I put on a ball cap this morning, prior to heading out for my daily walk.
And my head hurt.
No, not a headache. A soft knot of pain localized right on my temple, where the cap fit just a little tightly.
* * * * * * *
I’ve mentioned the SCA here a number of times in the past. How I used to be very involved in it, how I still have a number of close friends from those days, how I learned a lot from my years of active participation.
I don’t think I’ve mentioned too much how I also blame the SCA for some of my aches and pains. But shall we say that I have been known to grumble a bit from time to time, how my days of fighting led to several joint surgeries, multiple fractures, and so forth. Oh, the SCA combat is actually quite safe, if you do it in a sane manner with decent armor. But in my younger days I didn’t always take the proper precautions, and pushed myself pretty hard to compete at the highest level – well beyond what I would consider ‘sane’ these days.
Still, those old reflexes probably saved my life.
* * * * * * *
Last October I wrote about an incident involving my stupidity and moving large chunks of wood, how it gave me a good smack upside the head and a pressure split of the scalp.
Sometimes it is only in hindsight, seen from something of a distance, that you can appreciate just what actually happened in the case of an accident. Such is the case with this incident.
It became pretty quickly clear in the weeks following that episode that I had actually suffered a concussion and likely a skull fracture. I say this because I know how bones ache when healing from a break, having broken something north of 15 of ’em over the decades. Other kinds of injuries just don’t feel the same.
Anyway, I didn’t seek treatment for it, because in spite of all the pain, there wasn’t much of an indication of anything really dangerous happening, and besides taking X-rays/cat-scans and confirming the break there wasn’t much that medical science would be able to do for me. They don’t put your head in a cast for a simple skull fracture, and I had painkillers sufficient to deal with things. Yeah, had there been some kind of bleeding inside my brain they may have done something, but I had no evidence of any such injury – I was extremely lucky.
I was *extremely* lucky.
* * * * * * *
Where the handle of the hand truck struck me on the temple was right where the cap fit a little tight. I was wearing that cap when the accident happened.
And thinking about it, and thinking about what happened and how, I now realize something that I didn’t really realize before. When, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the handle of the hand truck swinging my way, I flinched away.
A normal reflex.
Yes, but one which had been reinforced and conditioned by years – years – of SCA combat. Combat which largely consisted of people trying to hit me upside the head with stout sticks moving at high speed. Combat in which I came to be one of the best in the world for a brief period of time.
Now, I can’t prove it, and don’t care to test the hypothesis by duplicating the experiment, but I would bet that the injury I received – skull fracture, concussion – would likely have been a lot worse had I not had that honed reflex. Had I not seen the handle move, or had I moved in response just a little slower, it could well have left me with permanent brain injury or even dead. I’m not trying to be melodramatic here, just honest with myself about the close call I had.
And you know, I don’t think I’ll bitch quite so much about my aching joints from here on.
Jim Downey
Just a quiet note, to follow up to a post from November. Our neighbor, Ray, passed away this morning.
Martha and I had been to visit him several times where he had been receiving care for his fall, the last time a bit before I went out to Las Vegas last month. It was clear then that his health was deteriorating quickly. He was happy to see us, but was no longer as mentally sharp or aware of his surroundings as he had been, and in fact he struck me as being more than a little impatient to be ‘moving on.’ It was almost as though he felt he had overstayed his welcome, living to 97.
So I had been expecting this news. Still, it is a sadness.
But I’ll remember him for as long as I grow tomatoes. One thing he did last year, when he was still very much aware of this world, was to tell me to take his tomato towers, wonderful 6′ tall box-wire supports that are about as old as I am. The last few years I had borrowed these, ‘renting them’ in exchange for keeping him supplied with fresh tomatoes through the summer, dutifully stacking them back in his yard at the end of the season. Now they’ll have a new home.
As I suppose Ray does, in our memories.
Jim Downey
Yup. Got back last night about midnight, after two days of 15 hour drives. Exhausting.
As was the SHOT Show. Well, frankly, the whole trip.
But good. Lots of things to tell. More of all of that, later.
