Dreams: A Strange and Wondrous Landscape!

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    Dreams -- A Strange and Wondrous Landscape...

Dreams!  Strange and mystical.  Sometimes haunting.  Odd plunges into deep wells of unconsciousness and fantasy.  In this time of advanced age (or Geezerhood, if you like) in which I now find myself, dreams have become more and more bizarre.  I remember them upon waking, something that was not always the case in my younger years.  Although frequent inebriation and the "delicate condition" of early mornings may have impeded memory in those decades past!  

Now in this autumnal time of life, my dreams have become even more peculiar, some downright ridiculous.  Allow me, please, to elucidate, via the following example...

To illustrate the standard dress of
a typical English barrister...
Rumpole of the Bailey!

I'm driving along in a 1940s-vintage Jaguar Sports Roadster.  It has huge rounded fenders and a split windscreen, slanted on either side and divided by a grooved strip of chromed metal.  With me are two other chaps.  We're all dressed as English barristers, black broadcloth jackets and waistcoats, a gold watch chain draped along the midsection, black and grey striped trousers, a derby or homburg-style hat perched on each of our heads.

The Tailor!

    We're traveling at considerable speed.  I realize something's wrong as I cannot see the roadway properly; I'm seated too low and can view only the top portions of trees, roofs of parked vehicles as we whizz past.  I'm concerned we'll strike something.  Suddenly, one of the companion barristers says in a voice raised in anger, "This is disgraceful; here we are traversing a pleasant lane and one spies a hideous barn!  Just look at that!  Stop!  Let me out!"  

Ancient kitchen
chair...  Pictured
in tailor shop!

    He exits the roadster, crosses the road and knocks at the wood paneled door of a red-brick building devoid of windows.  A man answers and my companion, the barrister, announces with indignation, "This is appalling!"  He enters and slams the door. 

The third barrister remains mute.  Now having parked at the side of the road, soon I'm walking along and carrying an antique wooden kitchen chair.  It has a rounded seat with curved back supports.  Quite soon I enter a tailor's shop.  I state to the three tailors in the shop, in my best faux English accent, "Gentlemen.  I cannot see properly through the windscreen of my roadster!"  I show them the chair.

One of the tailors looks up and says, "Let me just measure your trousers, sir."  I comply, and the tailor fusses with the cuffs of my English barrister trousers, using a flat piece of marking chalk.  "There we are, sir, right as rain," the tailor proclaims proudly.  

Illustrative image of a
man wearing
Striped Trousers!

"I shall return, then," I say in reply.  "I must advise you, though, I share these trousers with another gentleman.  What are your hours of operation?"  

"We're open Monday through Friday, sir," the tailor replies.

"But today is Saturday," I say.

"Monday through Friday, sir.  Trousers done in just a tick.  Right as rain, sir.  Next, please!"

I depart, carrying with me the antique kitchen chair.  I cross the lane to the red-brick building into which my companion barrister disappeared earlier.  I knock loudly on the wood paneled door.  Suddenly I wake, possibly roused by the imagined loud knocking!

Begging your indulgence, I wish to describe another odd dream, this one a recurring adventure!  In the dream, my dear and lifelong friend...  we'll call him Patrick...  telephones to insist that we play a round of golf.  I dislike golf, but I agree to meet him at a links location that remains unidentifiable in the

This image is intended to depict
"Patrick" as he and I prepare to
play backwards golf!...  also, "Plus
Fours" golf apparel!  (The bird
is probably extraneous...)

recurring dream.  Patrick wisely suggests -- to avoid an enormous crush of golf enthusiasts, comprising a great many groups of foursomes all wearing plus fours -- that we play backwards, teeing off from the greens and then putting on the tees.  I agree, as it all seems quite sensible in the dream.

We select our drivers and tee off from the first green into a throng of oncoming golfers.  As one of a foursome approaches us, he announces angrily to Patrick, "Sir, this is not on.  One simply cannot tee off from a green into a group of unprotected players!"

"Be quiet and move aside," admonishes Patrick, "you're obscuring the landing point of my superb tee shot!"

"Scoundrel...  man must be mad!" says the offended golfer vehemently, but softly, so as not to provoke violence, or so I suppose within the dream.  (I often wonder if other dreamers muse or suppose inside a dream, locked in deep slumber!)

