dropsinthewell

Little Sure Shot Sure Shocked ‘em

Jackie Wells-Fauth

I have read, for many years and with great interest, the expression, “the weaker sex,” when talking about women. As a member of the weaker sex, I frequently laugh myself sick while I drag around heavy, wet baskets of laundry or giant mounds of garbage or wheelbarrows full of dirt. Being the weaker sex means I shouldn’t have to do that kind of thing, right?

Oh wait, I forgot, all those types of jobs are also considered “women’s work.” There is another phrase that really eludes me. What exactly is women’s work and how did women, who go through the rigors of childbirth and hold entire households together, become known as the weaker sex? Hold the door for me? How about you lug heavy rugs to the deck to be cleaned or juggle three children, the evening meal after working outside the home all day and a couple of hours of homework wrangling.  Then, I will be glad to open the door myself, thank you!

I was having all of these bitter, gender-war thoughts when I came across a picture of Annie Oakley this week. Maybe you remember Annie Oakley, the young woman who was an expert shot with a gun and who traveled for many years with Buffalo Bill Cody and his Wild West Show. “Little Sure Shot,” they called her and I’m convinced that half of her appeal was that she was a woman—and since the weaker sex are not expected to be good at shooting, her ability to drill a dime in mid-air with a bullet made her an aberration worth watching.

Of course, women participating in the Wild West Show would be expected to ride out with the rest of the performers on a horse. The rest of the group, men in cowboy attire, would be astride their horses, one foot in each stirrup on either side of the horse. Not so for the “weaker sex.” Annie Oakley, as befitted the delicate gender, rode on a contraption called a “side-saddle”. Historians can explain all the many reasons for assigning women to ride the side-saddle, but if you’ve ever seen one or ridden on one, you know that there is nothing “weaker” about anyone who can hang on, draped as they would be in long skirts and clinging to one side of the horse!

I got to try out one of these things (not on a horse, of course) which was set up in a museum and the signs invited you to try and mount and sit on the saddle. It also mentioned that you should attempt to imagine sitting on that saddle on a moving horse. I was wearing jeans and I was a few years younger than I am now, and I could not mount and stay upright even with that saddle immobile on a sawhorse. I can’t imagine trying to sit on the side-saddle strapped to a horse.

That brings me to the picture of Little Sure Shot. Annie Oakley wasn’t just riding a horse with long, draping skirts and a side-saddle, the picture captured her as she reared the horse up on two legs. Now, maybe, after the photo was taken, she slid off the saddle and ended in the mud, but that picture made me so proud of her—proving that even with all of a woman’s restrictions, she could live in a man’s world. I didn’t see any of the men in the Wild West Show doing that!

In the same group of pictures was a photo of Belle Starr, also seated on a horse, riding side-saddle. That one just made me laugh. Belle Starr, if you remember, was known in the Old West as “the Bandit Queen.” She was an outlaw with the best of them. In the picture, she is both wearing guns and carrying them, but still, there she was, on a side saddle. I can understand; if she had ridden astride, people might have thought she wasn’t a lady!

Annie Oakley apparently lamented the fact that she was considered a “trick shot” because, as a woman, she wasn’t expected to be a good marksman. I see her point and I see that she was far ahead of her time in her outlook and abilities. So thank you, for setting the pace for all the girls coming after you and proving that the “weaker sex” isn’t so weak, after all!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

Right now, everyone’s celebrating the holiday. That one we squeeze in between trick-or-treating and Christmas. This is the one where we give ourselves permission to stuff ourselves and then sit around afterward discussing key issues like, what’s for sale already for Black Friday and whether it’s okay to have the Christmas tree up while the Pilgrim statues are still decorating the mantle.

People may not realize it, but Thanksgiving is actually a very divisive holiday. It’s divided between those who can cook and those who believe that God invented TV dinners for a reason. It is on Thanksgiving that we separate the chefs from those of us who made a last-minute dash to the store for two-day old buns and a can of black olives to take to the annual event.

