In the Headlights

Invictus

by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloodied, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how straight the gait
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

*     *     *     *     *

Amazing how many familiar lines there are in this powerful 16-line poem.

It was written around the time Henley had a leg amputated because of tuberculosis in the bone.

These lines were also Timothy McVeigh's last words.  But they don't belong to him, and shouldn't be tainted by his corruption.

Robert Louis Stevenson modeled Long John Silver after Henley.

Some have posited that the first two lines indicate that Henley was depressed when he wrote the poem.

The Greenbrier

These are some shots of the Greenbrier.  Outside the building, the lobby, then inside the cottage.  We had asked for a room with two doubles, and when we got there all they had was a room with a king-sized bed.  I like Tammy and all, but we both nixed that idea.  So they upgraded us to the cottage.  It was very nice, but we had to go outside a couple hundred yards to the hotel itself, and it was in the 30's the whole time.  Didn't want to tote a coat, so just ran for it, often in the snow.  No.  I'm not whining.  Honestly.

Nice work trip, but I am always glad to get home, where the mail and the papers are stacked up, and the dirty laundry piles up as I unpack, and the cats get underfoot and try to trip me.  Ultimately, there's no place like Nome....er...home.

The Last Robin of Winter

At The Greenbrier last week, I saw the fattest robin I have ever seen. 

 

He was pretty fearless, too.  I circled the tree getting numerous shots of him with full zoom, and he just sat there.  They turned out pretty well.  I cropped this one. I guess someone there is feeding these guys through the Winter, and that made me happy.  I was going to call him the first robin of Spring, but it snowed all that night, so I guess that wouldn't be accurate. It didn't stick there, but saw it in the countryside as we drove through higher altitudes, back to Charleston W.Va. where we caught our plane.  This is the view from the front of our cottage.  The others are on the road.

The robin and Spring seemed like a fitting antithesis to my recent morbid ramblings.  Maybe a post about the rebirth found in all religions and mythology, the phoenix rising from its ashes, day following night.  But I'm not there yet.  I am instead struck by the beauty of the darkness, of the Winter, of the snow.  The other will have to wait.

Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight,
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black,
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow,
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know,
The place where the sidewalk ends.

[via Poem Hunter]

Easy Rider

[Thanks, RR]

Memento Mori

Memento mori.

I've been feeling pretty mortal lately.  But nothing compared with how a couple of my co-workers feel.

A couple of my colleagues have had serious brushes with death this last month.  Both are men in their 40's,  a month ago in the prime of their lives and now locked in combat with destiny. 

Eric was doing his Navy Reserve duty at Bethesda Naval Base.  He is engaged to be married, and as many in that situation do, he had gone to the gym to work out.  He was on a treadmill when he collapsed, unconscious.  Someone at the gym knew CPR, and the medics were called pronto.  He was in ventricular fibrillation when they got an EKG on him.  He was resuscitated.  After the acute phase, he had a thorough cardiac workup.  On cardiac catheterization, he was found to have a 90% blockage of his left anterior descending artery--the coronary artery which feeds the most important part of your heart (although the argument could be made they are all pretty important).  His artery was stented.  He has since also had a defibrillator implanted which will shock him automatically if he fibrillates again.

If he had been at home on the treadmill, or if no one had known CPR, he'd be dead now.

Then, last friday while we were in West Virginia, we heard that Glenn had awakened with crushing chest pain, unable to speak.  His wife rushed him to the ER.  He had some tests which showed he had an aortic dissection.  From his heart to his legs, the lining of his aorta was separating from the outer wall.  He was life-flighted to a medical center where he had eight hours of very high-risk emergency surgery.

When I went to see him in the ICU this afternoon, he had been walking around.  He is to be discharged to the floor tomorrow. 

He and his wife had been scheduled to leave on a cruise last Sunday.  Guess what?  If he'd been on a cruise ship when this happened, he'd be dead.

For being so unlucky, these are the luckiest damned guys I've ever seen.  But their lives are changed forever. 

Not only will Eric be on medications (and a heart-healthy diet, I'll bet) for the rest of his life, he will fear another episode for the rest of his life.

And Glenn can never let his blood pressure get out of control.  He now has an artificial heart valve as well as a new aorta.  His life will never be the same.  And ditto the diet.

You can guess what this has done to a close-knit department.  And if one more person says, sagely, "well, you know, these things come in threes", I'm going to sock him (or her--I'm an equal opportunity socker).  I don't believe in that stuff.  But having said that, we all know it's just a matter of time before something bad befalls someone we care about.

And a lot of us are speculating on how much job stress (or life stress) had to do with the plight that befell these two men in their forties.  And while we rue their bad luck and celebrate their good, we look at ourselves and wonder if we might be next.

*     *     *     *

And though these two escaped with their lives, I am reminded of John Donne's poem:

"Death Be Not Proud"

Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for thou art not so,
For those whom thou thinkst thou dost overthrow
Die not, poore death, nor cans't thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwelle,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better than thy stroake;  why swell'st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

*     *     *     *
And stream of consciousness takes us to John Gunther's biography with the same title, which he wrote about his 17 year old son after he died from a brain tumor.  After battling his disease, his son died, and shortly before his death wrote this:

Accept my gratitude
for all thy gifts
and I shall try
to fight the good fight.  Amen

Which is all anyone could ask, or anyone can do.

*     *     *     *
For those who can't get their fill of death, try "Thanatopsis" by William Cullen Bryant, Stiff by Mary Roach, Memento Mori by  Muriel Spark, or  The American Way of Death by Jessica Mitford. A favorite of mine is "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas. Just to get you started.

Runaway!