But today is recovery, laundry, playing with the dog, catching up on email and the news of the world.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Ballistics, Depression, Emergency, Guns, Health, Predictions, Publishing, Writing stuff
Well, I’ve been in a funk all week.
The news that UTI is closing down, a decision I respect and even prompted, is still news of one aspect of my life coming to an end.
And there are others.
My shooting buddy here in town is moving to California. We’ll still be able to keep in touch, but it is still a loss to have him go. He’ll be leaving this week – while I am gone to the SHOT Show.
And our old neighbor, Ray, is slipping in health. This is common in the elderly when they have taken a fall, or moved out of their home. We saw him the other day, and, well, I’m glad his daughter is in town this weekend to visit him.
Even the really good news about the book I got last Monday is a bit bittersweet. That may be hard for some folks to understand. But for me, I enjoy the process of working on something – and miss it when a project is done. I started thinking about the story behind Communion of Dreams about 15 years ago, and really started writing it over a decade ago. There’s a lot of my life tied up in that book.
So, forgive the funk. A lot of changes, all at once.
I will be mostly unavailable through the 26th, but will try and schedule some posts to cycle while I am gone. And I may have a chance to post some thoughts about my trip while out in Vegas – we’ll see.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Ballistics, Book Conservation, Guns, Health, Hospice, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, tech, Writing stuff
As I have done for the last couple of years, I like to look at the stats for my sites on New Years Day – numbers don’t lie.
But they can be a bit confusing. Here’s how. In 2009, I could say that 9,619 people downloaded some or all of Communion of Dreams. That would break down as 5,877 downloads of the original “complete” .pdf of the book, 156 copies of the revised version, 3,183 of the first mp3, and 403 copies of the first chapter. Or I could say that there were a total of 6,765 downloads, using the numbers for the “complete” .pdfs plus the minimum downloads of both the mp3 and individual chapter files (on the theory that those numbers reflect “complete” downloads of the book in those formats.) For my year-end numbers in the past I have used the latter formula, and I will do so again.
So, 2009 had 6,765 downloads. That compares to 6,288 in 2007, and 6,182 in 2008. How many people have actually read the book, I have no idea – I have heard from people that they have passed on the .pdf they downloaded to friends, and others have told me that they printed the thing out and gave copies to others. So that would boost the numbers. Then again, just because someone downloaded the thing, doesn’t mean they read it. Lord knows I have plenty of books I own but have never gotten around to reading.
Which brings up another item – back in August I mentioned that I was working on a revision because there was a publisher who was interested in the book. In November I mentioned that I had submitted the manuscript with the revisions, and was waiting for them to take another look at it. Well, I’m still waiting, though the publisher said that he was going to assign it to one of their readers and go through it himself, and would get back to me soon. I’m not complaining about the wait – six weeks or so is not at all unreasonable – but I do wonder whether he just didn’t want to give me the bad news leading up to the holidays. So, we’ll see what comes of that.
I’m also in a “wait and see” mode on my two other writing projects. My co-author on the caregiving book Her Final Year still has to finish his editing before we can proceed with that, and I haven’t had a chance to get together with my sister to really get started on My Father’s Gun. But now that the end of the year is past, I hope to make progress on both of those soon.
Other aspects of life in 2009? A mix. I did get a lot of good conservation work done, though losing the one big client in the fall due to the economy hurt a lot – I have other work, but nowhere near as much, so that has hindered my efforts to resolve long standing debt leftover from the gallery. My health is better than it was a year ago, but I still need to lose several stones. The BBTI project was a huge success through 2009, and I’m sure will continue to be a source both of work and pleasure in the coming year. Otherwise, well, if you read this blog you probably already have had your fill of my introspection.
So, goodbye 2009, and best wishes to one and all for a better 2010.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Connections, Guns, Health, Privacy, Society, Survival, Violence, Writing stuff
I just sent the following email:
University City Chief of Police
Colonel Charles Adams
6801 Delmar Blvd.
University City, MO 63130Colonel Adams,
40 years ago, in the early hours of 12 December, my father, Wilbert James Downey, died while performing his duties as a patrolman for the University City Police Department.
