Testing, Testing 1-2-3

My six-week view - with nail polish graphically added by friend Marty Harris….

I always suspected I wouldn’t be the easiest of wives to live with. Since it’s nearly impossible to avoid acquiring the characteristics of one’s mother, and I come from a long line of women with perfectionist tendencies, it was clear that my control freak behaviors could be challenging.

Regardless, we have somehow completed 39 years of marriage and were preparing to celebrate success with dinner out at one of the few places that took reservations on an outdoor patio. Exciting that is, until I slipped on a well-traversed step on our staircase, and landed in a bundle on the aptly named landing with a weirdly angled ankle and a head whacked on a windowsill.

Turns out my head was harder than my leg bone, and after two days of thinking it was just a sprain, we went to an overwhelmed ER where it was confirmed – I had fractured my fibula and was told to only walk on it when necessary.  “Walking” in this case involved lurching unevenly with a neighbor’s old crutches, leg strapped into a Franken-Boot contraption with its hard plastic shell Velcro-ed into position.

This is an unnecessary test to a marriage that was just about to slide into its 40th year.

There are some tests one can predict.

 There are lists of life stressors and I’m pretty sure we’ve experienced most of them. We’ve moved seven times, lived in four states, raised two children, and balanced the preferences of a strong introvert with the tendencies of a raging extrovert.

And only one of us recognizes that there is a right way to set a dining table. A proper way to load a dishwasher. And only one way toilet paper should roll.

And now, one of us was forced into sedentariness in a four-story house, with bedrooms and office on the second floor and all food and engagement with the world on the first. The first pain-filled week is a fog of ibuprofen and Tylenol and awkward hobbling.

After that, I was a tad more demanding. My morning coffee? I requested my collagen peptides be added to the first cup; just a tablespoon or so of cream, please; and oh, the toast? Not just any old spread.

I am equally demanding with my requested supply of water. It needs ice, and constant refills to sustain my preferred state of hydration. Oh – and my Zoom happy hours didn’t stop, so Jacques had to learn which bottles of wine to open, and how to mix martinis and Rusty Nails.

I quickly learned that regular requests to “Just text me!” with any needs were less helpful when his phone was in the same room as I. After consultation with the kids, I did resist however the temptation to get a little bell to ring for service. Seemed a tad excessive.

The good news is that we seem to have weathered this test – so far. Only once or twice throughout this six-week experience has Jacques gone on a simple errand that somehow required many hours away. And when he returned, he looked so refreshed and relaxed that I avoided asking where he went – and just smiled, while handing him my water glass – again.

Time in These Times

The Astronomical Clock in Prague captures my current sense of time…

I’m struggling with time. The concept of time, the experience of the passage of time, remembering the time of day, remembering which Blursday it is – all those links with time have become a struggle.

We’ve come to the end of another really long yet curiously rapid week and I find myself wondering if I’m the only person who is experiencing time in a very different dimension at this point, a little over a year in to our constricted life of COVID.

Intellectually I know that May has just begun. If the weather isn’t clear on that, then my multiple calendars help keep me on track there. But if you ask me when it was that we all got together for that thing at the place we so enjoyed, well, anyone’s guess is better than mine.

It could have been in 2019 just before That Year. Or you could be referring to something that happened in the 1990s. Somehow That Year of 2020 has wiped out all perspective when it comes to time. Side note: I began writing this the first week of March, and that just goes to show how time is getting away from me.

I have scribbles on my calendar that note some of the calls and zooms and even an outing to a grocery store that have occurred. But without ink on paper staring me in the face, I wouldn’t be able to tell you whether those events happened yesterday, today, or a year or two ago. 

What is happening to my planful self? I think I remember having a stronger grasp over time. Knowing what was supposed to happen this week and next. Knowing when it was time to schedule the dentist or a doctor’s appointment. Remembering that I hadn’t had a shower for more than a day or two. All of these actions require a grasp of time. And I think I’ve lost it.

If you know me well – or at all, I suppose – you know I’m a raging extrovert. I get my strength, my energy, from gathering with friends and colleagues for conversation and laughter. One of my favorite activities is gathering close friends plus a few new acquaintances around the full length of our extended table for a long, languishing meal punctuated with stories and jokes.

