Posted on by rjonakait · 1 Comment

Snippets

My main exposure to farming in Maine came from my friend and colleague Don. His grandfather had a farm near the New Brunswick border, and Don spent part of his high school summers helping out there. The grandfather seemed to be the last of the New England Yankees. He heated his house with wood, and without power tools he cut and split cords upon cords to be ready for the winter. The grandfather may have grown several crops, but Don only talked about the potatoes and the hard work of tilling the soil, burying the seed potatoes, and then later pulling them out. Unpredictable rainfall made the onerous work even harder some years. Don, who had sensitive skin, did not have to worry about the dangerous sun when he was out in the field. He said that the notorious Maine black flies were so bad that he would only go out in full beekeeper’s regalia, which kept the flies from biting but made the hot work even hotter. When Don told me about these summers, he made clear how miserable he had been.

I thought again about Maine farm work when reading The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters for a book group at my residence. The book’s core is a group of Mi’kmaq people who came from Nova Scotia to pick blueberries in Maine. Haad I even been aware that a lot of blueberries are grown in Maine, I had never thought about how they were harvested. My images of migrant workers are people from south of border cutting lettuce or plucking strawberries, not people from the north harvesting fruit in New England. But now those images include those Canadians, and I wonder about other crops. Who harvests cherries in Michigan or wild rice in Minnesota?

The No Kings protest I attended was peaceful, like the others, but small. It was in suburban New York City. A few hundred people lined an intersection waving signs. (The one I saw most often: “No Faux King Way.”) I wore my tee shirt with the faded lettering: “Trump: His Mother Did Not Have Him Tested.” Maybe one or two people understood it. (N.B.: you have to be a fan of “The Big Bang Theory” TV show.) Perhaps I was hoping to be energized, and perhaps that would have happened if I had attended a truly mass rally of thousands like the ones elsewhere in the country. But mostly I was bored and wondered why I was there.

Nevertheless:

“For as in absolute governments the king is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other.” Thomas Paine.

“The links in the chains of tyranny are usually forged, singly and silently, and sometimes unconsciously, by those who are destined to wear them.” Tully Scott.

“A king can stand people’s fighting but he can’t last long if people start thinking.” Will Rogers.

“Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.” Thomas Jefferson.

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” James Madison.

Posted on by rjonakait

The Planted Face

“Everything is funny as long as it is happening to someone else.” Will Rogers.

My ball was thirty yards from the cup, but it had a steep uphill, sidehill lie. I hit my pitch—not surprisingly for me, not very well. I turned to return to the golf cart five yards away, but my foot caught the uphill grass. I knew instantly that I was about to plant my face on the downhill turf without being able to break the fall.

Tony, my playing partner, came over to assist me, but I got up more easily than I expected. I took stock. My nose was not broken. Blood was not gushing from the nostrils, as I had expected. I apparently had landed on the bottom of my forehead, not the middle of my face. My glasses had slightly gouged the space between my eyebrows and pushed hard into my cheeks right below my eyes. No blood poured off me but seeped from the gouged place and from a cut on my lip, but overall, I did not feel terrible. No major aches and pains. We continued on with our nine holes with me dabbing at the oozing blood with a golf towel that by happenstance had been freshly laundered.

I bailed on my usual lunch with Tony after golf and headed home. The spouse looked up from her reading as I stepped on the porch, and after explanations, she swung into nursing mode. Band-Aids, gauze, and adhesive tape were applied. She went to CVS to get more supplies, and I got additional medical attention. I looked in the mirror and so much had been applied to my face, I looked like Hannibal Lecter. Eventually, the seeping blood stopped.

The next day I carefully removed the dressings and decided not all had to be reapplied. I went to the mirror to assess. No pretty boy looks were in attendance. I had that gouge between the eyebrows. My nose was discolored and even more bulbous than usual, as if I had lifted it from W.C. Fields. I had a cut lip and a black and blue mark bruise on my chin. Most noticeable, however, were two black eyes with a significant mouse below the left one as if I had been hit with a heavyweight hook in the second round. There was no way to hide my racoon face except with a ski mask, which was not seasonally appropriate.

People were going to ask what happened. When that first happened, I said, “Don’t ask, but you should see her.” Then I tried, “The Pennsylvania barmaids are really fierce.” And then, “Next time I will give Tony the three-and-a-half-foot putt.” (I am convinced that three-and-a-half is funnier than three-foot or four-foot, but I don’t know why.) However, I am on blood thinners, and I will have the discolorations for a long time. I will be needing some more snappy come-backs.