JIM'S SHIRTS

AS ALWAYS

 I put them on thin wooden hangers, the kind they used in country general stores back in the fifties when you could buy a denim shirt along with a box of halfpenny nails and jug of maple syrup all from under one roof. A mercantile where wooden floors creaked as you walked and cotton boxer shorts were kept in drawers wrapped in tissue all smelling of pine.

I have separated my closet into sections; it's a big closet with two levels of hanging garments on other side of a shelving area for folded clothes. I keep my sweaters folded on the shelves and organized by color.  On either side of the stacked shelves I've organized the rest of the closet with one hanging bar to the right for my pants, another for my summer shirts, on the left a third bar for my winter shirts with the last bar for my collection of vests. I tucked those wooden hangers in with my winter shirts, three hangers for three shirts: a heavy denim long-sleeve, a faded cotton button-down with barely perceptible blue stripes on an off white field, and a grey and white ticking stripe. These are the shirts I pulled from Jim's closet before his sister put the rest of his clothes into black lawn refuse bags to be carted off to Goodwill.

We met over fifty years ago after we both had matriculated into tenth grade coming from different junior high schools to a brand new high school that had just opened for its first set of students. We were an unlikely pair; he was a football player and boy scout, I wasn't. But we both loved art and that was enough, we bonded over plaster of Paris and bas-relief. It was high school knowledge that art classes were mostly attended by kids who were looking for an easy pass/fail class with no final exam. Roland Jansky, our art teacher, had no intention of making it easy. He made it challenging, inspiring and fun. He bonded us into a group that would stick together through the rest of high school, college, our first trips to Europe, careers in New York City and finally back to our roots. Best friends forever.

When Jim died on a Sunday I couldn't find the tears. I sat with him in the hospital. I recognized him but I didn't recognize him. I knew he was dead but I didn't. He was my rock and rocks don't die. I ran my hand through his lush mane of gorgeous white hair and touched his forehead. It was still warm, not yet cold. It was the last time I touched him. The German in both of us always kept us at a physical distance. An awkward hug with a fist pound on the back and an equally uncomfortable disengagement was the best we could muster and only on very rare occasions. It wasn't the way we expressed our love but we did love each other, massively. 

Now I'm left to process. My closet now has three more hangers each with a shirt he wore. Each day since he died I've run my hand first over my summer shirts, then across the shelves of sweaters and finally onto the long-sleeve worn denim work shirt, the faded blue and off-white cotton button-down a bit too large for me and the grey striped ticking shirt. Since Jim died I haven't worn one of my shirts. I've worn his. It keeps him close to me. He hugs me all day long.

Photo: James Koch

HITTING THE NAIL ON THE HEAD

THE NEIGHBORHOOD AND THE VIRUS

THE HOOD

There have been many times in my life when the world seemed to have been turned upside down. When it felt like my life was balanced on a razor's edge when the stress was so potent and the fear so high my eyes jumped at the creak of a floorboard. This virus is different.
When I was young and insecure and had no resume for coping with danger, every war or financial failure seemed like a death note, something that would never end because there could never be a solution, but there always was.
This time the signs of trembling fear, the fear that weakens your knees and leaves your upper lip twitching with beads of sweat isn't within me. It probably should be.

I've been away from New York for almost two months. I'm in Madison, Wisconsin. The pandemic is here. We all stay close to home. We wear masks if we go out. We keep our distance but the sirens of death have yet to be heard with the severity of the city I left. Here in Madison it's the cardinal's song that wakes me in the morning.
Being home in Madison has been a gift, a gift of family, a gift of community. We have physical fences on all sides of out property but they've not been barriers. They've been supports to lean over to call out to Issac and Julie or Pat and Randy. For six years we've lived next to Caroline we've only spoken to her once. Now we're all on our knees pulling mustard weed out of each other's yards. Turns out our neighbors to the back sell organic pork, beef, lamb and poultry. Something we never knew. We bought a quarter hog that Issac is keeping for us in their freezer. We clap our hands every time Julie shows up in her backyard. She's a nurse and a hero and we wouldn't have known this if the virus hadn't put us at a six foot distance across our fences as both shouted out to each other, "Hi, I'm Rick, love what you're doing with your garden".