The day will come, I know, when I will not be able to accept someone’s generous invitation to Thanksgiving dinner, but I am not looking forward to that day because that is when I will sink irrevocably into that world where you “microwave on high for four minutes, stopping halfway through to stir the potatoes and turkey—separately.”

It’s not that no one tried to teach me to cook. But you have to have two things to learn to cook: a certain amount of aptitude and a great deal of willingness to do it—itude. I believe that from the start, I did not possess either. I would be content with a piece of toast and a fried egg for every meal…if only I could fry an egg. It’s sad, but when Roy wants a fried egg, he makes it himself, knowing that’s the only way it will not come out burned and slightly scrambled.

But back to Thanksgiving. You may think, as some do who have tried to encourage me, that I just don’t apply myself. But the truth is, I am highly intimidated by some of the cooks around me. And…yes, I don’t apply myself, either.

“Try some of the cranberry-apple resole, I made with fresh cranberries,” someone will say.

Fresh cranberries? I get my cranberries jellied in a can as nature intended. And I’m not trying anything whose name doesn’t appear in Webster’s standard dictionary. So, I missed out on the cranberry-apple thingy, but at least I kept my dignity, right?

As for stuffing, aside from the fact that I object to that much bread in one single sitting, I have a great deal of trouble with how it’s prepared. No, I do not wish to sample your great aunt Bessie’s stuffing, when it has to be shoveled out of a turkey’s butt to be served! And that is not just me being bitter because I can’t make a stuffing that anyone will eat, regardless of where it reposed during baking!

Obviously, the fact that I have failed this Thanksgiving test a great many times, causes people who do invite me for a meal to be less than enthusiastic for me to bring anything.

“I could bring a pumpkin pie,” I will offer, half-heartedly.

“Oh my, no,” the hostess will stammer, “I’d hate to have you go to that bother.”

“Are you sure? I think they are on sale at Kessler’s. Would be no trouble to go pick one up.”

Even if I’m bringing it from the store, most hostesses will turn it down. That’s fine, it saves me the trouble of shopping and it saves them the worry that I’ll take some wild notion in my head and make it myself. I have nightmares about making dinner rolls that turn out to be rocks or a macaroni salad loaded with mayonnaise-covered mystery lumps, and usually that’s enough to get me out of the notion of actually cooking.

So, I will continue to view Thanksgiving as the ultimate cooking test that I have failed and I will count myself on the side of those who are always asked to bring some paper cups or napkins but never Grandma’s homemade fudge! While it is a divisive thing, I think we will all survive it, especially after a good meal. And rest assured that my lack of cooking skills will continue to horrify others and be perfectly okay with me!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

I’m the first one to admit that my household is a little disorganized. I have often thought it would be better if I hired someone to clean and organize it regularly, but I’m afraid a professional would take one look at the blankets and throws all over the living room and yarn scraps from sewing projects throughout the house and run screaming into the night.

And so, I go on, year after year, wallowing in my disorganization and losing things right and left because of it. Or at least, that’s what I always believed. I figured that some higher power just liked messing with my mind, and rearranged things throughout the house. That explains the loss of things like scissors and ink pens.

I have a project that needs gold-colored yarn and I cannot find any in the house. So, I buy some and then, of course, the higher power places the missing yarn someplace quite ordinary, like the plate cupboard, or the freezer.

I have tolerated this circumstance because everyone assures me they have the same problems. Needles go missing, socks constantly lose their mates and finding a hairbrush is frequently so difficult, I have learned to comb my hair with my fingers and I have convinced myself that it looks just as good!

Everything was fine until the knives. Now, I have lost many pairs of scissors. It seems when I need a pair of scissors, there is never any around. I end up using a small knife or just as often my teeth. I can accept that scissors pack up and move out of the house, but now my knives have gotten into the act.

I bought a couple of knives a while ago that were really quite expensive because I was tired of the knives that cut so poorly I could chew it better and  more smoothly. Those two knives were great and I used them for everything. Then, one by one, they silently disappeared into the night. Frustrated by bread that got mashed and meat that wouldn’t slice, I got a couple more knives, not so expensive, but at least temporarily sharp. They, too, disappeared into knife oblivion.

