The Know-it-All

Who would have thought after living in a house for eighteen years and having a great lawn care company go out of business that I’d have a hard time finding another. Other years they’ve flooded my mailbox with fliers and I started looking for them by mid-February. None showed up. Finally, I did an internet search of lawn care services in the area, called all seven listed but none were taking new customers. One big company that’s been around forever would take me if I was willing to pay a surcharge the first year bringing the weekly cuts up from an estimated $40 a week to $65. “But then the following year you’d be in our system and the price would drop back down. That’s just for the cuts,” she went on, “the weed and feed treatments are extra.”

I don’t need the weed and feed, I told her, “l’ve already contracted for that.” You would have thought I said I contracted a hit-man to kill the postman. “You can’t do that!” she said with great indignation. ”They need to be tied to your cuts.” She was such a snippy know it-all that I had a hard time not hanging up on her but I hadn’t decided, yet, if I’d have to let her extort a surcharge out of me. I was running out of options so I politely told her I’ve been contracting feed and weed separately for eighteen years and it’s always worked out fine. I didn’t tell her my weed and feed company uses all organic-based, earth friendly products, the only company in the area that does and if I’m going to pay extra for a service, I’d pick them every time. Weed, feed and bug control is their only business---not a cheap service either---and they run fifty trucks. Obviously, I’m not the only one who commits the Cardinal Sin of not tying weed and feed treatments in with their mowing. How gullible does she think people are? 

It must have been a slow day at the office because ‘chatty’ seemed to be her default mode. She asked who I’d been using for lawn care. I told her and before she could badmouth him, I added that he is also my nephew and he went out of business. She said the reason everyone is full already is because six companies in town did the same thing. “We know everyone,” she says, and “no one is taking new clients.” Clients? Lawyers have ‘clients’ people who cut grass have ‘customers.’ Then she goes on to say that the remaining companies all got together in February “to kind of set the prices”---OOPS! It was almost fun listening to her backpedal on price fixing. She rushed to explain how low bid people always go out of business after bleeding their customers away and I said, “Ya, I know all about low bids. We were in the commercial snowplowing business for decades.” And while she was sucking on that tidbit of information I took the opportunity to ask again, “Are you sure you don’t know anyone who is still writing contracts?” She gave me a phone number.

I was almost afraid to take a recommendation from Ms. Know-it-All who talks-too-much but I called and within two hours a laid-back guy came over, walked the yard, gave me a price and as we talked I felt comfortable enough to write him a check for half the season. It seems he plows snow in the winter for Chatty Know-it-All's company and they tried to subcontract him to mow this summer. He turned them down but told them: “If you want to throw me a bone, I can handle a couple more lawns.” So now the surcharge makes sense. If this big company can subcontract guys like him who have their own small companies, they could collect the extra money to do the billing, then poach the customer away from the subcontractor the following year with no one being the wiser as to who really did the actual work. 

My sister-in-law who passed away a couple of years ago used to say she was ready to go to a nursing home because it was too hard to keep her yard up. And at the time I didn’t understand why anyone would say that. “What’s the big deal?” I’d ask. “All we do is make a few phone calls and write a few checks.” If I could, I’d go back and tell her I’m sorry I didn’t understand why her lawn care was wearing her down. I was stressed out this year thinking I’d be living in a hay field with township violation notices decorating my front door like mini flags waving along a parade route. Heck, I'll be stressed out until the new guy shows up to do the first cut of the season. He is doing my cuts for a bargain rate of $30 a week so when I'm finished worrying about him taking my check and disappearing off the earth, I'll start worrying about him being so cheap he’ll let me down before fall. He looks like a guy who loves his sweets so I might have to start baking on Thursdays to keep him happy and make him feel guilty if he even thinks about stranding an elderly woman before the season is over. ©

Baby Sweaters and the Danish Boat Lift

Last week before I got sick I went to a lecture that was spellbinding and mesmerizing---yes, there is a difference---and at several points it had the hair on my arms standing right up. That was a common reaction. I’ve been going to the Life Enrichment Lecture series at the senior hall for many years and this was only the second one where the speaker got a standing ovation. What was it about? It was titled “When Good People Do Something” and it was an uplifting account of what the people of Denmark did during WWII to save 98% of its Jewish population (7,200 people in all) from being rounded up by the occupying Nazis. The speaker was a professional storyteller and a Professor of Humanities at Lawrence Technological University, born in the Bronx and was great at doing accents. She took us through the steps the Danish people did spontaneously when they got wind of the fact that the Nazis were planning to raid the synagogues on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and send all the worshipers to concentration camps.