At some point in our round of golf, we find ourselves in the basement of a home on the periphery of the 18th fairway.  We've sought and been granted permission to play our golf balls from the aforementioned basement, through a window the homeowner has graciously opened.  We both select mashie niblicks.  (Inappropriate, perhaps, for "pitching" but nonetheless our clubs of choice.)  We both then successfully hit our balls onto a tee, where we proceed to putt for par.  (We use a beer can for putting.  It's an empty Blatz can, and we use it repeatedly throughout!)

Image of a Blatz Beer
Can into which we
aim our Putts!

 

After completing the round of golf, we decide to avail ourselves of potables at the club's "19th Hole" clubhouse.  We both order "905" Beer, and quaff hungrily, terribly thirsty after our vigorous round of 18 holes.  The bartender says, "Good day for it, eh?  You the chaps playing backwards?  Terribly clever!  Fifty-cents each, please!"  I awake as the beverage host smacks our bottles of chilled "905" beer soundly upon the bar!

One day I'll discuss the dream with Patrick.  Perhaps at some point in our  past we actually played a round of backwards golf.  Although I can't imagine why, as I dislike golf.

Above, below and to the right
are images of dreams.  I reason these
might require explanatory copy!

I know I dreamed as a youth, though I do not recall any dream of great significance.  I engaged in somnambulism as well.  My dear departed mother once told me I scratched on her bedroom door, and when she opened it at approximately 3:00 in the morning, I spat a mouthful of water upon her face and nightdress.  Later in life, my brother told me mother worried about my penchant for strong drink and its possible effect upon erratic deportment!  Alas, the foibles and follies of youth...  and dreams unremembered!

Mustn't grumble.  My dreams in "geezerhood" are quite entertaining, as I think about and relate them to my nearest and dearest.  Though some are skeptical about the veracity of my English Barrister dream and its authentic and well-remembered dialogue (though needn't be!), I suppose I hope for some sort of interpretation.  I cannot imagine what either of the aforementioned dreams might be construed to mean, if indeed they'd betray any sense of meaning to competent dream interpreters.  (I knew a potato peeler -- known as "Menominee Mary,"working at a saloon my family frequented, who was a remarkably talented interpreter of dreams.  She's long dead, but once told my father that he'd soon be taking a trip, after he'd related to her a frightening dream, something having to do with a freight train racing through his bedroom.  Verily, and soon afterward he actually went on a trip!  Although I should add, on balance, my father was constantly taking trips...) 

In conclusion, I must say I enjoy dreams --when having them, and, doubly, when actually remembering them -- particularly those in which I'm flying without the benefit of aircraft.  I don't enjoy those in which I'm being pursued by gunmen or commies or unruly gangs or scaly creatures with big teeth!  Happily the latter do not usually dominate my dreamscape.  Well, I'm off now for my afternoon slumber.  Getting on in years, you know.  Pleasant dreams!  

[ Post Script:    A Simple Quiz -- (Answer carefully; there may be more than one correct answer!)  Which of the following do you believe is a true, recurring dream:  1.)  I wake myself by asking someone to pass something...  e.g.  "Please pass the sausages!?"  2.)   I receive a telephone call from Barbara Walters (I call her "Babsy"...  we're jolly good chums!) to announce that I've been named the most fascinating person of the year!  3.)  I hit ("spike," "kill") volleyballs in my sleep, arm and hand actually flailing wildly...!  (Poor Sweetheart!) ]     

(Special Note of Attribution and Gratitude:   The perpetrator of this Blog extends enormous thanks to his great friends, Pat and Joey, Pat for inspiring this "edition," focused on "Dreams," and Joey for appreciating and encouraging the shared senses of humor and the ridiculous that P.T. and the perpetrator have enjoyed for more years than we'd care to admit.  Alternatively, sincere apologies to both for incriminating you in this latest bit of foolishness!)  

 Humbly Submitted 01-01-15 -- Joel K.                

  

                         

A New Wave of Conversation -- Or, Talking Points in the Geezer Age!

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    A New Wave of Conversation -- Or, Talking Points in the Geezer Age!

Compare it to a fogged glass of memory -- like squinting through a scrim in a stage play -- I try to summon scenes of life from the bloom of youth -- back about two score and 5 or 10 years ago.  It's not easy trying to recall distant conversations, gathered round dining or drinking tables, discussions that so enthralled us.  What topics commanded our attention, those that initiated overlapping, rapid-fire dialogue?  And how do today's conversations with peers compare?  Back then, I know we talked about friends, sports, parties, games, jobs, school, major courses of study, even career ideas, military service experiences, politics, travel, money or the lack of it, and, yes, if less enthusiastically, the future, our future...