It may be that my unmet need to plug in to the energy of friends has warped my sense of time. Or it may be that time truly has warped so that these days that feel like weeks and weeks that pass as quickly as a day are part of our new normal as we become new versions of our selves.

I’ve had the opportunity for a few chats with psychiatrists in the past several weeks as part of my work at the University. There has been some media interest in how we will adapt to the world as it begins to lurch open, slowly and carefully. These psychiatry professors are professionals who have built their careers around seeking to understand the science behind our emotional and behavioral selves. And they are finding that this COVID situation is presenting whole new fields of study around the supports we’ll all need to re-establish a sense of equilibrium moving forward.

While the scientists and physicians pursue their research into what it will take to give us back our balance, I’ll continue to struggle along. Between setting timers on my watch, alarms on my phone, dings and buzzes on my computer, not to mention color markers denoting “Things to Do” on my desk top calendar, I am well-equipped to continue moving forward in pursuit of deadlines and appointments.

And maybe – just maybe – this loss of the perspective on time is less related to Our Year of Pandemic than it is to our having achieved the age of Medicare. And maybe – just maybe – as each year of life becomes a shorter percentage of all that occurred before, I’ll need to focus those color markers on a wall sized timeline to track Big Events and Doings so I don’t have to guess when we traveled with Those Friends to That Place we so enjoyed.

Words Matter

U.S. Constitution Word Cloud Map, by Romero Gomez

When we were kids on the playground at Woodland School, in the midst of raging games of four square and tetherball, we would reply to the taunts of playground bullies with a sing-song rhyme, “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never harm me.”

I’ve been thinking of that saying over the past week or so, realizing the fallacy of that idea. Words can have – and have had – a powerful impact on our civic life in this nation, painting images of threats, real and imagined, designed to influence action and genuine harm.

A note of disclaimer here. I’ve made a living and a life based on the use of words to share news of our times as a journalist in DC, on behalf of corporate and government leaders as a public relations practitioner, and for the last twenty years or so in university and academic medical center settings on behalf of science.

I’m very familiar with the power of repetition and redundancy, with the power of words to influence opinions and ideas. Repeat an idea over and over with resonance and power, and it will be shared broad and wide as fact. Even if it’s not.

That’s why I’ve maintained a sense of care and awe when using words. Initially, it was based on the oversight of corporate attorneys at the networks who wanted to ensure our reporting didn’t lead to a lawsuit. “Do you have the facts? Have you confirmed with more than one source? Are you ready to stake your reputation on this story?” This was before the Federal Communications Commission had eliminated the Fairness Doctrine – yes, I am that old – and network attorneys worked hard to uphold its standards and concepts.

In the past few weeks, we’ve heard and watched what happens after years of using words to attack and vilify those we don’t agree with. We hear our political leaders weaponize language against those in the other political party. And that violates the core of a civilized society. Any time someone begins a sentence with “All…” be prepared to be skeptical. All Democrats don’t agree on anything. And last week, we watched brave action by some Republicans – so All Republicans aren’t any one thing either.

I’ve lived long enough to have grown up, received an education, married, raised children, and enjoyed a career during the service of twelve U.S. Presidents. Seven have been Republicans, and five have been Democrats, with one more elected this past November. A little addition shows I’ve lived 38 years with Republican Presidencies and nearly 28 with Democrats in that role.

We can argue policy directions, the impact of regulations, whether the Income Tax initially passed by Republicans, or the Social Security and Medicare acts initially proposed by Democrats were wise. We can also disagree on whether public lands and national parks should remain development free forever, or on the wisdom of large infrastructure projects. This is what democracy is designed to do.

It is the words embodied in the core tenet of our constitutional democracy that established a country based on the rule of law – and the concept of justice – that deserve our close attention now.

These are the powerful words we need to hold tight – (as originally written) –

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

These words, misspellings and all, were written nearly 235 years ago and resonate with the promises they seek for our nation. And as I listen to the soaring rhetoric delivered powerfully by Martin Luther King, Jr. just half a century ago, I once again recognize that words can inspire and unite to greater purpose.

Choose your words wisely, my friends.

Today...

from the Minneapolis Star Tribune

I write when I’m happy or moved. I write from my experience of life. And today, I write from a place of horror, sadness, and strong resolve. 