All the dull knives have remained and they are only good for causing cuts on my fingers as I sort through the drawer, looking for knives which can do anything besides cut me! I was debating about whether I should be shopping once again, for knives that can do kitchen work, when I happened to overhear a program on television that made me stop and think.

It was while I was in the living room, digging carefully through the furniture looking for both my scissors and my missing needles, that I overheard a man describing his experience with what he termed to be ghosts.

“My knives slowly started disappearing. No one seemed to know where they went,” he drawled. He had my attention.

“Before I knew it, all the sharp knives in the house and some scissors and a bunch of large needles had mysteriously vanished. I looked everywhere, I asked every one and no one could answer the question of where they went.”

By now, I was sitting in a chair, hanging on his every word. What happened? “Did you ever solve the mystery?” the interviewer asked.

“One night, I woke up in the middle of the night and I was pinned to the bed with my sheet, which had every sharp utensil that had disappeared in the last year holding the sheet to the bed all around me. Those ghosts were sending me a message and I left that house quickly.”

What? Ghosts were collecting all the sharp objects? Did that mean I was going wake up some night looking like the knife act in a circus show? I told my husband the whole story.

“Well, it seems more likely to me that he should check out his wife,” was his reply. “Besides, I have problems of my own. I can’t find my hatchet anywhere.”

Okay, that’s it. I’m packing up and moving out until that ax reappears…someplace other than in my bed!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

Things have apparently become desperate for the deer population. This week, a member of that species checked into the city drug store by way of an unscheduled dash through a plate glass window. Didn’t do the window or the store a lot of good and I don’t think the deer really enjoyed itself either.

I don’t think the deer said why he was there, but one can draw the conclusion that, with all the hunters in town, he was probably after some tranquilizers for his nerves. In any case, by the time he had crashed in through one window, checked out the merchandize in the store (maybe he was Christmas shopping?) and crashed out through a second window, he was probably in need of medication of some kind!

Deer infiltration is a pretty common occurrence for those of us who live in South Dakota, and once in a while, they will take a stroll down city streets where they almost always come to grief or cause it, anyway. Whether it’s a foray through someone’s garden, hoofprints through the flower beds or a walk on the wild side of a road, they are always with us.

I don’t need to tell any of you, either, about the rigors of driving down a road in the gloaming, searching for a deer, well-blended with the scenery and unwise enough to play “chicken” (if you’ll forgive the term) with the motorized monsters on the road.

Imagine, if you will, a gathering of deer in the ditch, observing the lights of oncoming traffic. Merwyn, the lead deer, is gauging speed and distance before he decides on a plan of action.

“Now, I’d watch it, there, Merwyn, that car is coming fast. Don’t get cocky,” says his brother.

“Yes, Merwyn,” his wife chimes in. “You be careful on that road; you’re not as young as you used to be, you know.” She screws up her face unhappily as she sees him standing, debating. “Remember, if you try it, the children will all think they should too,”

“I have been dodging these things for years, Mildred,” he counters. “There’s an art to it. I know just when to…”

And away goes Merwyn and the next thing anyone knows, Mildred is holding a roadside memorial over the moldering remains of the unwise Merwyn. Meanwhile, the driver of the car is being told it’ll cost $6,000 to remove the Merwyn-shaped dent from his vehicle.

In South Dakota, a deer dead on the side of the road because it lost a game of Russian Roulette is almost cliché. No one mourns the death, just the damage. But, in some of my travels, I have encountered places where they treat the deer like a precious, endangered species. A sign in Florida said, “Have a care for our deer friends.” That is not a problem—I don’t have any deer friends, and I only care for my property!

They might not think they are so precious if they have my experience. Their “deer friends” have caused two of my car doors to spring when they ran into them, one hood to need replacing after a deer did a handspring roll over it and a few side mirrors have disappeared because deer paused to check their hair as my car passed.

While cars are the biggest target, this week’s shopping spree on Main Street is proof that nothing is sacred. Deer tend to make themselves at home, no matter the inconvenience to us and the danger to them.

