Sluice and Pan = Pay Dirt

If you’ve ever panned for gold you might know the thrill of seeing a rim of sparkling yellow light called “color” show up. Much more when a genuine nugget appears. Now I’m not talking about one of those recreation park concessions. I mean out in the wild along some river or creek. 

I know something about this because my husband, Wally, and I owned a 60 acre ranch in Southern Oregon for eight years and it was rumored that along our half-mile of riverfront people had found gold nuggets. If that was true, what might a real mining project unearth? After our years of farm life, before we left to go north for an easier life-style, we decided to investigate. 

“I’d hate to think we might be leaving a gold mine.” Wally said. So, he went about securing a permit, felling a few of our many large trees to pay for the project, renting a tractor-shovel to dig out a pond for the sluice trough so as not to contaminate the river, and hiring one son and a son-in-law who both were out of work at the time to contribute labor. I took on the job of camp cook, hauling meals and lunches in a wheel barrow down to the river-side spot where the men were glad to stop, eat and rest. 

The operation was scary and fun, but the best part was panning for gold. We’d take the final and heaviest dirt from the bottom of the sluice box into a pan. By dipping it into the river and sloshing it around carefully we’d get down to the black grains of sand. That’s when, if there was any gold in the pan, it would show up brightly around the edges of the black. We’d call the others over then to show them. “Look! Isn’t it beautiful?”

Word got around what we were doing and an old-timer asked Wally, “How’s the gold mine coming?” He answered, “We’ve found a lot of color.” The response? “Color! Heck, I can find color in my garden!”

But we were not deterred. We worked that operation for about a month and got only a fraction of an ounce of gold for our effort. Entertainment got us an A+, but money? Nothing more than a hole in the ground and a tiny vial of gold dust. We left the ranch with a bank-load of good memories and a fatter purse for appreciation of its land value, but whatever happened to the wee vial of gold, I don’t know. I wish I had it here on my desk. I could really appreciate its worth.

If we’d found gold in large amounts we’d probably still be there grubbing away. Others would be in on the operation and we’d be stuck. Eventually, the scenery wouldn’t thrill us so much, the burden of excess, where to spend or invest it, wondering who might be ripping us off, and any number of painful considerations to temper the good would probably not measure up to that little capsule of fun we had in satisfying our minds that we were not leaving a gold mine behind when we pulled out the dirt driveway. If I were to hear tomorrow that the present owners struck it rich I wouldn’t envy them a mite. 

Now I live in a cozy little condo in southern California.  It rests beside a rippling brook and small waterfall.  Huge trees give me shade with enough sun sprinkling through to cheer my days. Cool breezes make me the envy of summertime heat wave sufferers elsewhere in the country. My neighbors are all quiet, often invisible but friendly when we meet out walking our dogs. I don’t have to milk a cow (though I enjoyed that when I did.) I don’t need to clean out a chicken coop, (but the eggs were worth it.) I don’t hear a car or see one, yet shopping malls are within an easy walk. I’ve had a good life with few sorrows and many joys. I count my blessings all day and every night. They are the “color” in my pan. Yes, they're even gold nuggets! 

Questions, Silly or Serious?

Ask anything. Get a true answer. That would be my desire, but sometimes the answer comes only with work and, let's face it, I'm a true American, I like things to come easily. The academic workaholics don't like people like me. They want no silly questions and won't give casual answers. Well,  I have serious questions too, but this morning I asked a silly one I'd never thought of before, and I'll bet you haven't either.   Do ants smile?

What brought that on? This: I was sitting at a curbside table in a small cafe and noticing how the patrons and waiters wove in and out amidst the tables, meeting others doing the same and smiling at each other. Strangers to one another, mostly, but nevertheless willing to give out smiles as if they were recklessly throwing diamonds to each other. (To me, smiles are pricier than diamonds.) Then a young mother with her little girl baby slung onto her hip passed by on the sidewalk. I couldn't help smiling. No one could. Pure enchantment they were. The mother didn't notice me but the baby did and she gave me the broadest and sweetest smile imaginable!

That's when I thought of the silly question. Ants move easily and quickly with apparent purpose in mind just as humans do. They pass each other rapidly, meet and sometimes greet, but do they smile as they go about their ways? I suspect there may be someone who has figured that out through long study and persistent observation. I could go to the library and research it or make it my own project, but I'm not that desperate for an answer.

My questions tend to be either too silly to warrant time to seek answers or so serious they are beyond reach and only speculation is possible. Like this one: Who triggered the Big Bang? The stuff of the universe, did it come from nothing? Can something come out of nothing? Is that either physically or mentally possible? And does every something become nothing at some time?