Your department, and the people of University City, have always graciously recognized his sacrifice, and honored his memory. This has always been a comfort to my family, and to myself, though I have not participated in any of the remembrances in recent years.
This morning I would like to ask your assistance in doing some research for a book about my father. I need some information which is not readily available, but it may be in your archives or in the collective memory of the department.
I would like to know about my father’s service revolver. I know that it was a .38 special, probably a S & W Model 15. If you could confirm this, or provide any additional information, I would greatly appreciate it. Is it possible that a serial number was recorded? Was the revolver retained by the department, or was it considered personal property?
Any help in this matter would be most welcome. If there is someone else there at the department with whom it would be better for me to correspond, please let me know.
Thank you for your time, and your service to the community –
James Downey
And with that, I have begun a new project, a new journey, likely a new book.
I’ve mentioned before that this time of year always leaves me feeling . . . nachdenklich. This year the intensity of the rumination has been greater than before. I’m not entirely sure why. Regardless, the feeling is there, and it has been growing on me all this year.
So, I’ve decided to embark on a quest to find my father’s gun. Specifically, his service revolver mentioned above. And through this, to find him.
Because the gun itself doesn’t really matter. What does matter is the journey. As I told my sister in an email this morning:
I too had been feeling that this year was somehow more ‘significant’, and it has had a greater impact on me than in most past years. In fact, this morning I was going to draft a letter/email to Chief Adams at the U City PD, and thereby initiate something I had been thinking about for the last couple of years: writing a book about dad through the mechanism of trying to track down his service revolver (working title idea “My Father’s Gun”). My intent is to explore a lot of the things I have thought about and wondered about over the last 40 years, as a way of understanding him and the lives he touched. I was planning on incorporating all my correspondence and such available resources as I can find – which will also mean my finally coming to terms with things I have deliberately tried to avoid (I think for good reason).
I’ve invited her to join me on this journey (we get along very well, and could work together on such a project easily), adding her perspective along the way. We’ll see.
Just thought I would share this.
Jim Downey
Update: I did hear back from the Chief’s office, have the serial number now, and have confirmed by it that was a Model 10 which was manufactured in early 1961. This fits perfectly with about the time my dad started on the force. JD
A number of health researchers have wondered whether an over-enthusiastic effort to create an ultra-clean/hygenic environment for children was behind a growing rate of asthma and possibly even obesity and cardiovascular disease. And now it looks like there’s pretty good evidence to support this:
Exposing kids to nasty germs might actually toughen them up to diseases as grown-ups, mounting research suggests.
A new study suggests that higher levels of exposure to common everyday bacteria and microbes may play a helpful role in the development of the body’s inflammatory systems, which plays a crucial role in the immune system’s fight against infection.
“Inflammatory networks may need the same type of microbial exposures early in life that have been part of the human environment for all of our evolutionary history to function optimally in adulthood,” said Thomas McDade, a professor of anthropology at Northwestern University and lead author of the study.
The investigation focused on how various early childhood environments affected levels of C-reactive protein (CRP), which rises in the blood because of inflammation. C-reactive protein is also considered by researchers to be a predictor of heart disease, independent of lipids, cholesterol and blood pressure, though the association has been disputed.
While earlier studies have been conducted in relatively affluent settings such as the United States, the researchers were interested in how C-reactive protein production differed in a country like the Philippines, a population with a high level of infectious diseases in early childhood, but low rates of obesity and cardiovascular diseases when compared to Western countries.
Turns out, the Filipino participants in the study had one-fifth to one-seventh the CRP levels of Americans.
Now, consider – the slow plague of obesity has also been linked to the spread of a virus (which I have written about previously). Could it be that because of an over-emphasis on protecting children from exposure to immune-system-building microbes more people are now susceptible to this obesity-causing virus? Did 20th century germophobia set the stage for 21st century heart disease?
Jim Downey
“You guys are really good with him,” said the ER nurse.
* * * * * * *
The knock came at the back door as I was finishing my first cup of coffee. It was a neighbor two doors down.
