Guess who won?
August 10, 2008
On July 31, 2008, at 0635 hours, I ruined the day of this bass. So… let’s see now, four pounds of lipped bass in left hand, slippery camera in right hand pointed backwards, pinky on shutter button, and bang-o! It looks like neither of us are particularly enjoying the moment. For my part I barked my shin wrestling him into the boat. For his part, he should have known better than to ingest a plastic worm! Maybe both parties are a little tetched in the head.
I had already been on the water since sunrise without seeing any sign of bass, except, of course, for the monsters feeding far out from shore. This one was apparently cruising for a shad breakfast under the branches of a large Weeping Willow at water’s edge between two boat docks, not a common occurrence on a hot July morning.
Dave, getting tired of being accused of forgetting how to catch bass.
Temporarily immortal
August 4, 2008
Thanks to blogger Michael Kruse for pointing me to Into the sunset. It is about the new trend in end-of-life care and raises the question: “The idea that the terminally ill need pain relief and humane care care instead of “curing” is catching on. But what about the people who just grow old?”
In America, the hospice movement was founded in 1974 to deal with the pain relief and humane care of the terminally ill, but what about those who cannot be easily defined as “terminally ill?”
Yet for all its successes, the hospice movement faces challenges that will far outstrip the resources now dedicated to palliative care, even in the richest countries. Hospices are generally associated with cancer, where after a certain stage life expectancy is short and fairly predictable. But the current habit of treating people as “either temporarily immortal, or dying”—as Joanne Lynn, an American geriatrics expert, puts it—makes no sense when patients suffer chronic disease of the heart or lungs, or succumb slowly to dementia, or to general decay. An important category of people, already huge in the rich world and soon to grow in developing countries (see article), consists of elderly people who will never be well, but have no idea when they will die. There is no single answer: hospitals, nursing homes and family care will all play a role.
My mother- and father-in law were elderly folk who would never be well, but had no idea of when they would die. In God’s good time they finally met their end in nursing home beds, and they had good, compassionate care for the most part, but it’s still a hell of a way to die.
To all who are still young enough to shrug off this situation, that’s okay, but it’s becoming more of an attention-grabber for this gent in his 78th year. I was on the local hospital Board of Trustees when the first hospice was formed in my town, so I already have a healthy appreciation for the “live-and-let-die” convictions of hospice leaders. For those not familiar with hospices I commend this article.
Dave, not fearing death but a tad uneasy about the process.
A walk at the lake
July 30, 2008
The roads winding to and from and around the Lake of the Ozarks are just the thing for chronic walkers. One thing I have noticed this summer is how extra-lush the shrubbery and foliage is after a very wet spring and early summer. I took my camera on a recent afternoon walk, and here are a few images.
A walk’s gotta have a starting point, and here I am gazing down on my launch pad from the second level balcony outside our condo apartment. 
This day it was a typical mid-summer day with the temperature in the low nineties and high humidity. I try to temper the discomfort with thoughts of the winter walks to come. I much prefer the heat.
I barely got started up the hill from Monarch Cove when I paused to admire some blooms that don’t seem to mind the Ozark summer heat. 
The next diversion was the used golf ball stand at Greenleaf Trace next door. If I don’t quit gawking and start walking, I’ll never get this walk done! On down the road I tried to catch the dark-greenness of the Oak forest lining my route.
Here is a young family’s house along the route. I hope their little imps appreciate the neat and colorful backyard play area.
Madison Park lesson #1
July 5, 2008
There may be no ‘lesson #2,’ but you never know. The lesson begins with what some of you already know, having read the following sign along Maine Street.
But here is one you may not have seen, being fairly recent. It is also along Maine where the diagonal brick path cuts across a corner of the park.
And here are a few more leaves for your collection, Linda. May they last as long as your first batch. You can ask your All Knowing Brother (AKB) why some leaves have jaggies and others on the same twig do not.
Here is an old tree that is winning the battle of the sidewalk. Some years ago they paved a short stretch just East of Maine with new bricks, but it didn’t reach to this old guy.
You should be able to tell me what kind of tree this is. In another year or two, many of these old, numbered trees may not be around.
But someone has rallied the community to “rebuild the canopy,” as you can see here. There are thirty newbies lining 24th Street along the West edge of Madison Park, each with a green bow. A watering truck cruises along to give them a drink once a week, although they certainly haven’t gotten very thirsty this year. The ones still around a year from now should have a good chance of surviving, but why did they plant them all in rows, for all love?
Thus endeth Madison Park lesson #1.
Dave, which he could use a new shot of life hisself.
Summer walk ‘08
July 4, 2008
A wet spring and early summer has resulted in a lush canopy of green over the sidewalks along my walking route. The foliage seems lusher and the shade deeper this summer. Here is a potpourri of images taken on recent walks.