I never thought I would see gangs of thugs, incited by the President of the United States, break into the U.S. Capitol to ransack and destroy the very building and institution established to represent our increasingly fragile democracy. And yet that’s what is happening right now.  

Yes, the British tried to destroy the Capitol building in 1814 – yet here we sit in our homes across the country in the 21st Century, in the midst of a pandemic, with easy access to instant visuals of lawlessness by our own citizens reacting to a call to action – from the President of the United States. 

Pause a minute here.

I’ve written before about my staunch standing in the moderate middle. And I have friends from across the range of political partisanship…all people I care about deeply.  

But today? Today we’ve seen what can happen when we truly cease to think for ourselves.

There are those who may not like the outcome, but Joe Biden won the Presidential election. The 2020 election had more oversight, more reviews, more recounts, more legal challenges, more safeguards in place to ensure people could exercise their constitutional right than we’ve seen or experienced before.

I was a poll observer on election day, and I watched people show their IDs, register on site (as is legally permissible in Minnesota), and swear a legally binding oath before exercising that right. All legal challenges have been knocked down – by both Republican appointed and Democrat appointed judges. All Secretaries of State – both Republican and Democrat – have certified their state’s results.

And only one man – who has worked to promote absurd lies – has refused to agree with the outcome. Unfortunately, this man has promoted those lies as well as promoting violence – and today we witnessed the result.

Let’s pause again here. Take a deep breath, and realize this is not who we are. Not who we are as a people. Shirtless white men in head gear rampaging through the halls of Congress? To what end?

Today is a stark reminder of the privilege white Americans still enjoy. Imagine for a minute the different militarized response if the hordes moving onto the Capitol grounds had been black or brown.

Today is also a day to hug your family, and prepare for the hard work we all have ahead in rebuilding the fragile democracy of our fractured nation.

Public Health Prophet

Mike Osterholm, PhD, MPH by Stuart Isett for Fortune Brainstorm Health

Like many of you, I’ve spent the past week or so reflecting on how our world shifted this year, and what that may predict about our future. 

Unlike many of you, I have known epidemiologist Mike Osterholm, PhD, MPH for nearly 20 years, so I should have been more prepared for all that unfolded this year.

Mike Osterholm returned to the University of Minnesota to start his latest gig at the beginning of September, 2001. It was before the world shifted and our perspective of risk shattered eleven days later.  

When he arrived, he brought with him his reputation as a solid public health professional with just a bit of flair for the dramatic. Even twenty years ago, he predicted a coming flu pandemic that would change our way of life with the ominous line, “I’m not here to scare you out of your wits, but into your wits.”

His office was just down the hall from our public affairs team and we were quite aware that his presence would require our attention and care. Among the first tasks was helping him nail down the name of his new center. He needed a logo and a website, and oh so many other ideas bubbled forth. 

And then planes hit buildings and everything changed.

We all remember what we were doing the morning of the 11th of September. My sharpest memory was Mike in our offices with three pagers going off, monitoring unbelievable media images as they played out on screen.  

He was hearing reports that the Mall of America would be next as a symbol of our materialism.  

Then it was the IDS tower as the tallest building between Chicago and the West Coast.

And then I asked him to move into my office so that his predictions would stop causing more stress for those in his earshot.

That was my first exposure to Mike Osterholm’s remarkable ability to project the possible, if not always the probable. The paperback version of his first New York Times bestseller, Living Terrors: What America Needs to Know to Survive the Coming Bioterrorist Catastrophe, came out in September, 2001 and provided a horrifying laundry list of other ways to disrupt life as we know it.

So, the anthrax mailings that quickly followed 9/11 made perfect sense. Mike was convinced he was a target when a package arrived in a University mailroom leaking a dusty, powdery substance from its brown paper wrapping addressed to him.

We called a hazard squad to come figure out what was in the package. Their arrival, with sirens blaring and personnel in full hazmat suit attire, attracted media interest which was slightly embarrassing when the package turned out to be a batch of cookies that had crumbled in the mail.

Mike has always had a fertile imagination for what could possibly happen when it involves catastrophe and its public health consequences. He’s brilliant that way – taking the possible into the realm of probable human outcomes. And then you realize that of course it all makes sense.