Still, it might be that we don’t have it as tough as we might have. My aunt still wins first prize in the wild times with wild life as she tells the story of living in the mountains and opening the patio curtains, thinking the dog was outside. Instead, a full-sized bear stood on its hind legs and pounded a rhythm on the glass.

She wins the wildlife stories, but a deer through a plate glass window is a close second. Nice going, Merwyn’s brother, I hope you didn’t cut yourself—or maybe I do!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

It’s been a rough couple of weeks. I was feeling pretty miserable with an ugly cold and then Roy made it so much worse.

“I want to check myself for Covid,” he said, holding his head and laying back in the chair. That got my attention. When Roy feels so bad, he wants to undergo actual tests, that’s quite a thing. I wasn’t worried, though. After all, Covid is long past—right?

I kept hoping he would test negative—but he didn’t. And so, that meant that I had to test and of course, I also had Covid. Talk about regressing immediately into the past a few years! (Where DID I put those masks????)

The worst part for me is calling the people I have been in contact with to let them know I exposed them. It’s always an awkward conversation. It’s not like we’re used to giving people heads up on our health issues. “Yeah, I just thought I’d call and tell you I have the diarrhea and an uncomfortable rash right where I can’t scratch it.” But with Covid, we feel an obligation to let them know what’s coming.

Luckily, we were not greatly inconvenienced or made too ill by this round of the disease, but it was a subtle (or not-so-subtle) reminder that the pandemic, much as we want it to be, isn’t quite over. We were forced to confront the harsh truth that life will probably never go back to pre-pandemic proportions.

Before Covid, I never really noticed if someone was coughing. They could cough up a lung and I would not react. Now, if someone clears their throat, I want to put on a full haz-mat suit and drench myself in Purell.

We have stopped regarding the handshake as a form of greeting and begun to see it as a hostile attack. Before Covid, we laughed at the germophobic detective Monk, seeing his exaggerated fear of human contact as something ridiculous. Since the pandemic, it’s difficult not to look upon him as the prophetic poster child for fighting disease!

As a student of history (and long before the pandemic hit) I read with fascination the accounts of the Spanish flu epidemic which hit in the early 20^th century. I sneered a little at these people who couldn’t find a way to control the spread of a simple disease.

 After Covid entered our lives, I began to understand the problem. I listened with great interest to the lady who got on television and read a list of “suggestions” for how to avoid the spread. One of the suggestions was to avoid putting your hands near your eyes, nose or mouth. Then, she promptly licked her finger to turn to the next page of her notes! Okay, maybe I understand better now.

Before the pandemic struck, it would not have occurred to me to get up in the morning and go to work by staying in my house. Terms like lockdown referred to prison riots or airport security. Since Covid rolled over us, most people got the opportunity to scramble through their homes, eating breakfast at a dining room table that was turned into a glorified office. Before Covid, I would have thought “working at home” meant stuffing envelopes or doing hand sewing. But now, people are still frequently working at home offices, using a computer to do business and the joke about holding a meeting in your suit jacket and Santa pajama pants has become old.

I’m not really sure where I’m going with this…just a line of thoughts on how one single but deadly infection could so change our lives and outlooks. We live in a world where infection from colds and flu was carelessly spread for all of my youth and adult life. When I went to college, they didn’t cover the complexities of teaching a classroom full of students with all of us masked like we’re robbing a bank. “You gave the right answer. Which one of you said it?” Likewise, I never took a health class where they taught you a song by the singer Lizzo to help you wash your hands long enough to get them germ free…My hands are cleaner, but I discovered that I’ll never be much of a singer!

I learned so much about the difference between pre-Covid times and the post-pandemic world, but what I apparently didn’t learn well enough was that despite all the wonderful things the medical community and everyone else have done, Covid is still out there—maybe not as predominant as before, but definitely still visiting me when I let down my guard. Cough carefully everyone, and make sure you wash those hands for 20 seconds!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

“If you know the extension of the person you wish to speak to, dial that now,” came the automated voice over the phone.

“I don’t know who I need to speak to, I just need a person,” I replied, still not getting that I was talking to a phone robot and one who didn’t really care about my problems.