The bell tower at the Church of St. Peter is displayed here against a backdrop of cumulus clouds. I have always had difficulty in photographing clouds, and these particular clouds weren’t very cooperative, but I like the looks of the tower with its cross.
Summer evening concerts by the concert band are always well-attended as families walk into Madison Park carrying their coolers and lawn chairs for an hour or so of easy listening. A special mobile stage with an acoustical shell gets hauled to the park du jour the evening before, and, as you can see here, if you play it they will come. The concert always begins with The Star Spangled Banner and usually ends with a patriotic march. When I was in High School I played for a summer or two in a community concert band, and I can still hum right along with most of the tunes. My guess is that in this day of opportunities to hear professionally produced music, the number of community concert bands may be dwindling as belonging to an earlier, slower-paced age. I wonder?
One of these days I will bone up on the history of Madison Park. According to the sign it dates back to the post bellum era when, I believe, the town of Quincy was beginning its push away from the river and to the East. I doubt that many of the large old trees in the park go back that far. Many of the trees have little numbered plaques on them, and several generations of school kids have been turned loose in the park to gather leaf samples and correctly identify the trees.
Some of the huge old trees lining York Street show their character in their gnarled trunks. I wonder what stories this old tree could tell. I would like to hear the one about the lightning bolt. Although you can’t tell it from the looks of his (her?) trunk, it’s otherwise a healthy tree and can always be counted on for a display of color in the fall.
There are several mature Pin Oaks along my route. Here is one of the tallest, dwarfing the house alongside. There were a pair of them, but a storm a few years ago toppled one of them and badly damaged a couple of nearby roofs.
Much of my walk is under a canopy of greenery, with trees on both sides of the street touching in the middle.
Here are a couple of large houses that seem well matched with the mature trees. I can’t help but wonder what this neighborhood will look like in 20 years as the old trees, one by one, die and are removed. It’s good to see an effort made to replace them with young trees, but the neighborhood will never be the same.
The inventive old couple who live in this house have for years kept this combination of flower pots and bird houses, and each spring it sports a new combination of color. On cooler summer days they sit on their porch and I never fail to give them a wave.
Some of the streets along my route have street markers imbedded in the concrete sidewalk at the crossings. Here is one that has survived at least one re-paving of the sidewalk.
And back to the home neighborhood again.
Dave, walking fool.
Lake dreams
June 29, 2008
In the early eighties, when we time-shared a lake front condo near the Lodge of the Four Seasons at about the 13-mile marker, I would hop in the car early in the morning and drive a mile to the Four Seasons Village City Hall to start my morning jog. I would cover my 4 miles at a brisk ten minute mile pace. As I jogged along Cherokee Drive I dreamed of moving to the lake full time and living in a small, waterfront home with a dish on the roof for telecommuting to my office at Quintron Corporation, a company I helped found in 1969 and was sure that I would manage until I decided to retire. My dream home would look something like this.
Fast forward twenty years.
My daily walk at a not-so-brisk twenty minute mile pace now covers two miles on a good day. Its starting point is a 3rd level condo apartment in an obscene high rise on a raped hillside overlooking Sandpiper Cove at about the 2-mile marker.
What happened?
Well, such matters as an elevator to lake level and easier maintenance somehow bubbled up to the top of our priority list. So when decision time came, we signed for the condo with a wistful last thought of what-might-have-been and didn’t look back.
It was a wise decision. I have my bass boat cradled on its lift below our condo, only a few minutes from first cast. Marilyn has a lake view and her binoculars to keep track of the Blue Herons. Provisions come up in the convenient elevator. We have become comfortable with the wimpy life.
Dave, almost believing what he just said.
Three Men in a Boat
May 31, 2008
With apologies to Jerome K. Jerome for cribbing his title (by the way, if you haven’t read this funny little book, you should) , three septuagenarian Ayers brothers met at Monarch Cove, Lake of the Ozarks, for four days of relaxation, conversation, and fishing, in order of importance.
Gathered here on the deck of Dave and Marilyn’s condo, the reminiscences flowed, some of them accurate, all of them fun to recount without being immediately subject to marital correction. I suspect that our close neighbors on the deck opposite may have learned more than they really wanted to know about us.
In the event that his two older brothers started getting boring or overbearing, Tom brought along his painting kit. Whether from boredom or not, he painted the view to the East from our deck. I hope 1) that he decides to color the water green instead of the present muddy brown and 2) finishes it and gives it to us for framing.
The plan for assaulting our piscatorial adversaries included fishing the sunken beds around the dock for Crappie, drifting for Crappie from a rented pontoon boat, casting for bass from Dave’s bass boat. I very reluctantly report that except for a handful of Crappie caught due to Tom’s relentless and untiring effort (he’s younger than we are after all), the plan failed. But we did catch a few, some of which posed for their portrait.
Since Tom has only two hands, brother Don offered to display the runt of the catch.
