28 May

The Back Yard

by Jon Katz
The Back Yard

We’ve lived on this Bedlam Farm for five years and it was a good and wise choice for us. One focal point of activity for us is the space between the farmhouse and the pasture. Sooner or later, almost every creature on the farm pops up there. Fate tries to lure me out to work with the sheep, the chickens march imperiously back and forth and Ed Gulley’s Tin Man watches over the enterprise.

I never set foot on a farm until I moved up here, and now I can hardly imagine life off of one. I can’t quite explain this, other than to say the farm has taught me so much about love and life. I am not a farmer but a writer with a farm, and there is an enormous difference.

But the farm is a great teacher and it has  transformed me into a learner. For me, Spring is the beginning of winter. I’m  waiting for 100 square bales of hay from the first cutting and we already have three cords of wood out of seven for next  winter.

The first lesson I ever learned on my first farm in Hebron was to start thinking about winter in May, or when it comes, you will not be ready but sorry. I learned to think again and plan.

28 May

Video: Alfalfa Treat: The Sweet Sound Of Donkey Crunching

by Jon Katz

Lulu and Fanny have been guilt tripping me into giving them treats for more than a  decade. They can hear me in the house, or even the bathroom in the morning, and know when I get up to stretch or get a drink in my study. They bray softly and pleadingly and it is somewhat hypnotic, and I usually succumb. Tonight I went out to bring the each an alfalfa treat – we keep them in the barn in a trash can.

I love the sound of donkeys crunching on their treats, it is a healing and soothing sound, the donkeys know how to eat – thoroughly and patiently and loudly. i often stand to listen to them crunch. Come and listen. Lulu is the donkey with the whiter snout.

28 May

How My Health Is: Great, And How Is Yours?

by Jon Katz
How My Health Is

I very much dislike talking about my health to people other than my wife, and I hate being vulnerable in front of her. I’m old enough, and don’t wish to appear any older.

But every few months, I am drawn to writing about my health, it seems as I begin to get old that I am learning important new things about my body and the very idea of health and also about the way mind works or doesn’t. I am also learning again and again that help helps, something that is often hard for men to grasp.

As someone with two increasingly common chronic diseases, I am also learning things that about my health that might be useful to others.

Beyond that, I have promised to be open on the blog, and that is a promise I have kept, it has seemed to work and so I will  continue the practice. It feels good to me to be open, it feels  honest and light, I have no secrets and nothing much to fear or hide from the truth. That is one of the best things about getting older. When I was young, I had 1,000 secrets to keep.

What I dislike about talking about my health is the way in which it can come to define the lives of older people, and the people around them. Ever since I  had open heart surgery, people have often treated me differently,  as if I am stricken with the plague, they often look at me with sadness or concern, as if I am object of pity, and will ask, sometimes clasping my hand, “how is your health?”

I have friends who I rarely have from, but come running if they think I am sick or hear I am sick. They want to hear all about it, and share some advice from their own experiences. That is the currency of being older in America, how can we all survive our own ideas of aging and health?

The people clasping my hand in sympathy would be shocked, and rightfully so, if they knew I wanted to slug them, but I haven’t and won’t do that.  Even though it is none of their business. Even though my health does not define who I am.

They are just expressing concern in the way they have learned to  express it, in the way they have  seen.  It is still okay to stereotype the aging and demean and trivialize their lives. We do not have a me.too movement for bigotry.

The foundation of old talk is health, from the cost of drugs to the foibles of doctors to the ills and pains of the body. Most of the older people I do know and talk with try to avoid many of the older people they know. They don’t want to talk about their health.  When I hear somebody start talking about the old days or young people today, I know it’s time to run.

I believe old talk is a lethal killer, it brings more people to ruin than any chronic disease. I’d rather talk about sex and change and the new things I am learning in life.

The last  thing I want is people telling me they are sorry for me on Facebook or praying for my recovery, or wishing me recovery. There is no recovery from the aging process, and I am happy being older. I’m good at it.

I am not sick or dying, and do not need pity, I’m just getting older, as every one of us is,  and learning how to do it.  And I realize that no one taught me anything about it, I have to teach myself.

And I have a lot to learn when it comes to taking good care of me.