“In a few words, state what you need from our facility,” was the next instruction.

“I NEED TO TALK TO A PERSON,” I don’t know why I was shouting; it was not so much because I was angry; just because somehow I thought the robo voice would respond better. I was nervous; give me a break.

“Please state, in a few words, what you wish to speak to our people about,” was the repeated instruction, and because even a robo voice knew they were dealing with the simple-minded, they went on, “For example, do you want to update an account, open a new account, have billing questions…”

“I want to talk to a person about my account,” I shouted; by now I was convinced that I was not going to be talking to a human being anytime soon.

“We apologize for any inconvenience, but there is no one who can assist you at this time,” the robo voice intoned without a hint of apology. “We recommend that you visit our website or call our 1-800 number.” The next thing I heard was dial tone.

This is not a new event. The advantage to living in a small town has always been that I could walk in the front door of the business and talk to real, live people who give every indication of being willing to help me with whatever the problem is. So I guess I’ve been spoiled.

Any business that must be done long distance—and that happens a lot—leaves us at the mercy of an automated phone system which doesn’t care if their bad attitude and limited responses make us mad.

As an older American, I am less than comfortable with the technological advances that spring up almost hourly around us. I have already stated that my children are much better at figuring out technology than I am, but this is of no concern to the companies who rely more and more on the robo voiced phone receptions which handle the high volume of calls. The older the American, the more likely that these phone experiences don’t go well.

The website visit for me is always just as useless as my conversation with the automated voice. “Click on the box at the left side of the screen for a list of options.” I followed these instructions. None of the options took me to a place where I could get information for my account.

“We have a different address than the one you gave,” is the message which comes up when I try to identify myself. This is a problem: I’ve only had one address for the last 30 years. That might explain everything—I’ve been living under a false identity at a false address, no wonder I can’t get a response to my problems!

In the end, I called the 1-800 number. After answering a long series of questions and responding to a special code that they sent and I repeated back to them, I finally got to speak to an ACTUAL PERSON! Judging by her voice, she was somewhere in the south, but when we finally got down to my problems, she was able to help me fix it. I was so thankful, I couldn’t tell her enough how grateful I was.

“Oh ma’am, you are so welcome,” she drawled with her honey voice. “Is there anything else I can do?”

“Yes, tell me how I can get a hold of someone at the branch of the office that is in my area. They keep hanging up on me,” I whined.

“Yes, ma’am. That’s the new automated phone system,” she explained. That much I already knew.

“When they ask what you want, just say, ‘Branch manager,’ and you will get a person in the most local office to you,” she went on to instruct me. We parted on very good terms.

Several days later, when another issue appeared, I was confident of myself. I now knew what to do. I called the most local number and waited while the robo voice greeted me and asked me to state in a few words what I wanted.

“Branch manager,” I enunciated proudly.

“We apologize for any inconvenience, but there is no one who can assist you at this time,” intoned the robo voice. My reply was highly emotional and slightly profane. But by then I was speaking to dial tone.

Jackie Wells-Fauth

When I was in my early 40s, I remember trying to pick something up and having a twinge somewhere in my back and thinking jokingly, “Oh, look at me, I’m getting old.”

Nowadays, I only have to bend over or move sideways–without picking anything up–and I’m reminded seriously of that bumper sticker which says, “I thought growing older would take longer.” It is a sad truth that I no longer joke about getting older and every day I am reminded more vividly that I am getting so very much older. And far from taking longer, it has all happened in the blink of an eye!

As our bodies begin to age, we all begin to make concessions. We begin to deal with ourselves to keep from facing the awful truth that age, that merciless witch, has caught up with us and she did it with all the speed of a sprinter. I sit down more carefully and walk more precisely than I ever did as a young woman and still, the body persists in showing that age.

I used to walk through a grocery store picking up things aimlessly and in no particular order. Today, I stand and debate with myself about whether I could really maybe get along without milk for another week because I don’t want to walk to the back of the store to pick up the carton that I forgot to get (memory–another age-related casualty) while I was at the other end of the store.

