Death in My Dryer

Death in my Dryer

Old Union Cemetery, Lincoln, IL.

I was doing my laundry. A common, ordinary, everyday thing usually associated with life, not death. But a T-shirt and a book I just finished reading combined to make my thoughts meander down the cemetery path.

"A T-shirt? What's a T-shirt have to do with death? Is it Goth?"

No, it's better than Goth.

It's a shirt for a very special school. I'm sure there are only two of these T-shirts in Lincoln - along with three hoodie sweatshirts.

They read: WORSHAM - COLLEGE OF MORTURARY SCIENCE

Worsham is a privately owned and operated, fully accredited two year school that has been in Wheeling, Illinois for 100 years, training morticians/funeral directors. It is one of the most respect schools of mortuary science in the US.

And how did my family come to have Worsham shirts & jackets?

Because Bruce teaches insurance seminars. Prepaid funeral packages are tied into life insurance policies so the future funeral directors at Worsham need to get licenses to sell life insurance. Bruce goes to Worsham once or twice a year to give them their pre-licensing life insurance seminar.

I proudly wear my Worsham "T" and hoodie. If you get delivery from Guzzardo's in the winter, you may have seen my son-in-law wearing his Worsham hoodie.

A contemplative statue in Union Cemetery

The book I just finished is about the assassination of President James Garfield: "Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President." by Candice Millard.

I love well-written books about historical events more than biographies. With the event books you get a broader view, I think, of the time period as well as learning a good deal about the primary people involved. In this case, you also learn about the state of medicine at a time when Joseph Lister had been promoting the practice of "antisepsis" in all medical procedures but it had not yet gained total acceptance amongst practicing physicians - especially here in the US.

Quite literally, President Garfield was as much killed by his doctor's care as by his assassin's bullet. None of his doctors washed their hands before dealing with the wound. The instruments that were used on him were not sterilized, or if they were they were being handled by unwashed hands so it didn't really matter. Plus, the handles on the instruments were usually wood or ivory - porous materials that don't sterilize well anyway. He quickly developed infections, which the man who assumed the position of chief physician dealt with poorly (even for that time) or did nothing at all. The wound was deep and could have killed him anyway, but many felt then, and now, that with the best care of that day - meaning the use of antiseptic procedures - the President may have lived as there were many Civil War veterans who survived serious bullet wounds, lived and still had the bullet inside them.

The author acknowledges that many of her readers were probably wondering why the president wasn't taken to the hospital? Why was he taken back to the White House?

Back then, in 1881, hospitals were places for the indigent. They were where you went if you couldn't afford a physician who would come and treat you in the comfort of your own home. Hospitals were, because antiseptic procedures had not been well accepted yet, filthy, smelly, vile places. Even more so than today - No One wanted to go to a hospital back then.

You were sick at home.

You were cared for at home.

You died at home.

Your funeral was in your home.

As hospitals improved, all the events of serious illness and surgery began to happen there, more people died there instead of at home, and funerals began to change as well. Instead of the funeral being in your home it was in the mortician’s or funeral director's home. You would be laid out in his parlor and people went to his house to mourn and pay their final respects. Hence the now familiar terms: funeral parlor and funeral home.

And so I've come full circle back to Worsham College of Mortuary Science, trainer of morticians and funeral directors . . .

and one of their school T-shirts in my clothes dryer.

The T-shirt that started it all.

The Conception & Birth of a New Backyard

 When you last heard from me I told you about my becoming a gardener - sort of.

I suppose, technically speaking, if you have plants and you've put them in the ground or some suitable container with soil you're a gardener. Not a good one, perhaps, not an experienced one or a Master Gardener. Just a generic gardener. And that's where I'm at.

My herb garden in a box is doing well and I actually used some of my herbs in a spaghetti sauce. Wow! "Look Ma, I used fresh herbs!" A definite first for me.

"But - - - what about your yard?" you're thinking. "Have you fetched home your plantlings from 'day care'? Have you put in flower/herb beds?"

Well, that's turned into a whole other story.

Once upon a time, Hubby & I bought a little house. The house had a back yard with drop-offs on two sides which are full of trees and bushes giving the yard a nice "country" feel. It also had a wood deck tucked into the "L" shape formed by the back of the garage and one side of the house. A nice deck which the home-maintainance challenged Richardsons didn't take good care of. In the sixteen years since we bought the house, the part of the deck that is always in the sun has suffered greatly. The yard isn't exactly pampered either.

The time has come.

I found I was seriously stressing over the whole "where to put the flower beds" and "what to do with the backyard" issue. Added to the situation is the fact we're on architectual land fill (all the bricks, cement, floor tiles, various fixtures, etc. from the old St. Clara's Hospital).

It is not fun digging in our yard.

Raised beds? Where? Edged with what? How deep should they be? Etc. Etc. Etc.

Finally, I brought Bruce in on this. He lives here too and should have imput into changes.

"Well," he said once we were outside looking at the current yard arrangement, "the deck has to go. I'd like to replace it with a patio using those patio blocks."

All Right! That was exactly what I was thinking we should do. How cool is that, we had the same idea.

But wait - there's more!

Bruce proceeded to walk around and with grand gestures described his dream yard to me - and I loved it.

Behold the plans for the new backyard (drawn by me).

 I'm sorry it won't get bigger than this. The area that reads "15'X15' Patio" is located where the wooden deck was. Off of that will be a gravel path with landscaping rock and container garden areas (I'll be putting a modest sized fountain in there somewhere as well :-) ) which will lead into either the open part of the yard or to a second patio.

Way more involved than anything I imagined! Bruce is way cool!

Work has begun. Of course the only photo I could find that really showed the old deck well is a winter shot, but you can get an idea of what it looked like. (The circle in the snow is a ring for holding a firebowl.)

Here is Bruce with the bench and the fence gone and a few of the "floor" boards gone.

By the end of the day Saturday June 9th, it looked like this - about half the floor gone.

Bruce got the bench and fence out all by himself, I didn't work on the deck until he already had three of the "floor" boards out. (I had been burning brush from trimming the trees and stuff along the ravine.)

We have a long way to go and I'll be posting the story and photos whenever progress is made.

Till then, hope things are progressing for you on whatever project you are working on. :-) Let us know about it so we can all be cheering you on as well. :-)