I know it's a waste of time to dwell long on questions either too silly or too serious. I've got to get to more basic ones like, What do you intend to do with the rest of your life? Are you content with the same old-same old, or do you want to do something more worthwhile than blogging or keeping a-float on the sea of information available or pursuing some senior activity agenda?

I know what I should do. I should read the manual of my new home phone and find out how to set up the answering device it's supposed to have in it. My instinct is to stay ignorant and let anyone anxious to get me call my cell phone or call again on the home phone. At any rate, that's something I can put off. What I will do is clean up the kitchen from the lunch I prepared and ate because I don't like the sight of it. I'll pay a few bills because the consequences of not doing so are unappealing. I'll listen to the evening news broadcast and try to make sense of that. And I'll settle down for the evening with a good book. Better things may yet be in the works but at my age I'm not looking too hard.

Ambition is not my middle name, but I love to ask questions. Both silly ones and serious. Sometimes I do get answers. But even if I don't, speculation is fun and who knows, I may speculate well enough to write a book of science fiction. Don't count on it though. I'll be asking questions till the cows come home.

Seniors, What Are You Expecting?

I love to tell stories I’ve told before, (so if I’ve told this in another blog, don’t worry, I know it.)  An elderly small farm owner named Joe had always been a hard worker and didn’t show signs of slowing down as he got older. One day a friend of his stopped by and Joe invited him to sit a spell on his front porch. After a bit of conversation the friend said to him, “Joe, this is really good. Why don’t you get someone else to do the work and sit here all day enjoying yourself?” Joe thought a minute and said, “Well, I suppose I could do that, but I never did see much sense in dying before my time had come.”

In my own case, I still keep house, manage my own affairs, and carry on as I did when I became an empty nester with kids grown and gone, no husband to watch out for and no outside job. If I were to sell everything and move to a senior living place I could not complain about housework. I’d not have to prepare my own meals. I’d have lots of company and a bus to take me places. Kinda cushy, but the thought of it reminds me of old Joe. I’d be exchanging the few complaints I have for just another set and I’d rather complain about little snags like cleaning house than thinking up other kinds of complaints.
  

Here at home a singing canary and a little Chihuahua keep me company and the housework is not a burden when I remember to be grateful for my home and the fact that I’m able to keep doing what is expected of it. Best of all, I’m my own boss and can do everything on my own initiative and at my own pace. I expect this of myself. What I don’t expect of myself is excellence in the use of my talents. I should be ashamed to admit it, but I rarely expect my work to be 100% perfect. I’m not like some I've seen, perfectionists who deliberately make some slight flaw in their work “so not to compete with angels.” I just let good enough be good enough after I’ve run out of interest in a project. No one is grading me. I’m in a kind of senior free-study-audit-any-class-you-want school. I’m expecting only to enjoy it. Yes, things can get better when you get older, if you expect them to. Believe me.

Stanley, My Sidekick

The news media today love to tout elderly people who do things younger ones would be proud to do such as bike-riding, playing tennis, running marathons and sky diving, to name a few. Just this morning the TV has a story about an 80 year old woman who went sky diving and the last minute her pro-partner had to force her out the door of the plane. That was painful to watch but she had told him to do so if she chickened out. It happened that she soon slipped out of her harness but the pro caught her and they descended safely, albeit with her in a most awkward position.

Whenever I hear about things like this I wonder why people of any age do things that seem crazy to me. What must motivate anyone to take chances like that? Is it pride, self-will, a dare, or do some senior seniors just keep on doing what has always been enjoyable to them? If the latter, then I say more power to them, but if it’s the former, then I say, grow up as you grow old.

Perhaps more often than this kind of resistance to old age, one tends to avoid doing the practical thing like getting glasses, hearing aids, or using canes and walkers. In any case pride may be the reason for action or inaction. No one wants to look old and so often we’ll resist age by tackling more than is sensible or failing to use the aids needed. I was reminded of this yesterday when, after a spell of painful walking because of a sore hip, I decided to get myself a cane. What a difference that extra “leg” makes! My complaining hip says, “Thank you, girl, for making me ever so much more comfortable! You didn’t give in to pride or will-power, and now I plan to reward you by shaping up and healing myself.”

Only about a year ago did I feel the need to get glasses and when I did, I got some.  No one had to push me into it and I was glad when it came time to renew my driver’s license because I’d not have passed the eye test if I hadn’t. I’m enjoying using my glasses, and now I’m also enjoying “Stanley,” my new cane and sidekick. He’s not only a great help, but I know he’ll gladly go into the closet if I should find I don’t need him anymore. In the meantime I wear him like a badge of honor knowing that He can make me look sporty if I think of him that way, stand erect and walk in gratitude.  What’s the shame in being sane?