This weekend, Tammy and I flew into Charleston, W.Va. and drove to White Sulphur Springs, a road trip through the beautiful Appalachian mountains.

  They have some pretty steep grades on those roads, and the downhill run can go on for quite a while.  It is not uncommon for an unfamiliar trucker to lose control of a big rig on those roads.  I saw numerous signs announcing 5%, or even 7% grades, which were pretty steep and went on for long distances.   For one stretch, we stayed behind a truck which was exuding the acrid odor of burning brakes.  We didn't think we should pass him, somehow.

My husband had driven the big rigs over the road for a time, and I myself took a six-week course in driving tractor trailers--and still have a piece of paper to prove it.  We had thought about buying a truck and driving as a team, but it never panned out.

I guess the drivers lose control when they are going too fast to downshift without stripping the gears, so they slow down using the brakes, which may be unable to adequately slow the truck, or may fail entirely. 

At intervals, there are "Runaway Truck Ramps"--roads to nowhere that go take off like a side road, and head upward to slow out of control trucks.  This option may save the driver, and other lives that would be lost should a major accident occur.  It still involves driving a huge, out of control truck down a narrow lane. Tammy says she remembers once a truck was going so fast, it ran right off the end of the ramp, and the driver was killed.

Carnival des Recipes #84

Greetings,

This week, Christine at Morning Coffee and Afternoon Tea and Chocolate in Between... hostessed the 84th Carnival.  That's over a year and a half of tasty dishes, served up one week at a time.  I haven't been here for the whole time, but Christine has hosted before, so double thanks to her for all the fine work.

With all these great dishes, there's no excuse for ever making the same thing twice. 

Once again, my acknowledgements are a few days after the post.  I've been dragged (kicking and screaming) into the real world lately, and this virtual stuff sometimes has to take a back seat.  Good thing there's comfort food.

Things Dee Ray Learned from his Mother

Dee Ray sent us this list of things his mother taught him. Save it and send it to your mother for Mother's Day.  I'm sure she''ll recognize herself in it.  And I'm sure she'll appreciate it.

M...is for the million things she gave me...

To appreciate a job well done:  "If you're going to kill each other, do it outside, I just finished cleaning the floor."

Religion:  "You'd better pray that will come out of the carpet."

Time travel:  "If you don't stop that, I'm going to knock you into the middle of next week."

Logic:  "Because I say so, that's why."

Logic #2:  "If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to the store with me."

Foresight:  "Make sure you wear nice underwear, in case you get into an accident."  (Those EMTs and trauma docs are sure to be impressed.)

Irony:  "If you don't stop crying, I'll give you something to cry about."

Science (osmosis):  "Shut your mouth and eat your dinner."

Contortionism:  "Look at the dirt on the back of your neck!"

Stamina:  "You'll sit there until all that spinach is gone." (Where's the darn dog when you need him?)

Weather:  "Your room looks like a tornado went through it."

Hypocrisy:  "If I've told you once, I've told you a million times.  Don't exaggerate!"

The Circle of Life:  "I brought you into this life, and I can take you out."

Behavior Modification:  "Stop acting like your father!"

Envy:  "There are millions of less fortunate children in the world who don't have wonderful parents like you do."

Anticipation:  "Just you wait until we get home."

Receiving:  "You are going to get it when we get home!"

Medical Science:  "If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they are going to get stuck that way."

Wisdom:  "When you get to be my age, you'll understand."

Payback:  "One day you'll have children, and I hope they turn out just like you."

[Thanks, Dee Ray]

Eggstraordinary Eggplant Parmesan

Just got back from a trip and went to my folks' house for a glass of wine and dinner.  Wonderful to be spoiled after a day spent caroming around airports.

My folks made one of my favorites.    Here's the recipe:

EGGPLANT PARMESAN

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Make a simple tomato sauce:  Over medium low heat, saute a  chopped shallot in 2 tbsp. of olive oil.  When translucent, add two cloves of minced garlic, stir about 1 minute, but don't allow the garlic to get dark.  Add one 28-oz. can of diced tomatoes (or chop about 3 cups of chopped fresh tomatoes).  Simmer five minutes.  Salt and pepper to taste. Add a handful of coarsely chopped basil, stir and remove from heat.

Grate 1/2 lb. of mozarella.  If you use whole milk mozarella, the melted cheese will be stringier, which I happen to like.  If you are a cheese hound like me, you may consider increasing the amount of mozarella to 3/4 or even 1 lb.  It's up to you.

Grate enough Reggiano parmesan to make 1 cup.

Make or buy 1/4 cup of unflavored bread crumbs.

Slice two large eggplants into 1/2 inch slices.  Heat a smooth griddle or large flat frying pan over medium-high heat.  Brush the slices of eggplant with some olive oil, and place on hot griddle.  While side 1 is browning, brush oil on the up side.  When brown, flip the eggplant slices, brown the other side, and salt lightly.  Repeat until all the eggplant is cooked.

Assemble:

Coat a shallow casserole dish with olive oil.  It should be big enough to hold all the eggplant in about two layers.  Scatter the bread crumbs over the bottom of the dish.  This will thicken the tomato sauce while the dish bakes.

Place a layer of eggplant over the crumbs, and cover with tomato sauce (about 1 cup).  Cover with 1/2 of the mozarella, then 1/2 of the parmesan.

Repeat another layer of eggplant, sauce, mozarella and parmesan.  Drizzle about 1 tbsp. of olive oil over the cheese layer (optional).

Bake about 30 minutes, or until the cheese on top is a golden brown.

Serve with salad and crusty bread.  That's how we had it, and it can't be beat.

[Image from Plants and People-fruit lab]