If we discussed anything having to do with the state of our health, it usually had to do with injuries incurred during sporting events -- a broken tibia suffered on the ski slopes, a rib cracked playing football or rugby, a "blown ACL" during soccer or rounding second base, a toe smashed by some behemoth lunatic galoot who landed on it in a volleyball match.

The Photo above  has little or nothing to do with this post.
I try to emulate Popeye, as I appear to be striking an
heroic pose aboard a stranded tug boat on Duluth's
Lake Superior shoreline.  The photo does,  however,
illustrate a descent into profound foolishness
that can often accompany geezer-hood!

  

 

And now?...

"Hello!  Is this Mrs. Geezie at the insurance place?...  Does my supplemental insurance cover a chiropractor?...  Uh huh...  Yes...  How about cosmetic surgery, like a jowl tuck...?  OK, yes...  I see.  Does Medicare cover the entire cost of a hip replacement?...  An ankle rebuild?  What?  Can you speak louder?..."

On a recent evening, my wife and I are having dinner with friends.  We'd been to an art museum.  (Doesn't seem that long ago the extent of our cultural enterprise would have been weaving from one saloon to another saloon!)  We stopped for dinner at a fine new restaurant.  Almost trendy.  I ordered a diet brown pop with a slice of lime.  (It's my current beverage of choice.  I get artificially inebriated lately drinking too much non-alcoholic wine-like stuff!)

I begin a conversation.  Our companions are "Yo" and "Glo":  "So, how are we doing?  How's your pain level.  I understand you've been having some trouble in the lower extremities?"

"Yeah, thanks for asking," says Yo.  "It's my shin bones.  I think I have splints, you know, from fast walking on cement or something."

"What are you doing for it," I ask.

"Ach...  what can one do?  I mean, the doctor says 'stay off your legs...  Rest, sit down, elevate your feet...  ice your shins 20, 30 minutes, two, three times a day...  And orthotics.  Do you have orthotics in your shoes?...'  Ah, for pity f-ing sake, I'm walking!  Not running 30 miles through Death Valley!!" 

"Yeah!  I know what you mean.  I get freezing toes on my right foot when I walk in winter.  I bought a mitten for my toes, but I can't find the damned thing.  My toes are always freezing.  Never used to freeze!  Think it's a kind of rheumatism?"

"Listen, my dear.  I going to dash out of here in a moment
so that we can 'beat the check.'  You wait a minute or
two, then you race out...!"
"Race!!??  Are you nuts!!?  I can barely rise!"

"Knees!" Yo announces truculently, like a biblical revelation.  "I got rattling dice in both my knees.  And my shoulder!  Geezus!  I lift a beer bottle and my shoulder erupts in a chorus of crunchy munchies and cracking twigs!"
"Please," I say.  "Don't ask me about knees.  I'm walking up steps in Milwaukee; they can hear me in Cincinnati!"

Glo addresses my wife.  "I think I have a kind of arthritis in my hands.  Really painful, especially when I mop."

"Tell me about it," says my wife.  "When I vacuum, my back is pure agony.  And mopping too.  It's that awkward body motion one has to use.  It's a misery!  I could be laid up an entire week!"

"Listen," I say to Yo, "What kind of pain medications do you take?  Ibuprofen, maybe?  Aspirin with codeine?  Smoke a joint?"

Glo jumps in, "I sometimes take a muscle relaxer, but they make me exhausted.  I'm destroyed for a whole day afterwards."  

"Ohmygod," my wife responds.  "Same with me!  I'm a sleep-walking zombie for 24 hours."  

A portrait of the artist
as a young geezer!

So when the hell did all of this happen, for crying out loud??!!  I mean, if someone introduces the subject of football or soccer, the conversation moves almost instantly into injuries suffered during a touch football game, or demonstrating a goalie move to a child,  resulting in involuntary splits -- impossible to reverse without the intervention of a team of medics and a mechanical hoist.  If we're not talking about grandkids, for example, we're a Greek Chorus, chanting agonies, surgeries, joint horrors and doctors who nearly killed us!  