“Jim, Ray’s fallen, and I need help to get him up,” he said, somewhat breathless from the quick walk over to our house.
Ray’s another neighbor, and an old family friend. He and Martha Sr shared a birthday, though he was five years older. This makes him 97. He’s been on his own for a while now, his wife having passed (he cared for her up until the final months of her life – she had Alzheimer’s) and his family long since scattered. But he was doing fine – spry, mental faculties still very sharp, and he would always consult with me on how my tomatoes were doing, offering his vastly greater experience what I should do for this or that minor problem. My wife and I, and the other neighbors, all kept an eye on him, and his family would call him a couple of times a day to keep track of how he was doing. Which is exactly what he wanted – he was adamant that he could continue to be on his own, in the house where he’d lived for 60 years.
I didn’t wait. I quickly headed out the door and across the yard, pulling out my mobile and calling my wife as I did so.
* * * * * * *
For some months now, I have been #4.
#4 on Ray’s speed-dial, that is. We set it up some time back, and tested it fairly regularly. Because though Ray was doing really well, recently he’d started having some problems with his balance. Reluctantly, he had started using a cane, then a walker. But he kept his phone with him at all times, because if something happened and he lost his balance, he wanted to have the ability to call me if he needed help getting back up or was injured.
And after his needing to call me a couple of times in the last month, I had taken to being more careful to make sure I always had my phone with me, that it was on. Recently I found myself checking it frequently, to make sure I hadn’t accidentally muted it, in case Ray called and I missed it.
This was a familiar feeling, an ingrained response. It was like always making sure I had the monitor with me while I was taking care of Martha Sr.
* * * * * * *
“Martha, I’m going over to Ray’s. He’s fallen in his bedroom, may be hurt.” Our other neighbor, the one who came to get me, has a heart condition. If I needed to move Ray or anything, I needed my wife.
“I’ll be right there.”
I went in the back door, through the house to the bedroom. Ray was there. He’d fallen, had hit his head on the corner of a small table. There was blood, but not a lot, and it was dried. He had been there a while, possibly overnight. He was conscious, and recognized me. “Oh, good, Jim – help me up.”
I quickly checked him over, asked him some questions about whether he hurt anywhere. But his answers were somewhat confused – moreso than usual. Whether from the blow to his head, or as a result of something else, I couldn’t tell.
“Help me up, Jim.”
Sorry, Ray, not this time.
My wife got there, she knelt down and did the same quick assessment I did. She looked at me, and knew what I was thinking. I handed her my phone. “Call an ambulance.”
She left the room and did so. I stayed with Ray, holding his hand. He was insistent that he didn’t need an ambulance, but he was otherwise not making sense about what had happened or how long he had been down.
There comes a point in time in dealing with someone who is in this condition when you have to make the decision as to whether you are willing to ruin your relationship with them in order to make sure they get the proper care. This is what keeps many family members from taking away the car keys of a parent, or getting them into a nursing home. For me, it was an easy choice in this case. I liked and respected Ray, valued his friendship, but he needed professional medical care.
* * * * * * *
Martha rode in the ambulance with Ray. I came home, changed clothes, grabbed something to eat, then went to the hospital. We stayed with him there in the ER through the rest of the day, along with his nephew that lives here in town. They did tests, CAT scans, all the usual things. This and that doctor came in, consulted, did their best to communicate with him. We helped, talking with him loudly until I went back to his house and got his hearing aid, but mostly we were just there to be friendly faces.
Ray stabilized, and his confusion cleared up, but there were reasons why they wanted to keep him there for observation.
This was not news Ray wanted to hear. It took a lot of convincing that it needed to be done before he finally relented. We stayed with him until they got him settled into his own room.
It is never easy to be in an ER for a long time. Late afternoon, while they were doing something with him which required a bit of privacy, Martha and I were standing outside the room, next to the nurses’ station. We were both tired, and no doubt looked it. The nurse there at the desk looked up at us. “You guys are really good with him.”
We nodded. “We’ve got a lot of experience – we cared for my wife’s mother – Alzheimer’s – until she died last year. Ray’s an old friend.”