The last months have been especially tiring for me, and  for the best possible reasons.

Many trips to Albany, visits to the Mansion, the drain of the resident’s illnesses, the tragedy, violence and struggle of the refugees. The strain of fund-raising almost every day, the negotiations with landlords, welfare officials,  amusement parts , aquariums, sports apparel companies and soccer field owners, bureaucratic do-gooders, rule-bound welfare agencies, writing, blogging, taking photos, loving my wife,  walking my dogs, caring for the farm, struggling with the news.

At night, I am often haunted by the images of Mansion residents who need shoes or clothes, of the refugees who need homes and help. They dance around in my dreams, calling out for help. They get under my skin, as they should.

And yes, I am also often worrying about the things everyone worries about, the bills, hay and wood orders, holes in the roof, dust on the lawn mowers, broken blinds on the porch, food for the dogs, tune-up and rotating tires for the car, the never ending stream of bills to pay, the rising cost of everything.

It’s an odd thing about getting older, it is hard to believe that I have less energy than I used to have, that I tire more easily, and need a bit more rest. I am bad at rest, my mind races through the night, it hates to rest.

I have been busy and distracted, so much so I haven’t noticed things that were happening to my body.

In recent months, I’ve had two medical situations to confront, both were disturbing and challenging, both reminded me of the importance of paying attention to myself, of having doctors (preferably nurses) I can talk openly with and listen to.

The first problem was glossing over a problem with my eyesight.

The tops of letters were disappearing on the pages of books and on my computer screen. It was as if almost all letters viewed at a certain angle lost about a third of their tops. It took me two months to finally make an appointment, and I was quickly rushed to a retinal specialist who showed me quite eerie photographs of serious swelling that threatened my left eye, and to a lesser sense, my right.  It could quite easily, I was told, cause blindness if not treated.

I was shocked of course, I attributed the problem to allergies, or aging or  computer  fatigue or any other dumb thing I could think of. This reminds me of the time I assured my wonderful nurse-practioner Karen Bruce that I had asthma even as I was in the middle of a heart attack. I never heard the end of that, but it didn’t keep me from doing the same dumb thing at least two times more, one regarding my eye, the other my diabetes.

One thing about me: I am slow to awaken to health problems, but a tiger once I get on it. Focus is my strength and salvation, even though I can be oblivious and  dense.

Over the past three months, I’ve  taken powerful and expensive eye drops four times a  day, and had two substantial laser eye surgeries, and a half-dozen visits to retinal specialists. My eye sight is now 20/20  again with glasses and I am no longer threatened with blindness, at least for now, and probably for good.

I will need more surgeries and more drops and more exams. I can’t just forget it again.

Once we got onto it, I found it treatable if I worked at it. The letters I see are clear and complete, the swelling has been pushed way back from the retina. I don’t need to so a doctor again for three months. I might need some surgery forever. I have no strain when I write, which is often.

The second problem:

In the intensity of the last few months, I stopped taking my blood sugar numbers regularly, sometimes not even for weeks. I have controlled my diabetes well and completely for some years now, I just took it for granted I was okay. I started paying less attention to diet and didn’t think about carbohydrates. Nor did I pay attention to diabetes and aging, it can roar up and bite. I just didn’t want to think about it all the time.

I didn’t want to notice that my body was bloating up, I was gaining weight even though I am quite active and eat well. Diabetes is not quite like that, of course, you always have to pay attention to it, and you can lose control quite easily, even if you eat well and are  active. As you get older, the treatment and control changes, and you have to change with it.

Some of you may have noticed my face bloating up in photographs. I didn’t, not until lately.

I had a regular check-up with Karen and when I saw her, she asked me how I was. I was fine, I said.

No,  you are not, she said. You are in trouble. My AiC number, the best indicator of diabetic health, has shot up two points.

In the days before the exam, I suspected trouble. I started checking my numbers again and was alarmed. My blood sugar was up by 30 or 40 per cent, even after fasting. Some of my post-meal numbers dinner were even higher than that. And I couldn’t bring them down. I was sure they would come down, they always had. They didn’t.