As a young man, I worked in a liquor store run by a family of characters one couldn't possibly invent.  Rose, the elderly sister of the principal owner, shambled constantly back and forth through the aisles, arms folded, haunting the store like an anguished ghoul, announcing every 10 minutes or so, "Oh dear god, how I suffer, how I suffer!"  To which her brother, after every groan and lamentation, responded, "Rose, for god's sake, don't start with me!"  Or...  "Rose, shut the hell up, I'm beggink you...?!"  Sometimes...  "Rose, please, I'm trying to think...  I have a customer here...  We're discussing!"  

At the time, I thought, "If I ever degenerate into caricatures like these babbling lunatics, please, someone shoot me!"  But now -- and I'm still wondering when did this happen, for pity f-ing sake -- I'm there.  I'm "Rose" the roaming zombie ghoul, uttering ejaculations of pain as a knee collapses or a hip sends a bullet of agony into my tortured brain.

Back at the restaurant...  Yo asks, "Who's that old actor who said, 'getting old aint for sissies,' Bitzy or Netty something?"
"Yeah," I say.  "I think I remember.  It's almost funny, if sadly true.  Is she still with us; was this a recent observation?"
"Nah," says Yo.  "She's dead.  Couldn't be recent, unless she's been exhumed to make public service announcements for the elderly."  We chuckle.  

Sometimes I listen to my children and their friends as they chatter happily, noisily about subjects that probably consumed our own range of interests when my peers and I were young.  But, I wouldn't want to go backward; I'm perfectly happy to be firmly ensconced in "robust middle age"...  better known in some circles as "GeezerHood" or "senior status."  I mean, I get nice discounts, lots of them.  And after we play volleyball on Monday nights, I go sit down and change my shoes, while the youngsters take down and put away the nets.

Sometimes, older persons engage in
Fine Whining while dining!  As an
old friend once remarked, "I'm
only happy when I'm miserable...
or drinking!"  

Conversations may have taken a turn toward pills and the grave these days, but I wouldn't trade places with anyone who still gets pimples and embarrassment anxiety.  Good friends of our common generational status share values and history, and we can talk about things that would only bewilder, or bore, those begat a generation or two later than our own.  And besides, "geezer chatter" creates a world of amusement for our children and their children, if they happen to be listening.  It'd be remiss of us to deprive them of such a vast reservoir of potential ridicule, not to mention riotous mirth!

I hasten to apologize to those more advanced in years than I if I seem to be usurping their prerogatives of bruising misery and body pain complaints.  I merely wanted to effect a start, in case I can't somehow articulate a proper amount of verbal or written aging agony a decade or two hence!!  Thank you!  I have to go lie down now...  

(Special Note of Attribution and Gratitude:   The perpetrator of this Blog extends enormous thanks to his great friends, Rob and Sue, and to SweetHeart too!  Thank you for the fine suggestions, for the germs of ideas that led to this post and for your good company, or please accept my apologies, as the case may be!  My love and profound thanks for your patience, understanding and generosity of spirit!) 

Humbly Submitted 12-02-14 -- Joel K.          

             

             

Newspaper Chronicles -- The Many Labors of a Young Reporter!

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    Newspaper Chronicles -- The Many Labors of a Young Reporter!

The roadway was impossibly dark and twisted.  Headlamps reflected blazing green-eyed beasts at every turn, causing electric shocks of panic and frenzied braking.  Once even a specter, bald and wrinkled, walking in the middle of the endless blacktop.  Each a brief slap of awakening from dangerous exhaustion.  Monolithic sentries cast their stony glances of disapproval on the lone traveler.  Or were they being protective, eyes intent and guiding?  Seeing, at last, a turnoff, I pulled over and slept.  Some hours later, a brilliant rising sun re-ignited the odyssey, and I moved on, obsessively eager to reach a destination both frightening and alluring.  

Next morning -- it was sometime in the very late 1960's -- I arrived at the offices of The Southwest Gawker Talker!  It's masthead proudly announced, The Only Newspaper in the World that Gives a Hoot about Our Portion of the Metroplex! The owner and publisher, Ferd Fozzlefinger, bade me sit.  I sat.  I produced my credentials, including a bound diploma attesting to a BA degree in Journalism, along with my Honorable Discharge from the US Armed Forces, something upon which Ferd insisted.  The interview lasted maybe five minutes.  Ferd looked pleased; I offered silent thanks to the Colorado Press Association.

"Can you start today?" Ferd Fozzlefinger asked.  

"You mean like right now?

"Yes, today, right now.  Can you do it?" Ferd asked with emphasis.

"Sure.  I guess so."  

"Good," said Ferd,  "You're hired."

