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Ken and I spent most of last Saturday in an area city that we don’t often visit. Knowing it would be close to supper time when we finished our business, I had made a reservation at a favorite restaurant. We finished our commitment before the eatery’s scheduled opening time. While waiting in their parking lot, we listened to classic country music on the truck radio. Ken thought about the frog legs he would soon be enjoying. They’re a delicacy few places serve.

What a disappointment when we were seated at our table. They had drastically reduced their menu since COVID-19 and various new, government regulations. Instead of several pages in a folder, we were given a typed sheet that didn’t include his favorite. When I had looked for a phone number on their website, they didn’t include their menu so we were surprised. The establishment was soon crowded. Apparently, their regulars had adjusted to their changes or maybe they had added some new customers.

A few weeks ago, my husband had gone fishing. I decided to treat myself and drove to a place that specialized in ladies’ lunches. When I pulled into their deserted parking lot, I saw a hand-lettered sign leaning against their front door, “Closed temporarily because we don’t have enough help.” I returned home and opened a can of soup.

A girlfriend and I have also run into problems trying to schedule a lunch together. Some of the places where we have met before, no longer serve at mid-day, but are only open in the evening for dinner. Others have closed permanently.

I don’t blame the restaurants who are trying to survive during the pandemic. It’s our obligation to find their website and check their current status. We need to accept unexpected changes.

Have you noticed differences in your favorite restaurants?

Mom taught me the benefit of taking a break in what I was doing when I was eight years old. I had received my first adult, three-hundred-piece, picture puzzle as a Christmas gift. After I had spent most of the morning trying to put together the three red and blue hued parrots, I began to cry in frustration. I couldn’t find any more pieces that fit. Mom said, “Go do something else for a while.”

I drew a picture of a house and colored it. When I returned to the card table, the correct pieces practically jumped out at me.

When I worked in an office, we had a 15-minute, coffee break in the morning and again in the afternoon. I think it was a combination of walking across the street to the shop, drinking coffee, conversation with my three co-workers and leaving the paperwork for a while that made me feel refreshed when I returned to my desk.

Entertainment also takes breaks. At dances, the musicians take an intermission. Plays are performed in three acts. Concerts give performers an interlude. That down-time also gives attendees an opportunity to buy refreshments and souvenirs.

As a writer who works at home, I’m a firm believer in the saying, “Apply the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.” But taking a break from time to time helps, too. It doesn’t have to be food or drink–it can be a household chore. I’ve found doing laundry is a good accompaniment. It only takes a few minutes to throw clothes into the automatic washer or move a load to the dryer. Even folding a batch doesn’t take long–the break time is limited. Then, it’s back to the computer. Often a word or idea that I couldn’t think of is right there waiting for me.

Do you incorporate breaks with your work?

Labor Day reminded me that many of the kid jobs that boosted self-esteem have disappeared. When my husband was a teenager, he and his friends, who also lived in town, were hired by area farmers to help bale hay during the summers. Today, large machines have automated the chore.

Growing up on a family dairy farm like I did, there were child-sized jobs such as feeding a calf from a pail of milk. Acreage has expanded and the work requires grown-ups.

Fifty years ago, in our village, a school boy or girl placed the daily newspaper on our front porch each morning before 7:00 a.m. Every other Friday, during the late afternoon or early evening, the young person knocked on our door to collect for our subscription. Now an adult flips the rolled-up paper from a car window and it lands on or near our front sidewalk. We pay online with a credit card.

During the same era, according to a “Not So Long Ago” column in our weekly, The Volunteer, “Dennis Snook has been named one of the top ten patrol boys in Winnebago County. The eighth grader is captain of the safety patrol. He received a certificate of recognition from the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Chicago Motor Club.” The elementary ‘big boys’ who donned white, woven, San Browne belts, guided the younger pupils walking across streets before and after school. Today, we have a woman in an orange vest holding up a sign to stop traffic while she shepherds students of all ages through the intersection.

When our son grew big enough to push our power mower, he cut the grass surrounding the homes of two elderly ladies who were our neighbors. He always complained about the Boston Bull Terrier who left deposits in the owner’s yard. Now, people hire landscaping businesses to do their mowing.

During the summer, our young daughter walked to the local nursing home where she volunteered as a ‘candy striper’ (referring to the red and while apron she wore). She did mundane tasks such as bringing fresh water to the residents and brightening their day with her smiling face and conversation. Some of our retired friends volunteer at health institutions to aid the staff.

While you were growing up, did you have a kid job that taught you the work ethic of honoring your task, taking pride in hard work and delivering the best results possible?

Sunday will be my 85th birthday. I’m amazed at the changes that have taken place during my lifetime.

Growing up an only child on a family dairy farm, I was dragged along when my mother labored outdoors alongside my father. Field work had to be sandwiched between morning and evening milking. As fall approaches, I’m reminded of corn picking.