Worse, Karen was leaving the health center and moving to the Adirondacks. She was worried about me, she said and made me promise to contact my diabetes specialist in Bennington, Vt. To make sure, she called them about my blood work, a final act of love and concern.  And told them to hunt me down if I didn’t show up. I did, she is good at frightening me.

And I saw that she was concerned. I was concerned. I didn’t tell her I had been feeling increasingly drowsy in the morning, and early afternoon, two time periods when I have plenty of energy.

This was a bad path for me, these numbers unchecked lead to strokes, heart attacks and many other things I don’t wish to have. Diabetes is one of the best chronic diseases to have, because it can be controlled to a great extent if you really bother to control it. It will wreak havoc with your body if you don’t. For years, Karen has been telling me I was the best diabetic patient she had ever had in her practice, the most diligent and disciplined. She didn’t say that this time, I didn’t even get a sticker.

I made an appointment and went to see Sheila, my diabetic nurse practitioner, another woman I could talk to who cared about. She didn’t waste any time. She said she was certain my body was processing sugar differently as I got older, and I probably did need to pay much more attention to carbohydrates I was consuming, lots of things that say healthy on the package are not healthy if you look at the ingredients.

She put me on a new medication that helped the body eliminate excess sugar and bring my numbers back under control. She said it was a powerful new medication and warned of severe side effects for at least a few days.

I started checking my blood regularly, I re-cast my diet and paid close attention to carbohydrates. I stopped consuming them.

The new medication was potent, and there were a lot of side effects – nausea, dizziness, irritability, lightness in the head. It got better after a few days, but it was hard to adjust to it.

I may be on it the rest of my life, but my body is getting used to it. Among other things, it  triggered startly frequent  urination – this is how the diabetic body gets rid of excess sugar. I was stunned by what came out of me, what had been building in my blood and body. I lost 11 pounds in just a few days. That is serious.

Yesterday, and today, my numbers returned to normal.

My drowsiness has disappeared. I am eating the right food at the right time, and paying close attention to my numbers. I feel dramatically better, and back in control. I feel strong and ready for the good and hard work I have to do and love to do. Bring it on. I have my energy back, I told Maria. Dear God, she said.

Anybody who tries old talk or health chatter with me will regret it, and when they come up to me with sad eyes and ask softly, “how’s your health?,” I will look at them cross-eyed and say with a smile, “great, how’s yours?”

What’s the lesson for me? Hubris can kill. I must always find a good health care person and listen to them, hopefully a her. I will make no assumptions about chronic diseases, they will sneak up and bite me in the ass.

This is a story with a happy ending for me, there is no need for worry. And I have no speeches to give to others.

Health is a personal thing, we are all different, we all want different things.  We all have the right to make our own decisionsI talked to a man in the  waiting room who said his diabetes was killing him, but you know what?, he  said, I’m happy to die rather than give up the lifestyle I want.

Not me, brother, I said, I am happier than I have ever  been, and busier doing things I value, and living with a wonderful woman. I have much to live for and am just beginning to get on with it.

As I got up to see Karen, we shook hands and hugged and wished the other well.  I couldn’t see her, but I got a bit teary. She will be very hard to replace.

But I didn’t want to be  him, and he didn’t want to be me. Fair enough. I’ll keep a better eye on myself, and get back to life.

28 May

The Secret Garden. Tomorrow Is Tomorrow, We Must Mind Today

by Jon Katz
The Secret Garden

I think I never love Maria more than when she is working on her gardens at the beginning of Spring. She loves living things, talks to them, recognizes, knows them. She senses when they are thirsty, worries when they are disturbed, props them up after storms. She is never more delighted than when I stop at a nursery to bring her some flowers for her garden, and I do this as often as I can.

In two days, she has transformed our back porch once more – Flo sleeps through all of this on warm days – with hanging flowers, flowers in parts.

I wish that people thought of the Earth as lovingly and carefully as Maria thinks of her gardens, over the weekend this garden has taken on life and depth, a joy for a photographer.

And it is a secret garden, visible only to us, not from the street or road. The fence keeps the chickens at bay until the seeds root,  and as a warrior for color and light, this brings me the greatest pleasure.

She will get something into our head soon, we already went to a garden stand to fill up the one or two pots that are still empty.