With less than 24 hours’ notice, gentiles and Jews alike sprang into action. They passed the warning around not to go to the synagogues and to find places to hide away from their homes. Strangers and neighbors took people in to their homes to hide, businessman provided money to help them flee the country and hospital workers helped sedate Jewish children so they could be hidden in fishing boats for an impromptu boat lift to take the Jewish people off the peninsula that was Denmark to neutral Sweden where they could apply for political asylum. Only 500 of Denmark’s nearly 8,000 Jewish population were rounded up by the Gestapo and deported to Theresienadt concentration camp. By far, the most successful Resistance Operation in all of Europe.

Denmark was important to Hitler because it was his breadbasket to feed his troops. Along with its rich fishing industry they also had some of the best boat builders in the world and Germany brought all their ships to their ports for repair. The Resistances repaired them in such a way that they’d break down again out at sea. The lecturer read some words written by the King of Denmark in late 1930s about Adolph Hitler and they were the same words we often hear used to describe Donald Trump. She snuck that quote in so fast and kept right going to another antidote that it had everyone looking at each other, wondering if we just heard what we heard.

When good people do something. Christian churches hide artifacts from the synagogues until the end of the war and when the Jewish people were able to come back to Denmark two years later they found their houses just as they left them only they’d been cleaned, the cupboards stocked with food and fresh flowers were on the tables. But the Danish people were not the only ones who did courageous things during those dark days. Historians speculate that the person who spilled the beans about the planned raid was a high ranking German in charge of occupied Denmark who had lived there long enough to learn to love the country. Another high ranking German, historians believe, let his humanity show when he pulled most of the Germany patrol boats off the waters to “paint” during the month while the boat lift was in full operation and that added to their evacuation success. 

The lecturer, Corine Stavish, ended her talk with these words: “People were presented with a clear choice between good and evil and they choose ‘good.’” She’s active at National Storytelling Festivals and, if you get a chance to hear her talk, go. She’s witty and poignant and she knows how to make history come alive.

Switching Gears: Let’s talk knitting. The sweater and vest below are my last projects of the 2018/19 winter. I have to put my knitting needles and yarn away because it gets too hot and sticky to knit in the summer. The lady bug sweater is for my youngest niece’s cottage where her grandkids often need a sweater on cool summer evenings on their pontoon. The vest is for my oldest niece’s grandson who loves wearing vests, and he loves his grandpa’s John Deere tractor.

My mom used to make graphic pictures on sweaters but the tractor was my first attempt. She also used to make entire sweaters with patterns like on the lady bug sweater’s front panels only fancier and with more colors. With the vest I learned how to use yarn bobbins---at one time there were nine bobbins hanging down the back of the tractor---and I can see how they can take the frustration out of those Scandinavian designs. I may try another next winter. Anyway, good-bye knitting and hello eBay. May is here! ©

NOTE: Photo at top is from the Danish Jewish Museum and shows one of the fishing boats used to smuggle people to Sweden. Can you imagine how many trips it would take to get 7,200 people across the bay to Sweden? Our speaker said someone tried to burn that musuem down recently but they saved it.