"Where's the rest of the staff?" I inquired.

"You're it," said Ferd.  "Well, naturally we have our typesetter and graphic artist, Gimel Sneedby.  You'll like him.  He's good, real professional.  Also too, you'll be editor and head writer of The Big Bugle, a Legion Post newspaper.  I own that one also too."  (I enjoyed "total staff" status on that one "also too"!)

I met Gimel in the typesetting and reporting office.  Ferd showed me to a small desk, and I had my first real newspaper job.  Ferd provided a set of verbal instructions, including how to cover my daily beat, whom to call upon for advertising revenue, a listing of advertising prospects, addresses and directions for the local police department, fire house, municipal offices,

Young reporters must always keep
eyes wide open for big doings and
scoops (free ice cream and
important breaking news!)

area elementary and high schools, snitches, neighborhood people he termed "sources for anything of importance that's going on in our portion of the region."  So much to learn, so quickly.  I frowned purposely for dramatic effect, making sure my eyebrows were contorted with anxiety, my forehead a plowed field!    

"Don't worry," said Ferd.  "I'll be with you every step of the way."  I never saw him again.  Gimel and I -- he told me to call him "Gibby" -- became an effective team, collaborators, even great pals.  He operated a kind of photo-headline-making machine, a typesetting device that created neat columns of newsprint and something flat that whirred quietly and applied adhesive to strips of newsprint.  I was enthralled.  Page templates, chart packs, adhesive dingbats and black lines, "Press-Type" and sharp little picks with protective corks for placing graphic elements on the page.  This was newspaper compositor technology at its zenith!  

We did everything, just the two of us, to produce fine weekly editions of The Southwest Gawker Talker.  Eventually I established a beat, discovered news sources; I acquired some advertising contracts, got to know a police sergeant who became my primary source for crime news, an assistant fire chief, grocers, school officials, a pharmacist, city personnel, backyard gossips, a plumber, malcontents, neighborhood politicos, a guy who chased stray dogs and cats and told me he once roped a coyote in an urban public park.  And, of course, "Guttural Gus," my personal "rat-stoolie" who somehow collected vast material on sexual peccadilloes and nefarious tittle-tattle.  (More about "Gus" in a future edition, perhaps!) 

After a period of time had passed, I asked Gibby, "I mean, is there compensation involved with these fine career positions of ours?  Are there, like, paydays?"  

"Hey, don't worry," said Gibby.  " 'Ferdy the Finger' -- that's our pet name for the boss -- sends checks to the office.  He's not real consistent, but we get paid, ya know, like kind of regularly."  

"When?" I asked

"Lemme see...  I think we can expect some pay, well, something like next Wednesday," said Gibby.  "I'll make a note to call 'The Finger.'  He listens to me when I threaten to walk out.  I'll threaten for you too!"

"Good," I said.  "My room is small and cheap, but the landlady expects rent occasionally.  And food," I continued.  "I find that I must eat occasionally too."  Gibby thought this amusing.  He chuckled, raised a hand to his face and smeared his mouth with printer's ink.

As time passed, Gibby and I decided that we'd become, among our other duties, "Auntie Muriel," the advice columnist.  "We have to have a little fun around here," he insisted.  I agreed.  And thus we re-launched a column that, he said, "had been too long dormant, and it's an essential feature of the weekly newspaper format."  What a hoot, it was, and we loved writing or editing it, some entries real, most fictitious.  Here's an example:

Dear Auntie Muriel...  I don't do work, you see.  It's an agreement my lady friend of 12 years and I have.  She likes to work.  I distain work; I find it demeaning and undignified, and I have gout, I think.  I'd like to marry the woman, my dear lady friend of 12 years, but I worry she's a bit flighty and can't seem to commit herself to a single job for any purposeful length of time.  I worry a lot about this, and I try to tell her we need stability, money.  I mean, let me elucidate:  she's been a shrubbery trimmer, a gandy dancer, a coal dock worker, a governess, a butcher's apprentice, an underwear designer, a saloon keeper, a taxidermist, a rubber chicken packer, a mahout, a mob assassin, a tweedy wife of the drunken vicar of Islington, a deep sea diver, a communist infiltrator, an exterminator, an attorney, a garage door installer...  I could go on.  I once even threatened to purchase a girdle and become the tweedy wife of a drunken vicar myself.  Nothing works.  I'm a fine companion, after all.  A frightfully decent sort of chap.  I clean our living spaces at least bi-monthly, well, sort of.  I dress nice; I own a selection of handsome argyle sweater vests.  I once in a while cook excellent frozen dinners on aluminum platters.  I buy her the finest cleaning supplies.  Metal buckets, powders and self-squeezing mops.  I leave detailed instructions for her cooking assignments.  Recipes too; I clip them out neatly for her.  What can I do, Auntie Muriel, how can I convince my lady friend to find a position of permanence with real good pay?  (Signed)...