Tom the younger simply never gave up, leaving his older siblings gasping for breath. Our Uncle Bus used to tell us that if we wanted to sink a basket, we probably should try to get the ball at least as high as the rim. Likewise, it’s hard to catch fish if our lure is not in the water. I might note here that, in spite of a friend’s insistence that you have to use minnows to catch Crappie, we were using little 1/16-Oz tube jigs below small bobbers. So there! I must admit, however, that our catch might have been better using minnows - live ones rather than the fragrant dead ones left in the boat after said friend’s last trip out.
Fishing tactic number two was to fish in the creature comfort of a 21-ft rented pontoon boat. Comfort it gave us; fish it did not, but not for a lack of trying. I remember days in my fishing past catching gobs of Crappie by letting the wind drift our bobbers over their hidey-holes. I’m morally certain that they got drifted over time and again, but this time they were not hungry. I blame it on sex. They were just off their spawn and were undoubtedly resting up.
We returned the pontoon boat and fired up the trusty, 14-year-old Ranger bass boat, which complained a bit trying to get “out of the hole” with three-abreast fishermen weighing it down, but up on plane it got and we went skimming across the lake to a pleasant little North Shore cove near historic Wilmore Lodge. Conditions were perfect and expectations were high. Little wind, temperature in the seventies. I guess that the bass were even more comfortable, because we got no bites in spite of expert technique and limitless patience.
Don’t we look professional and confident?
I’ll close this little photo essay with an image that personifies our fishing and conversational demeanor: calm and casual. Which is how it should be when three brothers gather to enjoy each other’s company, engage in tale-swapping, and try to eat each other under the table. Life is short, and opportunities like our pre-Memorial Day reunion are too rare. We figure that in a year or so we may try it again, if the Lord continues to bless and the creek doesn’t rise.
Dave, grateful for my bros; they’re the greatest!
Dogwood color
May 14, 2008
Springtime in Quincy, Illinois is often a riot of color. Her at 40 degrees North latitude, just about every flowering tree, plant, or shrub thrives. The color this spring was outstanding, and we had no late frosts or bad storms to rain on the parade of color. So did I get out and take lots of pics? No I did not. But I did make a few images of some Dogwoods in a park nearby that I will share with you.
Here a pink and a white Dogwood were just beginning to bloom, on April 26, with just a soft haze of color. But the best was yet to come.
Same trees on May 9, about 2 weeks later. The most brilliant display is usually when the flowers (they are really leaves, I am told) are fully developed and the green leaves are popping out. The whites are usually a solid mass of brilliant white, and it is a rare block in Quincy that doesn’t have a few of these eye-poppers.
Pink Dogwood blooms. There is also such a thing as a “Red Dogwood,” and we see a few of them around town. Their color is a deeper pink, and they rival the whites as attention-getters.
It’s another week later at this writing. The color, especially the whites have survived a couple of thunderstorms in pretty good shape, but one of these days a good blow will strip the petals off the trees to let us know that summertime is not far away.
Dave, slacker photographer
My blogger grand-daughter
May 5, 2008
This is a shameless plug for grand-daughter Andrea Cooley’s blog, creative overflow. Andrea is an Associate Editor for a Des Moines publisher, and has a lot of creative juices flowing in her veins.
Her latest post is the reaction of Andrea and husband Adam to the profusion of spring color. They wonder if this was partly a reaction to a long winter with its shades of gray. (You left-coasters wouldn’t know about that.)
All of which reminds me that I have a few images of a recent spring walk in Quincy yet to post. I’ll do it Real Soon Now.
Dave, full of pride and good intentions.
Resolutions
April 10, 2008
I’m not much on making resolutions, probably because my track record on keeping them is pretty spotty. An 18th Century theologian named Jonathan Edwards, yes that one (Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God), had a go at it on August 17, 1723, and couldn’t stop until he listed 70 resolutions that he vowed to review once a week.
My blogging friend Toby Brown suggests that some of these resolutions would be quite appropriate for bloggers of all stripes.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
What Jonathan Edwards might say to those who blog
In my devotional reading I ran across these selected resolutions of the young Jonathan Edwards. I think they have much to teach those of us who live in the digital age:
8. Resolved, to act, in all respects, both speaking and doing, as if nobody had been so vile as I, and as if I had committed the same sins, or had the same infirmities or failings as others; and that I will let the knowledge of their failings promote nothing but shame in myself, and prove only an occasion of my confessing my own sins and misery to God.
12. Resolved, if I take delight in it as a gratification of pride, or vanity, or on any such account, immediately to throw it by.
15. Resolved, never to suffer the least motions of anger towards irrational beings.
21. Resolved, never to do any thing, which if I should see in another, I should count a just occasion to despise him for, or to think any way the more meanly of him.
(Resolutions 1 through 21 written in one setting in New Haven in 1722)
All bloggers will take these resolutions to heart when pigs fly, says I, but that doesn’t mean that I should not take them to heart. And not only while blogging.
Dave, who tends to be a tad cynical about some things.