As the state’s epidemiologist, his dogged approach and ability to imagine the possible quickly tracked down the source of foodborne outbreaks, as well as the connection between tampons and toxic shock syndrome. 

As his Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy gained well-earned attention, Mike was frequently invited to speak on the range of public health topics that have emerged in the past twenty years. We learned early on that it was best to have Mike do a presentation following the lunch or dinner hour as he was fond of speaking on food safety issues, frequently noting that lettuce is “nature’s toilet paper.”

His writing and his books are always provocative. So, I wasn’t surprised at all when his next best seller arrived in 2017 and read like a compelling screenplay.  Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs predicts the impact of a highly contagious coronavirus with a degree of accuracy that foretells our next year or so.

It’s not easy being a prophet. During the twenty or so years I’ve known him well, his frightening predictions earned him the moniker of Dr. Doom, as he told us exactly what a viral pandemic could do to our way of life.

He was right and we need more people like him who aren’t afraid to speak their science, based on research, facts, and yes, critical imagination.

Pushing the Holidays

Summer of 1960-something - an Alleshouse family picnic.

This is the season of in gathering – inviting in the people and family we love for gathering around tables to laugh, share, and remember the year(s) past.

This year, none of us truly are interested in remembering this past year and there will be no gathering of family and friends. In fact, the most in gathering we have done involved bringing in the porch cushions and patio furniture to protect it from the weather.

It’s funny – last year, when we did that task, I distinctly remember feeling sad that we hadn’t used our outdoor furniture much at all. We had seven weddings – and a funeral – plus a few spectacular road trips that kept us away most of the warm outdoor season. It was sad to say goodbye for another winter to outdoor furniture that had not lived up to its promise of outdoor fun.

Not true for 2020. This year, of course, was the summer of hanging out at Porcho Myarda – on our porch and in my yard. It’s how we gathered and saw faces of those we loved – at a distance - but the laughter was sweet even then.

And now, here we are barreling into the holidays. Indoors. No gatherings.

So I have a proposal – I say we push out the holidays to next summer. Let’s wait for 6 months and have a Thanksgiving gathering over Memorial Day weekend. And if we hold off on gathering indoors, then there will be fewer people for us to memorialize that weekend.

As much as my childhood family loved gathering at Grandpa’s farm with our relatives over Thanksgiving, we also enjoyed seeing the cousins no matter when we gathered. The photo above is from the early 1960s in our Townview Circle side yard with our Alleshouse cousins.

And, a side note? Although nearly all of the older generation in this photo are gone, Aunt Marge is still with us at 103 and is as fun and interesting as ever. For that, I’m very grateful.

Is This Retrograde?

It’s 4:30 in the afternoon and I have been so sedentary that my watch stopped telling me to Stand Up. It now just says “Give Up!”

I tried today. I really did.

It’s been that kind of week though, hasn’t it?

As if 2020 isn’t challenging enough, Mother Nature decided we Minnesotans have had just enough of seeing friends outdoors for the year. She dumped a bunch of snow on us and then followed that up with ridiculously cold air to freeze the white stuff solid on top of the leaves that are still falling.

My friends from California say it has something to do with the planet Mercury being in retrograde. Sigh.

So here I sit - In the midst of this funk - wondering what Sue Wink would do with this sense of ennui. And wondering how much she would laugh at the idea of retrograde planets affecting life on this Earth.

I’m not really certain Sue was ever lazy like this. She was constantly moving – a font of energy that inspired action all around her. She used to quote her mother’s credo – “Get up early. Dress for the day with pizzazz. Make the day count. And always work to stay thin.”

And she did all of those things – inspiring others as she went. Oh, how I miss her now. 

Sue was my Other Mother when I was growing up, presiding over the house I ran to when my parents were being, well, annoyingly parents.  After my mom died when I was 22, she remained a touchpoint to my childhood until she died somewhat abruptly a month ago.   

If I’m being honest, I didn’t think Sue would stay around too long after Dick Wink left. They were a couple for more than 65 years until Dick died last summer, following a series of unfortunate events that left him unable to fight off an infection. They were a power couple in the musical life of my hometown. And to me, they were a haven of home every time we returned to Mansfield.