   Agonized in Argyle!

Dear Agonized in Argyle...  Shut up!  Whiney, obtuse fool!  Go out and get a job of work, you supercilious gnat-brained buffoon!  I obscenitize in the soured milk of your impotence!  I'm astonished the woman didn't leave you eleven and a-half years ago!  She's either a saint or an idiot.  You're certainly an idiot!  Give the woman some time to discover her true self, her real identity, her joie de vivre, her forte (the "e" is silent, you contemptible snot-nosed baboon!), her metier, her bag, man!  Instead of whining about your lady friend and her magnificent achievements, her attainment of varied, extraordinary skills, you should be on your knobbly knees in adoration of such a remarkable woman whom you clearly don't deserve.  You should bury your needy, reedy and haughty nose in the want ads, or at least get on relief, you brick-headed issue of a dung beetle.  (Don't take offense -- merely constructive criticism)...  But I believe you ought to take some responsibility for the economic sustenance of the relationship.  Jerk!  Thanks for your interesting and nicely-composed letter!  (Signed)...  Auntie Muriel!

The two Aunties Muriel discuss
Advice over greenery, biscuits
and booze (the latter pretending
to be weak tea!)  

Among letters actually published?  Whether or not is up to you, gentle reader.  Gibby and I enjoyed our "Auntie Muriel" correspondence enormously, both the real and the manufactured.  Over time, he and I produced a significant number of weekly editions of our newspaper; I edited and helped produce only two issues of The Big Bugle.  We received erratic payments from Ferb, but I never again saw him in the flesh.  Once he Fax'ed us a photo of himself eating snails in a French bistro, greasy dribble on his chin.  

Eventually, in the passage of journalistic time, I was lured to Cheyenne, Wyoming and a daily newspaper for which I served as general assignment reporter and erstwhile sportswriter and editor, all for the princely sum of $75.00 a week.  I covered and photographed a rodeo from a barrel...  (that, too, is a story for another time).  Other newspaper, broadcast journalism assignments as well, were 
joined like boxcars to my resume whenever the itch and unexplored geography beckoned.  

The weekly newspaper is, or was, an exceptionally good training ground for a young journalist.  That is, for a young reporter who worked in the field some 40 or more years ago.  Being long removed, one is not now an authority on the present status of the weekly press.  Never quite achieving fame or fortune in my journalistic career, I am lavishly enriched by the overall experience, having gained a treasure of knowledge and adventure, now zealously guarded in a cerebral vault, that I'll keep and cherish -- brain function willing -- all the way to the tomb.

(Special Note of Attribution and Gratitude:   The perpetrator of this Blog extends enormous thanks to his great friend, teacher and mentor, Larry Lorenz, a man of exceptional talent in the written word, author, broadcaster, educator, whose love of the profession of journalism and the power of the printed word is an enduring gift to all who have benefitted from his wisdom and intellectual generosity.  Thank you, my friend, for your most valued influence, and for sharing ideas, at least one of which led me to recall and recount some adventures in newspaper journalism!) 

Humbly Submitted 11-05-14 -- Joel K.                    

     

              

Grandparenting, or "Be the Helicopter..."

Memoirs of a Geezer!

Reflections and Observations -- A Bright Passage from the Fantasies of Youth 

to Illuminations of Advanced Maturity!

This Episode:    Grandparenting, or "Be the Helicopter" and Other Personae Dramatis!

In late summer, some 11 years ago, we first assumed the roles of grandparents, my wife and I.  It has been a truly remarkable and loving experience, but not without its challenges.  We now have four beautiful grandchildren, each with his or her own astonishing personality and behavioral characteristics.  

Coen (foreground) and Seany
(wearing glasses)  examine gifts during
Coey's 11th birthday celebration!