There are numberless angels who help us all when we acknowledge their presence. Slowing down to notice the beauty and wonder of everyday miracles is the best of medicines. Being cheerful by choice becomes natural when we focus on the good in life. A happy heart, a hopeful outlook, a mind full of good thoughts, - these are the best of helpers. But if in our daily walk we could use a good cane, then why not get one? I’m already walking a little straighter and steadier and more spritely. My cane is a sporty tool!

It’s a beautiful summer afternoon here in my neighborhood. Guess I’ll take Dolce 

the dog for a walk and Stanley’s coming along too. I think he makes me look like one smart cookie!

Is Older Really Better?

Having started this blog I find myself coming to grips occasionally with the title of it. “Your blog has to have a name, Mom,” my daughter said as she set it up. The whole idea of blogging was new to me but I thought, what do I have to offer in words? The answer was ideas. Especially ones I’m most wrestling with today. That way I get to keep a record of some of my conclusions and share them with others who are my contemporaries. I suspect that would include everyone since no one can escape the clocks and calendars of life.

A big part of the senior senior’s life is getting to know oneself. It’s inescapable. Eventually most of us have to face living alone. No longer do we live to support another, be supported by another, live with another, keep company with another. Some have lived alone most of their lives and know what that means. Only when you experience independent living do you face up to yourself.

Tommy, my canary, is a case of that. At the pet shop where I found him he shared the cage with another male canary in the vicinity of other cages occupied by other birds. Then I brought him home where his cage stood next to another cage with two Gouldian finches I’d had for a number of years. After about a year Freddy and Fannie left for bird heaven or bird hereafter. Now Tommy is alone. He doesn’t seem to know it though because he hops up to a small toy’s mirror the first thing every morning  and talks to it. I’d give anything to know what he’s saying.

Just so, my pen and journal or the computer keyboard and monitor serve me as mirrors to my thoughts. I am alone in my house, but these “mirrors” keep me company. They keep me on track. They demand a certain standard of thought. I cannot treat them like our writing teacher tells us to by letting every shabby thought that passes by get written down randomly and then torn up. With me, pride or self-protection or propriety, whatever, has kept shabbiness at such a distance that I never dignify it by my pen or keyboard. The TV and newspapers do a good enough job for that. 

No, my kind of word-company is one of elucidation, problem-solving, getting things right in my mental household. This spills out in my little condo too. Like yesterday. Starting out with a shampoo and shower, I proceeded to tidy up my rooms. I don’t stick to some dogged rule about housework. I let myself get side-tracked freely and it’s all fun and games. A darling photo of my latest great grand-baby boy needed to be framed. I did it in a charmingly innovative way. Side-tracks like that in housework make the job go happily. 

Life is full of puzzles, unsolved problems and inequities. I’ve found that taking them one at a time and writing about them in a positive way helps to sort things out in my mind. It’s a lot like taking life’s perplexities to a sage and talking them out. That’s the way it is with the subject of age.

“Older,” let’s face it, has a bad reputation because of its accompaniments, not its substance. Taken in substance it should mean all kinds of good things. Like getting older is getting smarter. Getting older is getting wiser. Getting older is getting sweeter, riper, gentler, kinder. Getting older should not be getting lonely but rather getting better acquainted with one’s truer self. This can result in making small and large changes for the better in one’s person, in one’s mind, in one’s house, in one’s attitudes, in one’s habits, in every way possible. It’s art. It’s entertainment. It’s fun.

As I write this Tommy is no longer sitting in front of his mirror. He’s no longer chit-chatting as he was the first thing this morning. He’s bursting in song. He’s seen himself and liked what he saw. He’s enjoying his own company and that is not narcism, it’s simply that he is the only company he has. Except me. He likes me because I take care of him, talk to him once in a while, and put him in the best spot in the house. I do the same for myself. 

As I get older I am happier. Especially in the morning. That’s all I need to say today.

Judgment Day

I can’t speak for others of my generation but, for myself, not a day goes by but this one niggling Shadow taunts me: “Why are you here?” Like shadows do, it changes its position, rephrases its question: “How are you going to make up for lost time?” Or: “Do you deserve to be so contented?”

Then there’s the most recurring question of all: “What are you going to do today to warrant your good fortune?”

 It’s not to impress the world I write down my thoughts in a blog. It’s more like launching a bottle out to sea with the message in it: “Whoever finds this bottle, please get back to me if you are of a kindred spirit. Or, even if not. But if the person who finds this is in their eighties or nineties and would like to share your life story, all the better.”