Just Shoot me the Next Time This Happens

I’m not good at being sick. It doesn’t happen often so I don’t have a lot of practice at suffering in silence while hacking up my lungs, coughing so hard I peed my pants an embarrassing number of times. I thought I’d broken some ribs in the process like my mom did once. I was so worried about what was trying to come up from my lungs that I got out the pink ‘vomit dishes’---left over from various hospital stays---and staged them all over the house. I felt nauseated, too, but I never upchucked and while the cough was the wickedly deep, hacking and rumbling kind it never brought up bowels of the devil like I thought it would. Still, my rib cage hurt like it was on fire and I couldn’t take a deep breath without pain. Luckily I still had my winter cold and flu supplies on hand and I put on so much medicated chest rub that I smelled like a camphor factory. Then I took a Coricidin Chest Congestion and Cough Liqui Gel and went to bed at 7:00 Thursday night, thinking in the morning I’d go to the med center. By morning, my temperature was 99.9. Better, so I nixed the med center idea.

Spoiled Levi, no matter what happens to me he doesn’t have a sympathetic bone in his body. As sick as I was over the weekend he still demanded that I feed and water him, get him treats and let him outside and back in again---all on his schedule. Even begging him to leave me alone didn’t help. At one point he wanted me in the kitchen. It was his emergency-don’t-ignore-me bark. Did I leave the stove on and the place was on fire? No, I wasn’t eating or cooking. Was Timmy down in a well again and needed help? Finally I threw off the two blankets that weren’t keeping me warm. Go Lassie, lead the way! It was pretty clear Levi had been having a good time without me. His first-tier toys were strewed all over the house and his second-tier toys had been tossed in a pile like rib bones at a barbecue. In the kitchen, Levi sat down by his food dish and barked, “Look at this disgusting mess!” I did. Twice before I figured out the problem. His kibble had been invaded by black ants the size of pepper grains. How did they do that, get all the way inside the house to find his dinner? It’s such a long trip you’d think they’d die of old age before getting there. 

I’ve never lived without a dog in my life and Levi is the first one who wouldn’t cuddle with whoever was sick in the house, staying in bed with them or nearby on the floor, for as long as it took to get them well again. That page was missing in Levi’s handbook on how to be a good dog. Maybe that’s because he came into the family after Don’s stroke and Don needed a lot of naps. Maybe Levi took one look at that situation and thought, Five minutes of sympathy is all I’m giving him a day. Having a ‘sick human’ was his norm and for an active, twelve week old puppy when he was adopted, five minutes was a long time to be in healing-the-sick mode. At least Don got five minutes. I have to bribe Levi with Milk-Bonz Trail Mix mini bones to get him to sit next to me for three minutes. Yes, my nose is out of joint. When you’re sick you want a little canine sympathy. Or is it just me?

Friday and Saturday I rarely left the bedroom. By Sunday night I got out of bed, still wearing the nightgown I’d been wearing since Thursday to sit in the living room to watch American Idol. That’s when Levi decided to vomit next to my chair. I cleaned it up and no more than sat back down when he upchucked again. A total of four times before he was finished and then he put himself to bed for the rest of the evening. I guessed his stomach didn’t like the chicken soup I mixed with his kibble or maybe it was the germs he got from shredding Kleenex that he stole out of my bathrobe pockets or maybe he ate some of the ants before he saw the “pepper” was moving around. At least he hung his head in shame after parking his vomit at my feet and I told him that it was okay. No sense having two in the house who wanted and didn’t get any sympathy. 

Monday I was hoping I was well enough to go to my dentist appointment but I canceled because I wouldn’t want to stick my fingers into a mouth that was sure to still have a bunch of yucky germs inside and I wasn’t positive I could even keep my mouth open a whole hour or drive as far as I’d have to drive in the rain to get there without falling asleep at the wheel. I did, however, pronounce myself past the contagious stage. I still had a cough but most of the rib cage pain was gone and my temperature was 98.0. But that morning I woke up with my nightgown soaked in sweat---where did that come from?---so I took a shower in case Prince Charming should show up on my doorstep. I filled an ice cube tray up with canned pumpkin puree for Levi’s tummy and did a thorough cleaning of the ant area. By one o'clock I needed a nap and do you know what that twit of a dog did? Without so much as an invitation or the bribe it usually takes he crawled up in bed and took a nap at my feet. ©