The first of them, Coen -- I call him Coey -- adopted an expression that we find irresistible, and use ourselves, constantly:  "Not Doin' It."  A laconic expression -- sometimes but not always effective -- relating to something that merits one's reluctance or disaffection.  Coen has been fascinated, variously, with volcanoes, planets, caves, electronic game creations and their odd beeping and pulsing...  He has become an accomplished juggler, a self-taught diversion learned recently at a camping-concert event in West Virginia!  

His sister, Lucy -- often we call her LuLu -- now almost 7 years old, invented her own delightful remonstrance:  "It's good, but it's not the best!"  On trips in the automobile, Lucy offers us three choices:  "...Play 'I Spy', or you may sing a song, or you can tell a story."  She challenges us to flex our creativity, all the time!  Coey and Lucy are the extraordinary and brilliant issue of our own first-born.  They are bright and funny, at times disarming, surprising, always delightful companions.

Lucy and Papa in an
inflatable tube.  Earlier
we played in Lake Erie!

Lucy (left) and Coey at Sea!
(Uh...  maybe Lake Michigan?!)

Our second-born produced two equally accomplished and beautiful children, ages 7 and 4 (the latter nearly 5).  Sean -- I call him Seany -- is the older of the pair.  In his pre-school era, my wife and I would report to his home in the middle of the night (about 6:30 or 7:00 AM) and perform childcare and play activities prior to school drop-off time, enabling his educator parents to get to their respective classrooms at an hour their contracts demanded.  On many of those occasions, Seany would stand on my feet, facing frontwards, instruct me to position my hands in a certain fashion, and then announce that I was to be his helicopter.  "Up, helicopter," he'd command...  

I would then ambulate for the two of us, following the path in which my hands and fingers -- the craft's "controls" -- were wrenched, um...  that is, directed.  We'd climb several stairs to his bedroom and I'd then be placed in his closet, the hanger.  If I chanced to inquire, "How long must I remain in the 'hanger'?"  The answer arrived quickly:  "Shush, Papa...  Quiet! Helicopters don't talk."  And he'd shut the "hanger's" louvered doors until the helicopter was next required.

Phia (Sophia) is older now, but
this picture of her is a favorite!

For granddaughter, Sophia -- she prefers Phia or Phi Phi...  Angel Face is also acceptable -- both my wife and I are frequently engaged in play pageants.  We become water tigers, water squirrels, parental mice, doggies, kitty cats, dolphins and other creatures.  We're instructed as to the rules and progression of play, often asked to comment on the hatching of a little water squirrel's egg.  Apparently all creatures begin as eggs, usually quite shiny, purple and pink ones!

For Coey and Lucy, we've enjoyed soccer and baseball games for the former, dance recitals for the latter, in addition to swim lessons, coaster-wagon-pulling walks to the coffee house for cinnamon rolls (the children), coffee ("Baba and Papa").  There have been some most enjoyable travel holidays as well, including trips to sunny beaches, islands, a windmill house, a giraffe, bison and goat sanctuary...  

The July 3rd Fireworks Family
Picnic is a fine opportunity to
 sit on Papa and choke him!

Seany is an accomplished soccer player, a star among his peers.  He currently plays in a much vaunted club league.  We attend lots of matches, and have done so through the years.  Phia is just beginning to discover her interests, and has participated in "itty bitty" soccer; whether she'll continue or gravitate to other sporting or artistic pursuits remains to be determined.

And, oh yes, we have a sweet cousin who owns a condo in Florida that she generously allows us to use in the off-season at most attractive "family" rate.  When we're there, I become a kind of elevator for the grandchildren, conveying them to the bottom of the pool and up again.  Sometimes I'm a submarine...  Sometimes I'm gasping for air! 

Don't know what those things are in
my ears, but apparently we bought
them for two of the grandkids!
(But no help with noise abatement!)

In all of its eclectic roles and incarnations, grandparentlng is an exhilarating, exhausting, perplexing, delightful, even sort of mystical labor of great joy and loving wonder.  

Seany (left) and Phi Phi become
cows at the Wisconsin State Fair!

We're reliably told a child's fascination, even adoration of a grandparent is an ephemeral experience, as age 12 or so marks the end of the magic, when grandchildren's peers begin to dominate both time and energy.  But, we're also reliably told that when the "age of the amusement park" ends for a grandparent, another, a more cerebral interrelationship era, begins.  Ah, well...  However these things play out, we look forward to the next chapter in the book of grandparenting.  "What's that?"  Sorry, have to dash...  Lucy's calling; she wants to count to 1,000 for us before we hear her read a chapter from Beezus and Ramona!