I avoid certain clothes in my closet because they require me to twist my body to get them on in ways that age now forbids me to do. I don’t throw away the clothes, mind you, because someday I’m going to feel better and exercise my way back to all of the moves that I didn’t appreciate when I was young. And of course, I never clean the closet because my body is no longer fond of that activity, if it ever was!

I like to think that I am meticulous about keeping my kitchen floors clean—always mopped them regularly. Old age has made me watch the dog much more carefully. If she is out in the kitchen, licking the floor, I figure I can let the mopping go for another day or two. And as for moving out appliances to clean or mop beneath, well, if the dog isn’t bothered by their condition now, I see no reason I should get excited about it!

When my children were babies I dreamed of going to bed early and not having to get up in the night. That dream has never become a reality. If I go to bed too early, the old body protests against too much time in a prone position and as for not having to get up in the night, well, most of us old people will tell you that we have a night light in the bathroom and it’s not just for show!

Each morning, I get up and do an inventory of what aches, is numb from an unwise sleeping position or just plain has shifted and sends up notice that its function has now changed and it won’t be performing all those menial tasks for me anymore.

In my 20s, I threw fits because my hair was so thick I couldn’t get a comb through it. Today, I have put away all of those worries and just hope I have enough hair to cover my head. I loved high, spiky heels as a girl, believing they flattered my legs. Now, I wear heavy sneakers and comfort myself with the fact that my legs are always covered in compression socks, so no one would see them anyway!

At 35, I wrote my first column/blog about getting old. It was a complete whine about having to face the problems of encroaching age. Now, at almost 70, I would like to go back and kick that idiot 35-year-old in the butt—except I can’t get my foot up that high. And I suppose, if I live to be 100, I’ll look back on this column and laugh at what I can still do now that I won’t be able to then! It is all relative.

So it’s true, I did think growing old was going to take longer and instead, it has happened in the blink of an eye. This thought was really kind of depressing me the other day and I confided to a colleague that “I can’t believe I got old so very fast.”

He looked at me, cocked his head thoughtfully and replied, “This is all very true. It’s not that much fun getting older…but the alternative is a lot less attractive. I’ll take aging.”

And there you have it; the aging process is all in how you look at it—whether you’re 35, 50 or 80. So, I’ll try to be content with my growing age, but I still say that eye blinked pretty darn fast!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

It happened again the other day. Roy had to buy himself a new reading lamp and after he had unpacked and assembled it, he asked that fatal question:

“Where are the lightbulbs? This didn’t come with lightbulbs.”

What he may not know (and should by now) is that his wife doesn’t come with lightbulbs, either. There is never a spare lightbulb in the house, unless it is lying unwrapped in the cupboard and cracked so that it will not light. As I was sneaking around the house, stealing lightbulbs from any available unlit lamp, I reflected on this fact. The idea that I am the keeper of supplies (known in the Army as the Quartermaster) is a little like putting a four-year-old in charge of the aspirin supply. I never know how much of anything we have and the chances that we are out of something is equal to the desperation for which we need it.

My shopping lists are usually very detailed. They give me everything I need when I go to the store. And while I am at the store, the shopping list is laying conveniently on the counter at home. That forces me to shop by what I like to call the “take a stab at it and rely on my ever more failing memory.” This is not a good method.

While things like lightbulbs and stamps and ink pens are neglected in supply at our house, I have at present four boxes of Zesta saltines, five and a half tubes of Crest toothpaste and enough eggs to feed an actual army if they came for breakfast.

I like to make jelly when I can get my hands on enough chokecherries. I know that sometimes lids are in short supply, so the fact that I have a kitchen drawer I can’t shut because of all the lids doesn’t surprise me. What I’m still trying to figure out is why I felt the need to buy four packs of a dozen jelly jars each—given the fact that it has been three years since I made jelly. Now those are at least useful. Having never been taken out of the package, they make an excellent place for me to store all the bottles of Super glue, hot glue and Elmer’s glue that I have drying in the basement. They also are great support for the two dozen glue guns that I keep in stock. You think I’m joking…I wish I was!