Early in the spring, Dad planted the crop using a two-row implement pulled by our team of horses. Button wire was stretched from one end of the 20-acre field to the other, attached to the planter for each round and made the seed kernels drop two-to-a-hill in a checkerboard pattern. At the beginning of the growing season, he mounted the cultivator on his Allis Chalmers tractor and drove lengthwise and crosswise between the rows to remove the weeds.

My folks husked the ripened grain by hand. Dad, who covered two rows at a time while Mom did one, had a metal claws gadget that he strapped over his left glove. She used an aluminum peg to open the husks. My parents carefully tossed the cleaned ears so they didn’t hit me sitting in the wagon pulled by Dick and Brownie.

To liven up my day, Dad would lift me to sit astride Old Dick. My short legs stretched sideways as well as down over my fat steed. I held onto the harness and pretended I was riding the range with my favorite movie cowboys, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. Sometimes, when the afternoon sun was warm, I would fall asleep and had to be moved so I didn’t fall off.

Today, farmers stick to one crop. I drive by spreads including thousands of acres dense with corn rows harvested by huge machines.

What changes during your lifetime have impressed you?

Several years ago, my freelance articles published by national magazines qualified me to attend a new, three-day, summer conference for professional writers being held in Chicago. I looked forward to the opportunity although it was a little scary for this country gal to hobnob with big city folks.

After the first intense day of writing workshops and five-minute, one-on-one meetings with magazine editors, a few of us stopped in the hotel bar after dinner. Although, the women would have had a few gray hairs if it wasn’t for Miss Clairol, they began reminiscing about college escapades. I had nothing to add to the conversation–I’d never attended college. I’m sure they didn’t intend to intimidate me, but they did. I didn’t sleep well that night. By morning, I’d decided I didn’t belong. After breakfast, I found the leader of the conference and made an excuse that my husband needed me at home to care for our developmentally different daughter.

During the following year, I continued to submit magazine articles and did some soul searching. While flipping through one of those catalogs that came in the mail once in a while, I saw a Popeye tee shirt proclaiming, “I ‘yam what I ‘yam.” I never liked the old sea dog’s cartoons while I was growing up but, not to make Olive Oyl jealous, suddenly, he was my hero. His catchphrase spoke to me.

From talking with others, I realized nobody writes the same as somebody else. We all have different experiences, which shape our approach to articles.

The next summer, I received an invitation to the second conference for professional writers and attended with “I ‘yam what I ‘yam” firmly in mind. I made some useful, professional contacts with editors and some new writer friends.

How have you strengthen your self-confidence?

Papers and publications that I want to be sure don’t get lost go on our coffee table in the living room or my desk in the family room. The stacks can get a little high.

The coffee table always includes the TV remote, my guide to our cable channels, a coaster waiting for a beverage to be enjoyed and framed pictures of our two grandchildren. It is usually littered with the local, weekly newspaper, current magazines plus books I’m reading and those waiting to be read. Some of the novels on the list for our book club are so uninteresting to me that I keep another one going at the same time so I can switch when my attention wanes. An invitation to a social event goes there. too. They always arrive well in advance and may need to be consulted several times before we attend.

My desk contains the usual office supplies plus book-ends holding the two-volume set of The World Book Dictionary. I also keep notes and news items for possible use with my blog. Somewhere in the mélange is information regarding writers’ groups I belong to and anything connected with my published memoir, “The View from a Midwest Ferris Wheel.”

I don’t get as much done in a day as I used to. Instead of a big cleaning once a week, I cut the piles one thing at a time–it doesn’t leave a gap. I am reminded of my favorite Bill Murray move, What About Bob? The comedian was the obsessive-compulsive, neurotic patient intruding on the vacation of his successful psychotherapist played by Richard Dreyfuss. Murray’s line, “baby steps,” was the way to change anything. That has stuck in my mind. I console myself that I’m taking “baby steps” to a neat house.

Do you have a project that you need to approach with “baby steps?”

One of the topics that crops up from time to time at writers’ workshops is a session on dreams. According to presenters, we should analyze our night-time adventures because they are telling us something.

Linda, our developmentally different daughter, had let a bunch of exotic animals out of their cages. I was trying to decide how to get them back where they belonged without anyone knowing who let them loose. This morning when I looked at the calendar, I knew the message the dream was sending me–it had been fourteen years since she died of breast cancer.

The answer was easier when I was alerted to a possible problem. Ken and I were vacationing in a cabin. In the evening, I decided to go to the grocery store. I got lost in the dark and then the car quit. I walked to a nearby farm. The lady-of-the-house greeted me and invited me inside. The young woman, who was obviously pregnant, told me she was from Australia. She had met the farmer when he visited her homeland. I checked my pockets for my cell phone to call my husband but I had left it behind. I asked to borrow hers and she handed it to me. Then, I realized her instrument was useless because I didn’t know anyone’s number except my own–I relied on my list of contacts. I woke up without knowing how I was rescued.