“You guys are really good with him,” she repeated, “that experience shows.”
* * * * * * *
Jim Downey
Post Script: one of Ray’s daughters got into town last night. She had planned on coming in for Thanksgiving, anyway, and they were going to spend some time looking to find a good assisted care facility for him while she was here. Ray had come to the conclusion that the time had come to take this step. It was just bad timing that this accident happened when it did.
Filed under: Alzheimer's, BoingBoing, Health, Humor, Publishing, Writing stuff, YouTube
So, things continue. I finished editing my entries in the care-giving book yesterday, so next I need to sort out with my co-author what else needs to be done to finish that project. And I’m now through Chapter 13 of the revisions of Communion of Dreams – having trimmed 19,884 words so far. With a little luck, I should be able to finish that editing and get the revised manuscript off to the publisher this week. As you might have gathered, I am recovering fairly well from the concussion, though I now think that it was probably a bit more serious than I initially thought, including a hairline fracture. Oh well, I’m healing and that’s what matters.
This is amusing:
Via BB.
Jim Downey
“Hi Jim, this is Dottie. I just wanted to make sure that you were the one who came by and got the wood this weekend.”
“Yeah, thanks. As I said, if it was still there by the weekend, I’d get it out of your way. Sorry that I left those three large pieces – something came up. I’ll come get them later this week.” I didn’t figure I needed to tell her about the accident.
“OK, thanks. I just wanted to make sure you were the one to get the wood, that someone else didn’t take it.”
* * * * * * *
Sunday, I basically couldn’t work. Was still much too dizzy from the concussion on Saturday, so just spent the time trying to take it easy. Which meant that I lost one of the three day’s time to finish up a batch of books I had promised my big client that I would deliver on Wednesday morning.
But by Monday, the dizziness had mostly passed. I worked steadily through the day and into the evening, making up for lost time. Tuesday I got back to it, and concentrated on trying to finish up, but there are some things that just take time – I stopped at midnight. Got up yesterday at 5:00, and with a little help packing things from my good lady wife was ready to leave as scheduled.
Drove to KC, arrived about ten minutes early. Unpacked the car, was waiting for the Director when he walked in. He looked at me and said “Oh, were we meeting today?”
* * * * * * *
I got home, tired from working hard the last couple of days, tired from not getting much sleep, tired from the 5-hour round trip drive over to KC. Patted the dog, chatted with my wife, came in to check mail and the state of the world. A couple of minutes later my wife came into my office.
“Oh, meant to tell you, Dottie called.”
“Oh? She called me the other day to confirm that I was the one who cleared out the wood. What’s up?”
“Well, she promised her daughter that she could have the smaller stuff.”
“She didn’t mention that when I talked to her.”
“Well, evidently her daughter had been delayed. Dottie thought that maybe you could just come over and split the rest of the wood that’s there, so her daughter could take it.”
“Split large chunks of green wood? She has no idea how hard that would be, does she?”
* * * * * * *
The Director shook my hand as his assistant started unpacking the books. They love my work, always make nice noises when they unpack things and see the results of my labor.
“Well, I have bad news. We can’t send any books back with you.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, we’ve run out of money for this project.”
This came as no surprise to me, since they had delayed paying me for the last batch of book for two months, with one excuse after another. And then the Director had asked for and pushed through an estimated invoice for the work I was delivering, the check coming to me a couple of weeks ago. My guess is that they got in some money, and he wanted to make sure I got paid before it went to something else.
“But we want to keep at it, as soon as we get some more donations!” Said the Director.
“Well, let me know.”
I helped them unpack the rest of the books. Shook hands, and left.
And with that, about 75% of my workload disappeared.
* * * * * * *
I laid in bed this morning after waking about 4:00, thinking. I still have enough other work to keep me busy and the wolf from the door. And now I can spend more time finishing the revisions of Communion, and what remains to be done on the care-giving book.
And I must admit, I am seriously tempted to just take back all the wood I had gotten from Dottie, be done with it.
Jim Downey
Communion Of Dreams 