We treasure these days together, every one of them, we know how precious and fleeting they are. I admit I think of our friends the Gulleys heading towards the Badlands, Ed struggling already  with his brain cancer, bravely and determinedly choose life, every day that he can,  Carol joining him in this journey.

It’s not my illness, for sure, but it does get into your head. It reminds me to be grateful. How can I not think of it?

A spiritual counselor told me once that if I wanted to be happy, live in the moment, live in the breath. Let go of the ghosts of yesterday. Sophocles wrote that tomorrow is tomorrow, future cares have future cures, and we must mind today.

I think people do not naturally live in the present, like dogs do.

We lament the past or blind to the riches that surround us, stand on our toes to peek into the future. The gardens are a reminder to live in the moment, I have learned that like Maria, I cannot be happy or strong unless I  live with nature in the present, far above time.

Maria is the moment for me, the present, she is my garden, the color and the light.

28 May

Godspeed, Ed And Carol. Heading For The Badlands

by Jon Katz
Onto The Badlands

Whenever I look out at our Tin Man, I think of Ed Gulley, my friend, the farmer and artist who created  him. The Tin Man took a beating during several windstorms but we will figure out a way to patch up his farm. He is standing strong, like his creator.

Ed and Carol  are on a trip our west. He wants to get to the Badlands National Park of South Dakota, given its name by the Lakota Indian Tribe, they are just a half day away. Ed has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer and wanted to see the Badlands while he could, and Carol went out and leased a car.

I got a text message from Carol this morning, saying they were only hours away, and the landscape was already beautiful.

This is something they both have wanted to do for a long time, and Ed was very determined to go now.

Carol  was equally determined to  help, she refers to him as “My Farmer,” something our writing class has  chided her about, but it is the way she feels, and it is quite genuine, it is how she feels. Ed and their children and grand-children and their animals and farm are her life.

I can only imagine what she is feeling now, she is not prone to talking about her own feelings.

Ed and Carol have been gone nearly a week and I haven’t written much about them because I don’t really know what to say. With Ed gone, the world seems quieter and off kilter.  Carol has been posting every day on their  Bejosh Farm Journal but Ed has gone silent. In the photos, he looks tired.

Like me, Ed is not prone to silence, and  I imagine he is feeling the effects of his illness. Carol’s messages are shorter, she is letting us know where she and Ed are. I haven’t heard much from them.

There are no poems, videos or observations about life, no ranting about milk prices.

I hope this means they are having fun, they don’t need to be worried about the  rest of the world. They can take care of themselves.

We drove by the farm Monday hoping to catch them before they left, we brought them two leather journals to write in on their trip. But they were gone by the time we got there, and the farm was eerily quiet. Ed is one of those larger than life people, he takes up a lot of space. When he is gone, the silence is loud.

I got a message on my Iphone saying they needed to go, and I was glad to hear it. They did need to go.

Carol’s posts suggest they are having a good and important time together.

I talked to Ed once or twice on the trip, but I am frankly and strangely uncomfortable calling them.

Although they have have repeatedly said they value contacts and messages from the outside world, it still feels like a private and very personal time for them to me, and if they wish to speak to me, they will call. They know they can call anytime, so why not leave it up to them?

I think they know that they do not need  to call, I hope so.

Some things, I imagine, are just difficult to share, and do not need to be shared. I have the sense they are both very much enjoying their time together, something they got very little of over their decades together working on their farm.

You can follow this extraordinary journey here.

It is strange to be so out of touch with Ed, but it also feels appropriate to me. This is their trip, and I hope they are not too busy with messages and calls, as they seemed to invite. I don’t want to add to them. I have this idea that they are telling people they are fine all day long. That could get old.

My idea – and Maria’s – is to let them know we are here if they need us, and to let them be. There has never been a trip like this for them, and there may never be another. I hope it is precious for them.

The Tin Man reminds me of the impact Ed and Carol have had on our lives and the lives of the farm. I hope to take him out to lunch when he gets back.

I’m not sure what Ed’s attraction to the Badlands is, it’s not something in my blood, but I know it is a beautiful place, and the pull is deep and I wish him Godspeed. I hope he founds what he is seeking there.

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