The time spent at home with safe walks around the sidewalks of our neighborhood has unexpectedly soothed me with a blanket of calm. There is so much kindness out there it overwhelms me with gratitude that I live here, here where signs like this dot the front yards of many homes.

Green spaces and nature sanctuaries are abundant and protected perfuming the communal air

with the sweetness of mowed grass and honeysuckle.

Little free libraries, a movement that began here in Madison several years ago, dot the city and our neighborhood in color, ingenuity and culture.

There's been a relaxation of fear as a dash of humor has been the spice that makes our neighborhood so delicious. We have a designated block harkening back to the days of Monty Python where silly walks are mandatory. The marshals of our silly walks sitting out on their patio told me the story of a police cruiser that passed by. It made a slow first pace then turned around and parked. The officer got out and did his silly walk for the whole block before he got back into his car and drove away.

With all this goodness guilt is still here. I know not everyone is lucky enough to be able to remove themselves from the grave dangers that exist right now. I was able to escape New York before the door on that possibility of leaving was shut. I don't have a job that requires me to put my life on the line. Right now I don't have to make a choice between my health and putting food on the table.
I'm lucky. I wish everyone was. I can't say moving back to Madison was a choice I made enthusiastically. Fate pushed me back here. I'm so glad it did.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Even this Georgia born New Yorker has finally come to feel connected with this beautiful city he once anointed with the moniker " My own private Siberia" at first feeling exiled from my beloved New York City.  I have a beautiful, comfortable home, gardens I can get my hands dirty in and neighbors I love, neighbors who when you need a gardening tool or advice, are there for you (you know who you are - Pat & Randy , Julie & Issac).  This pandemic will end, my NYC apartment will be there, actually an upgraded one, but I will forever be grateful to Madison, Wisconsin for saving my life, not once but twice; you see I am a 10 year cancer survivor and had it not been for an exceptional medical community providing exceptional care in this city, I may not be here in this amazing world we all live in.

OUR LIFE IN INDUSTRIAL SHOW BUSINESS

WE WERE ONCE SPLASHING IN THE BATHTUB OVER BROADWAY POOL

Left with too much idle time and a mind trending toward the melancholy I've been trying to detain the approaching ennui by doing a checklist of my life's milestones. It's been like putting together a bucket list in reverse. I've been reminiscing and with each memory I've added a mental tick mark signifying, "I did that". First black eye from a bully, check "I did that". First girlfriend, and her name was Betty White, honestly, check, "I did that".. Finished my masters degree and went on to become an associate professor at of all places Kansas State University, check, "I did that". Went to a nude beach, more than once, check, "I did that". Kissed a boy and we all know how that went, check, "I did that". Moved to Hollywood looking for fame, check, "I did that". Moved to New York to find my destiny and the love of my life, check, "I did that" and in my list of life's ups and downs that's where my past lined up with my present a few days ago.

That part of my bucket list story was thrown back at me on an afternoon that began with Rick giggling and chortling from the bedroom while watching TV. It got to the point where I couldn't stand the mystery of what was poking his funny bone. I wandered back to where the laughter was rippling between waves of mirthful chirps to snorts of tearing hysterics.
"What are you watching?"
"You've got to see this. It's called Bathtubs Over Broadway"

Steve Young, once a writer on The David Letterman Show,  created and developed the documentary about his obsession with collecting vinyl recordings and footage of the elaborate musical numbers done for a limited audience of business sales forces on a one showing only basis.

This was our life for almost twenty years in the 80's and 90's. Rick job managed and I designed shows for Avon, McNeil Labs, The Italian Trade Commission, Wang Computers and a host of pharmaceutical, insurance and cosmetic companies. The work was demanding. All-nighters were a way of life but we traveled the world and the pay was more than pretty good.  The shows were either product introductions, annual sales meetings or incentive rewards for a company's top sales force. Many of the shows required charts and graphs, some used complicated screen moves requiring  dozens of projectors and video, while others were full blown musicals with original music and a professional cast of singers and dancers.

