over the head.  He was tired, however, and opted to wait it out.

That afternoon at our group, the young naif went on and on about coping skills and happy places and thoughts to distract us from doing whatever it was we were there for having done.  She said something that sparked my friend's recollection of the night before.  He spoke about becoming more and more angry and how he'd considered breaking the chair and hitting the woman to the floor.  The group leader's eyes grew rather large as she tried mightily to maintain her placid expression.  She asked, "What would you have done if she got up again?"  "She wouldn't have got up again," he said matter-of-factly.  I'll give her points for staying in the room, but she did have to look away.  The young guy looked at me and it took all I had to keep from laughing.  I knew I was supposed to be horrified, but it just struck me as being very funny.

Later in the session, she read/talked about coming up with something to think about that would keep us from attempting suicide or battering someone to the floor.  I looked at him and suggested, "Maybe your mantra should be 'The chair is not the answer.'"  He laughed good naturedly; the leader nodded her head and agreed in all seriousness.

He was released before I was, and we had a few conversations before then.  We figured out several things we had in common.  I also told him how I hated being picked on when I was young.  He told me that he was the one in his school who dealt with bullies.  I thanked him.  We agreed that maybe an act of violence might be called for sometimes.  He suggested, "The chair is sometimes the answer."  Sometimes maybe.

Back home again...

Hi...

I have returned from two more-or-less all-expenses-paid weeks in Harrisburg's psychiatric institute.  As close to suicide as I've ever been.  I realize this is all going to sound like a really bad Movie of the Week, but my life frequently feels like a really bad Movie of the Week. 

My meltdown happened on Friday the 13th.  I've been having a really bad time trying to keep up with bills for quite some time.  I've been seeing a therapist about it and we keep coming to dead ends.  On Friday the 13th I received a note from PPL saying they were going to cut off the power unless I paid them what might as well have been $1,000,000.  Jack is unofficially disabled, but the doctor contacted PPL and told them he would be adversely effected by losing electric.  A month's reprieve but still not a real solution.  Jack finally applied for public assistance and medical assistance and was rejected.  (I learned in the hospital that 1st time rejection is now commonplace.  I wish we'd been told before we started counting on it.  He was refused because he didn't fill out a couple of forms...which they didn't send.  But, of course, that's not their fault.)  All the other bills were as overdue as they have been forever.  Nasty-grams are kind of expected. 

My therapist and I talked about maybe borrowing from the life insurance my mother set up long ago.  I called the life insurance company to see if it were possible to borrow against a policy.  I was told it was not.

And that was it.  I saw that as my final possibility and it was shot down.  I went into some kind of state I'd never been in before.  I felt totally useless, hopeless, helpless, enraged at myself.  Jack walked in and managed to talk me down and finally got me to lie down.  He called our doctor who called the pharmacy with a prescription for Xanax.  Because we've been going to the pharmacy forever, they gave Jack the Xanax (I frequently pick up his prescriptions and we're never given a hard time) and I was good for the night.

My head seemed clearer, I was less panicked, but I still had no idea what to do.  One night as I was about to take a Xanax, I poured the contents into the palm of my hand it finally dawned on me:  I may not be able to take care of the bills, but I could certainly take care of the idiot who was responsible for it all.  I looked at the pills and I can't explain the sense of power and relief I felt.  Then I thought of Jack and realized I couldn't lay that on him and, except for one, I put the pills back in the bottle.

I talked to my therapist and we agreed it was time to go into the hospital.  I'd been having suicide fantasies for quite a long time, but they never had that ring of truth to them.  This did. 

I went in on the 18^th and emerged from the cocoon this past Wednesday.  I felt so much better in there.  It's not that the rest of the world stopped, but there was nothing I could do about it and I could just concentrate on being me.  I've discovered that's someone I haven't known for a long time.  I still feel kind of fragile, but it's all right.  I'm supposed to start asking banks for a consolidation loan or a credit card.  So far it's encouraging.  The odd thing is that I haven't come back to my music.  The last time I touched it was the night before the breakdown.  All in good time, I suppose, and I've been writing words a lot.  It's just that the music hasn't come back.

I'm OK for the most part.  It's just that I thought I should tell you.

Trust you're doing well and getting the skis polished up for the winter.  I miss you.  Take good care.


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