Thinking about my dream the next day reminded me that when our phone hung on the wall, I didn’t need to look in the book listings for most of the numbers I dialed. I even still remember some of the 4-digits that I used years ago when an operator asked, “Number, please?” As a precaution, I have memorized my husband’s cell phone number.

Have you had a dream that was a message?

We are enthralled with a baby’s firsts–first smile, first words, first steps.

I think it’s also fascinating to watch a teenager’s first steps toward adulthood. With three kids born in four years, we had sieges of development from potty training to driver’s licenses. It may have been hair-raising at times to sit in the passenger seat while a teenager practices handling a car, but it’s part of parenthood in rural areas. After a sixteen-year-old passes the state exam, comes buying a used auto. That also takes a part-time job to pay-off a car loan.

Our two younger kids enrolled in the work/study program in high school. Instead of a full day in a classroom, one was hired part-time by the owner of a car dealership and the other by a ‘mom and pop’ marina. As part of their education, the employers taught them how small businesses function.

Our son is two years younger that his sister but they compete. I enjoyed listening to their conversations. One would say, “At work, we do this.” The other replied, “Well, at work, we do that.” It surprised me how much responsibility their bosses gave them. I was still fighting the urge to hold their hands to cross the street. The two continued those jobs while obtaining two-year degrees at Rock Valley College.

The firsts continued as they entered careers and moved out of our home. Soon they each bought a house. We were fortunate that they settled in our area.

Watching our two grandchildren grow up has been “Deja vu all over again” as Yogi Berra, the famous, Yankee’s baseball catcher of our day, would say. Many times, my husband and I look at each other and nod as the two young ones remind us of their father and their aunt.

Life consists of a succession of firsts. That’s what makes it interesting. This is my first experience as an octogenaarian–it has its rewards and its penalties.

What firsts have captivated you?

Daily, we’re asked to donate to a myriad of worthy causes. Our mail contains solicitations from both area and national charities. We watch TV commercials showing Shriners Hospitals for Children and the youngsters being treated for orthopedic conditions, spinal cord injuries and cleft lips and palates. Wounded Warriors assists veterans. At holiday time, Salvation Army bell ringers with red kettles stand in front of stores collecting for the needy. We are also solicited for money to rescue dogs being abused and to save the elephants in Africa. Some associations offer a gift such as a tee shirt, a blanket or return-address labels to show our support. Others sponsor gatherings of people enjoying a walk, a motorcycle ride or a meal.

Heart disease, cancer and Alzheimer’s hit all families. Others, known as ‘orphan diseases’, strike a small percentage of people. They don’t attract much public attention, research or funding. I’d never heard of scleroderma until my cousin told me she was dying from this autoimmune disease that affects skin, tissues, blood vessels and major organs. Its cause if unknown and there is no cure.

One organization touched me directly. When I was 19, my nagging cough was diagnosed as a serious case of tuberculosis. There was no charge for my five months stay at the Rockford Municipal Sanitarium, which treated patients from several, northern Illinois counties. Until 1957, my only contact with TB had been the Christmas seals Mom purchased every winter. The disease had been the scourge of the world before the development of the antibiotic streptomycin in 1946 made effective treatment and cure a reality.

Some solicitations are local. I worked with a parents’ group raising funds to establish an area sheltered workshop that employs people with disabilities after they age out of school.

How do you decide which charities to support?

In today’s culture, most people swear all of their lives according to the Ph.D.’s who study such things. Cussing isn’t just for the uneducated–it knows no social boundaries.

Expletives are a natural part of speech development. Little kids may not speak all words plainly, but curse words they’ve picked up from adults are loud and clear at the appropriate time.

It hasn’t always been this way. While I was growing up, men were cautioned to watch their language in front of the ladies. Apparently, the women in my family weren’t ladies–they swore when the occasion called for it. I learned their words, but didn’t use them out loud until I was too big to spank.

Movies reflect our times. In 1939, Gone with the Wind audiences were shocked when Rhett Butler (Clark Gable) told Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh), “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” In 2013, Leonardo DiCaprio starred as Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street. The f-word was used 569 times in the film.

Not all swear words are equal–they range from a mild euphemism to the extremely offensive. Taboo expressions include insults, profanity, blasphemy, vulgarity, sexual innuendoes, disgusting objects, animal references, ancestral allusions and offensive slang.

We swear to signify a number of emotions such as frustration, anger or surprise. Sometimes we’re alone but often it’s done to achieve a specific reaction from others. We choose our words according to our company, our relationship with the people and the social setting. Our vocabulary is quite different if we’re in our boss’s office or with friends in a bar having a drink after work.

People may underestimate the benefits of swearing. Four-letter words can be used as a substitute for physical violence such as throwing a balky cell phone against the wall or punching someone in the nose. A few off-color words may enhance pain tolerance.

Do you swear?