I try to make do when I must. I have found that those large Christmas light bulbs, of which I have dozens, fit into most of my lamps, so Roy is lucky that he did not get a red or green light to read by until I was able to re-stock regular lightbulbs. Too many crackers lead to a lot of soup (if I have any in stock) and the eggs can be used in any number of dishes, until I start clucking like a chicken and have to desist.

I can’t even imagine what life would be like for me in the quartermaster’s corps. My father used to describe the work he had to do to keep uniforms and equipment available for the soldiers in his unit when he had to serve on the supply line. He made jokes about the wrong sizes, wrong equipment, etc., but I have to say that had I been in charge, it would probably not have been funny!

Imagine we are in the forests of middle Europe. Guns are blazing, troops are advancing, and I am in charge of supply.

“Sergeant Fauth, we need more bullets!” would come the demand.

“I’m all out of bullets; I’ll have to go to the store. While I’m gone, just fire these tubes of toothpaste at them. Aim for the eyes!”

I would be demoted in a real hurry on that job. And when I couldn’t find any lightbulbs for Roy to put in his new lamp, I was demoted to undependable at my house as well.

I don’t see myself getting any better at this supply thing, so when I finally did get lightbulbs, I only got enough to fill his lamp, with one left over. That one is presently on a shelf in the bathroom…and I’m pretty sure I cracked it when I put it in there!

Jackie Wells-Fauth

Roy’s phone did one of its funny little quirks this week, so he did what we always do when our technology fails: he called one of our IT guys. Now, it should come as no surprise to most people that I gave birth to two of the IT team and they married the other half of the set. And take my word for it, our IT guys are always delighted to hear from us…especially when everything must be done by phone!

The phone issue for Roy was a tough one and he had to use my phone to communicate with our elder daughter to describe what his phone was doing. Since she was at home, alone, with the four-year old computer trainee in the family, it made for an interesting conversation.

“It won’t show me my e-mail, and I like to get that on my phone,” he complained.

“All right, I need you to go into the apps and click on the Google app,” she said, while in the background, the little one was chanting, “Hi, Grandpa; Mommy, I’m saying hi to Grandpa.”

By the time our IT guy had sorted out what was wrong, handled the minor crisis or two that the little one had and convinced her father (customer) that he had to Face time her so she could SEE what was on the phone, I’m fairly certain she was wishing she was an orphan.

Her ultra patient customer service voice was very soothing, but I’m pretty sure that underneath it, she was thinking that she could send us poison through the mail, but then she’d have to explain to her sister why she had done it.

She shouldn’t have worried though. Her sister, another one of the IT support staff in our family, has also dealt with her parents and their issues. “Okay, is the computer plugged in?” You laugh at this question, but half the time, that’s the problem. “Well, now, try turning it off and turning it back on,” is the second step. This always makes me mad. Do they think we can solve a huge problem in technology by just powering down and powering back up…how stupid or naïve do they think we are…oh wait a minute, that worked!

The married half of the IT team has no better luck, although for each of them, the approach is different. Stefanie’s husband, Marty, once confiscated Roy’s phone for an entire afternoon, industriously inputting the locations and directions for the places we intended to visit in Germany. We had all of that set up in our GPS, so it was annoying that Marty tied up the phone the whole afternoon to do what was not necessary. We thought this right up until the GPS, and every other location device we had, failed us in a foreign country and we were hanging on the every word of the directions Marty had put into the phone. We confessed that it was very helpful and he, as any good IT customer service member would, kept his mouth shut and refrained from saying, “I told you so.”

Tracie’s husband, Charles, is the epitome of patience as well. Each time I buy a new laptop, he sets it up for me. He asks questions that I don’t have an answer for and he attempts to set up the programs I need without any help or suggestion from me. He has even, on one rare occasion, locked into my computer from his house and fixed a problem I was having. I am convinced he learned that trick during his computer magic training at Hogwarts. However, I am also convinced that he has mastered the art of mentally facepalming himself every time he asks, “What is your password for your server?” And I answer, “I think it’s something to do with cheese. Try that.”