Sue surprised all of us by rallying and thriving in her newly single role. She saw friends, engaged with family, danced at her granddaughter’s wedding, and re-engaged with her art, garden, and church groups.

Dick and Sue Wink, laughing as usual…

And then COVID hit. I know the solitude – without Dick – was so hard for her. She just hated the shutdown of life that happened in the Spring. And her girls were very diligent with all of the virus precautions to ensure they didn’t infect Sue. When the weather warmed up, they did arrange for happy hours on the patio – spending time in the safer air outdoors.

Turns out the virus wasn’t the issue. Her daughter Dayna took Sue for a haircut where her longtime stylist noticed Sue had a yellow pallor. A number of doctors and tests later told Sue that advanced pancreatic cancer provided a deadline for making her days count.

And count they did. Her daughters, her grandchildren, and even great grandchildren along with in-laws, and friends filled her time. We made it to Ohio in time for a wonderful visit – time to thank her for providing a haven to this neighbor child. And time for a final COVID-violating hug.

It appears this exhausting anxiety-filled planetary retrograde, along with the freeze in Minnesota, will lift the first week of November.  Maybe then I can get up early and dress with pizzazz to make the day count. Working to stay thin will be a stretch…

Playing with Feelings...

Remember “Lassie, Come Home”?

I didn’t watch much television when I was a little girl. Mom kept us busy with lots of activities, so kicking back to watch a show just wasn’t a thing. Besides, we only had a black and white TV long after many of our friends had moved into the world of color. But then, you don’t know what you’re missing if you’ve never had it.

There was one show that I would seek out in those rare moments of inactivity – Lassie, the program about the adventures of a beautiful, smart collie dog and his accident-prone boy, Timmy. The lack of a color palette had no impact on my ability to get sucked in to a good story line and Lassie had it all. There was a mom in the kitchen perpetually preparing a meal, a dad busily at work on the farm, which left Timmy free to go explore the wide world around him. Inevitably, Timmy would encounter some form of danger and then it was Lassie to the rescue.

As with many shows in the 1960s, one never had to guess when peril was coming. The musical score provided a foreshadowing undercurrent, with an ominous score predicting hazards for Timmy.

Apparently, my mother’s ears also were attuned to the meaning of ominous music coming from the television. Inevitably, just as I was holding my breath, wide-eyed in front of the set as Lassie ran to the farmhouse once more barking his alarm of danger for Timmy, in would swoop my mom to snap off the TV with a brisk, “That’s enough of that, now.”

“Mahhhmmmmm! Whyyyyy?” was my usual wail.  

“That show gets you all upset. It totally riles up your feelings,” was her highly unsatisfactory response. And that was followed by a quick distracting pivot to ask for help in setting the table.

I was remembering this somewhat annoying habit of my mother’s the other day as I feeling those riled up feelings of being upset.

This time it had nothing to do with a TV show like Lassie. It was the result of a series of social media posts by old friends. A majority were re-posts of content from other sources designed to distort, to amplify, obscure, and manipulate how we relate to current events.

At this point in my journey of life, I’m well aware of the way certain words and images can impact what we feel and understand. I’ve built a career out of carefully using the words and images that help my employers and clients promote stronger reputations.  

Sometimes the difference is nuanced – like emphasizing leading edge medical research rather than cutting edge medical research. Most people (patients or customers) prefer being on the leading edge when it’s medicine that can cure, rather than the harsher cutting edge that feels surgical. So those are the words we use when promoting positive breakthroughs. 

That’s the upside of my work.

But it’s the downside that concerns me now.

There are far too many online publishers in the business of promoting extreme and manipulative content designed to anger and upset us. There is an entire industry of content producers whose sole goal is making us angry.

Some of the worst of these publishers produce content that promotes both the far left and the far right, inspiring hatred and vitriol on both ends of the fractured spectrum - with the ultimate goal of gathering IP addresses that can be sold for big profit to partisan organizations. These publishers are not promoting a “one true way of life” for liberals or conservatives. It’s all about personal profit at the expense of our society.

That’s what really riles up my feelings, as Mom used to say - recognizing the tools being used by manipulative sources to inspire hatred, fear, anger, and a shattering of our better selves.