This morning I filled out another of those ubiquitous surveys that ask your occupation. “Retired” and none of the other usual answers seem to fit me. Somehow they don’t capsulize adequately my unique (I’d like to think) occupational categories. Here’s a run-down (not in order of importance) of some titles I could claim:

Canary keeper, dog sitter, housekeeper, world-watcher, clay sculptor, writer, reader, grandmother, mom, friend of a few, enemy of none, and glad-to-be-alive grateful citizen of the USA.

 

Somehow the niggling Shadow I mentioned above tags along with me asking those questions of accounting without actually accusing me. He, she, whoever it is, does not deny me the pleasure of just savoring the joy of any given moment. It never takes over like a schoolmaster or life regulator. It seems to know I’ll do just as I please anyway, but doesn’t give up in urging me to do better whatever I choose. 

It’s been said that every day is judgment day, but if there is to be some final judgment, I’d dread most the one that would parade in front of me all the things I could have accomplished in life and didn’t because of wrong choices, lack of motivation, or simple selfish desire. I've had my share of sins of commission, but it's the sins of omission I most worry about.

I have a couple of friends who are slightly older than I and someday I may talk to them about this. For now we just enjoy each others’ company, reminisce about the olden days, and share a few outings now and then. In between our infrequent get-togethers I keep nearly daily company with a dear daughter who lives in this same block, enjoy occasional visits with one son, a weekly Skype hour with another son, a gathering of grandchildren and sweet great grandies on holidays, and daily exchanges with my Muse in a journal. The latter have become increasingly more public with blogs like this. (I laugh at the word “public” when I remember how few even read them. And that’s OK. It helps me open up.)

So, when my niggling Shadow asks what on earth I’m good for now-a-days I just say, “Sit down here beside me. Look around at all the beauty you see, be grateful for relatively good health, have a bite of lunch on the patio next to the creek, give tasties to Dolce, your granddaughter’s little dog, listen to Tommy the canary sing, and quit talking!” Then I pat the little fellow on the shoulder and apologize. “I’m sorry, my friend, you’re doing a good job keeping me enough on track to not fear too much any kind of judgment day, whether daily or final, and I’m grateful to you for not being too hard on me.” 

As for the occupational query on that survey? I just wrote: "Read my blog." 

About Time

Some years ago I discovered Jack Finney. He’s an author who writes about bridging over time when the desire to do so makes it possible. He’s a great story teller who has no problem at all getting me to suspend my disbelief. I’m like a child again listening to my father tell bedtime stories. No book or pictures were necessary with Daddy’s stories. I was all ears and my imagination drew pictures. I knew Daddy’s stories were made up in his own heart and mind and memory and that made them all the more real for me. 

Finney writes like my Daddy talked in that half hushed confidential way so no one else can hear. He draws me in comfortingly so that everything he says becomes totally believable. His longing for another time, a  gentler time when news came in newspapers and was not so in your face. He wonders about old buildings, old houses, old streets where today you might find occasional remnants of the past. And it’s not just nostalgia. There’s the element of wonder, romance or mystery, even the possibility of stepping into the past that clutch’s at the reader. Where will the story end?  

I remember when first the sound barrier was broken in aviation. It had been believed impossible; that going beyond the speed of sound would suddenly cause a plane to disintegrate. Silly, we say now. So, why can’t we break the time barrier? Or any other barrier that we labor under in belief? 

I’ve always been fascinated by the probability that the so-called impossible is a mere illusion. I admire those scientists and engineers who make dreams come true. I’m told that airplanes these days practically fly themselves and in time pilots will become unnecessary altogether. Just this morning I saw on TV a car driven entirely by a computerized piloting system. We’d all be dumbfounded, I’m sure, by the things on the drawing boards of those who know how to make the “impossible” possible.

Can’t you imagine how it would be to slip into some other time frame? Once, when we owned a sixty acre ranch along the Applegate River in southern Oregon I dreamed of creating a place exactly like an 1800’s spread. It would have dirt roads along the river bank (about a mile amidst tall trees and blackberry bushes.) I’d have antique cars, horse drawn wagons, and pony carts. The house would be large and rambling with porches and swings. Fruit and vegetable gardens. Milk cows and sheep, chickens, ducks, pigs. One caveat: we’d have the animals lead a life of pleasure with no violent end, no ending up on the dinner plate. I loved that dream. We’d invite paying guests to enjoy stepping into the past with the uglier aspects of ranch life removed. But never once did I entertain the idea that we could actually go back in time there. Nor would I have wanted to. After eight years on the ranch I realized that the past might not be so idyllic after all.

Certainly today’s world has a long way to go in achieving the ideal. What if the next experience after this turns out to be a mere skip in time? What if, when I appear to die, I’ll go to sleep and wake up in another age? Will it be like changing channels on the TV or frequencies on the radio? Jack Finney's book has stirred my imagination but right now I'm willing to let "reality" stay right where it is.