It’s possible that all four members of our IT team get away from their work on our technology only to bang their head against a convenient wall, but so far, they have not refused our calls or sent us any bills. We will probably never master the fine art of technology, so it’s necessary for us to continue to make use of our IT support team.

The good news is that we have discovered that we have new trainees for IT support, since the two older grandsons are now almost as good as their parents at adjusting our technology. They aren’t quite as patient, however.

“No, Grandma, you didn’t do it right! Didn’t you listen to what I said?”  They will have to work on that if they want to be good IT guys.

Jackie Wells-Fauth

Before I begin, I should give the following disclaimer: I recognize how important medical tests and exams are. There is so much that the medical community can do for us and help us to solve using their potions and pills and machines and tests. That having been said, I feel years of being x-rayed, ultra-sounded, run through the MRI, having endured multiple thyroid biopsies and the ever-enjoyable colonoscopy, I have a right to try and find the humor somewhere.

So as grateful as I am for modern science, I’m here to tell you that the little blue box that allows you to screen for colon cancer “your way” is misrepresenting things and the yearly mammogram for women is really no picnic, either!

I was thinking about the mammogram specifically during my yearly screening this last week. For the men in the reading audience, I realize the word mammogram makes you a little squeamish and that is too bad; maybe this is the week you don’t read this article to the end. For the brave men and the women, however, I believe I have something worth sharing.

The mammogram has always freaked me out. The first one I ever had was the baseline and they did so many views, re-takes and follow-ups that I was pretty much convinced I was just going to die right there. The trauma of that one has stayed with me, so I admit, I drag my feet and try everything to put it off—don’t ask me why; I know it must be done.

When they finally get me dragged in there, it is in some ways even worse, because when it’s over, I have to wait for that phone call. You know the one. “Yes, this is the clinic, and we have the results of your mammogram…” I don’t want those preliminaries. In fact, if they could arrange for a phone ringtone that was like an “All-clear” button, that would put me out of my misery immediately. However, I realize that there is a certain professional protocol, so I just have to be happy if at some point, they say everything’s normal.

All of these feelings were present when I reported for this year’s mammogram. I took my book along as usual, because I have heard that anxiety is handled better if you have something to read while you wait. I have never read a book while waiting for a mammogram that I did not have to re-read later, but it is something to hold in my hands, so I look reasonably calm.

I knew it was going to be different when I didn’t have to wait at all and the technician doing the mammogram led me into her exam room where I discovered calm, soothing lights and party music playing. You can’t get too wound up with a girl who is playing party music in the mammogram room.

A friend told me recently that she is sure that the mammogram machine was concocted by a man, and she is probably right. They don’t look friendly at all. They look like a giant monster with a huge mouth ready to swallow you. Erma Bombeck once said that in order to prepare for a mammogram, a woman should slam her most delicate appendage repeatedly in a refrigerator door. I have never tried that, but I think of it often when I approach those machines.

I particularly hate that you have to stand there in a gown open down the front (every year I put it on backwards first, don’t ask me why) while the technician puts little stickies as markers for any moles, etc. These stickies are meant to cling, and they do. But this technician, as she was liberally putting them on, said, “I just got a new set of stickies. They are great.” Can’t argue with that kind of cheerfulness.

At last, we got to the actual mammogram. This fantastic technician announced, “Now, we are going to do what I like to call the “Mammo Mamba.” When I got done laughing, I discovered that she had a whole set of footsteps on the floor, showing me exactly where to stand and how to approach the mammo monster. Before I knew it, I had concentrated so much on where to put my feet in those dance moves, that the exam was pretty much over. Somehow, she made having the most delicate portions of my body awkwardly squashed, not quite so bad.

When I was ready to leave, she even gave me a prize for being so good. I got a string of gold, plastic beads. It didn’t occur to me until later that this was kind of like Mardi Gras: Women flash themselves and get bead necklaces. It didn’t matter, I was so happy to be done, that I even left the machine without calling it my usual bad names.

So, I got a good report, and I was happy about that. I really enjoyed the attitude and atmosphere set forth by that technician. The question remains: Now that I can do the Mammo Mamba, will these tests be better in the future? Not a chance!