"A Rainy Night..."

 "We watched our friends grow up together

 And we saw them as they fell

Some of them fell into Heaven

Some of them fell into Hell"

February 25, 2023

 Marks one year of brain damage. I used to be so smart.

P.S. If a person in dire condition needed medical transport via emergency ambulance service to the hospital, and the ambulance was unavailable because it was dispatched to a caller because they were feeling anxious or in need of comfort, that needy person would and should be mad as hell. And  that person denied vital lifesaving transport will come back from the grave to haunt the attention seeker. The cold winds will howl around their houses forever. (It is almost 2 a.m.and I'm half, well one quarter, asleep. I can always delete tomorrow. I do that a lot lately. 

Winter Memory

 The day, February 28, 1973, started out as usual, for back then. I would take the kids to the Valley Falls Post Office to pick up my mother's mail. The weather was fairly mild, for February, so I had 2-year-old David wear a newly-purchased jacket. Since this was only his second year walking, his previous winter wear was the traditional one-piece snowsuit so he was pleased to be wearing a "real" jacket, with big-boy pockets in front. Both kids were wearing those lightweight slip-on rubberized boots. 

   We drove to the post office and entered by the steps that were then on the side of the building facing the library. The rest of the library porch then was open, no rails or barriers in place. As the three of us approached the top of the steps, a large black German Shepherd came  up to us in an excited greeting. He was animated and seemed friendly. He was wearing a chain collar with several tags and they jingled as he came close to us. I was concerned that he could knock the kids off the porch, so I moved them to the right, close to the building.

   We entered and got the mail.  The dog's owner, known  to me, was at the window  chatting with Gloria J. Knowing them both,  it seemed they may have been talking for quite a while. M. prided herself on being able to use Nana's combination, B-FG-B, to open the box and get the mail so she was carryng Nana's mail as we left. The dog was not in sight, forgotten by us.

   M. stepped out first and I reached out to help David down the step at the doorway, but he had both hands in those new pockets, so I used his shoulder to guide him down that single step. M. was a few steps ahead of me and D. a few steps behind. The length of the porch was only a few feet to the descending steps. Within seconds, I heard a snarling noise and turned to see the dog on top of David, who had been knocked flat on his back. The dog was standing over his body, attacking his head, I think at least 3  primary bites. I turned and the dog ran off, though I don't exactly remember where to. I picked up David, whose head was covered and dripping with blood, and carried him back into the post office, yelling dog bite. The dog's owner asked, in horror, if it was her dog. It was, she soon learned, and she ran outside. Gloria had us go into the office area and called the ambulance. D's head was bleeding so badly that she grabbed a box of Kleenex and ended up placing the entire contents on his head, which the blood seeped right through.  I asked her to look and see if his eye was still there, at the center of the most bleeding, and she picked up the stack of blood-soaked  Kleenex, looked,  and told me his eye was there. That was a relief; I had not been able to look.

  G. then called Dave, who was at work. I heard her sternly saying to him to never mind those questions  now.  It's bad, she said, just get to the hospital. Thankfully, Dorothy and Gus showed up about the same time, and were able to calm him and keep him from any violent actions. I don't remember who called them. Maybe I did. Maybe my mother. During the wait for the ambulance, Joyce Bott (?) showed up at the p.o. and she drove M. to Nana's house. (She later told me she thought M. must have been at least 5 years old, as she related the events and directed her to her Nana's house.

   The surgeon who stitched up his wounds, a few hundred stitches, said the force of the bites was so powerful that  the dog's teeth had penetrated his skull and that if he had been bitten anywhere else on his body it would have most likely been fatal.

  Of course, even then there were some dog advocates who speculated that maybe the child had stepped on the dog's toes, etc. The child was 28 months old and weighed 27 lbs. Dr. Grattan, who exerted full authority when he found out, said the dog weighed about 135 lbs. And because its teeth had entered into the child's skull, he ordered that it be euthanized and tested for rabies, even though it had had its rabies shot. The results were negative, but with no regrets on Dr. G's part. He said it was "a bad dog."

For the Birds

 In November, the Canada geese were congregated around the Frear Park circle, I'd guess up to  a hundred of them.  In the following weeks of our winter season, the number seen dwindled, to as low as a pair, but today there were an estimated couple of dozen. Whether some flew south and then back or whether they took to the wooded areas is of course an unknown. If we get a major snowstorm, you might say their goose would ----oh you know. 

  The geese have been cooperative, to the extent of my contact with them. None have crossed my path, though the Speed Humps may deter physical contact I suppose.

  But not the same for the wild turkeys, stupid creatures. One ran across Oakwood Ave. today, or I should say slowly traversed it, just in front of my car. I slowed down to avoid it and it crossed the road. But then an even stupider turkey hustled from the browse to the road in front of my car, and Birdstrike! Up and over my vehicle onto the car behind or maybe into the ditch to the right. (At least it wasn't a deer. 

C. C. does respond:

 

For ERIC