The money spent on these shows could veer into the millions. Steve Young points out that in 1956 the producers of the Broadway production of My Fair Lady spent $446,000 on the opening while Chevrolet spent three million dollars on their industrial that opened, ran and closed all in one night that same year.
Even if your company never took you to an annual meeting or you never won an incentive trip to Rome as your regions top salesperson, watching Bathtubs Over Broadway on Netflix or On Demand is time well spent. You know you've got the time and by now you should be running out of episodes of Tiger King and reruns of The Office. It's a good laugh and for Rick and me a real stroll down memory lane but by all means don't miss the ending. It's a production any Broadway show would be proud to call their own.

COPING WITH COVID 19; HOW ABOUT A DOSE OF LAUGHTER

I've had an epiphany or as Oprah says, an "Ah ha moment".  I have become numb to all the death and dying, heartache and suffering in my, OUR world today.  Oh I still cry at the drop of a hat as I always have when I see or hear something that moves me.  Heck I even cry sometimes when I attempt to sing along with a song I hear which stirs my emotions.  When I see news stories of the brave women and men on the frontlines of fighting this horrible pandemic I cry.  When I see lists of names of those who died because of Covid 19 I cry.  Emmy and Lee are reprimanding and shaming me for leaving my used tissues all around the house, as they should!  Still I feel as though I'm watching some sort of Sci-Fi movie, though I'd never watch such a film.  But somehow I feel this calamity is something happening out side of me, somewhere out there, still I know it's real.  The numbness comes I think from the bombardment of news reports, talking heads and pundits relating stories and opinions of the very grave time in which we are living.  This simply can't be good for one's psyche.  So like many I've taken to my phone, reading Instagram posts and playing word games and games of solitaire and desperately trying to learn Italian on Duolingo.  I've watched documentaries and movies on Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime that in normal times I would most likely not have seen.
The professor, author, political journalist and advocate for world peace Norman Cousins detailed the powerful benefits of "laugh therapy" in his 1979 book Anatomy of an Illness.  
Cousins attributed his cure of two very serious illnesses partially to watching comedy films and laughing.  Subscribing to his advice I've taken to the streaming services to ease my fears, anxiety and sadness about this terrible situation we are all in.  I've rewatched all seven seasons of Designing Women on Hulu hearing my own Southern accent thicken and vacillating between affecting the personas of those four feisty belles.  I've viewed countless hilarious so called "chic flicks" with plot lines of moms' nights out and female road trips.  Hey whatta you want, I'm a gay guy who embraces his feminine side!  So my advice to you is turn off CNN, MSNBC and Fox News and relegate your news intake to the morning and evening news programs or a few newspaper articles and the rest of the time watch some silly movie or TV show.  Better yet, bury yourself in a good book!  And please share this advice and post with your family and friends.  Please stay safe and well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1fbQSf2jSI

CONVERGENCE

RIGHT PLACE-RIGHT TIME/WRONG TIME-WRONG PLACE

Most people live the bulk of their lives in neutral with the major highs and lows, the forwards and the reverses only showing up as a few blips on the cardiogram of their lives. Being at the right place at the right time or being at the wrong place at the wrong time are the points on one's cardiogram of life that show up infrequently if at all. The most rare of these spikes is when one person's right time right place collides with another person's wrong time wrong place and their intersecting collision cancels each other out. These points of intersection shouldn't be confused with luck. It's not when someone wins the lottery that's just being at the right place at the right time. It's not about losing your life savings at the blackjack table. That's just your bad luck.
With the Coronavirus halting all life as we've known it, the wisest amongst us have told us we're all to shelter in place. Staying home helps all of us in protecting ourselves and each other. Other than emergencies or essential shopping for food or medications we should all be isolating, keeping out of the Coronavirus' way.

Being stuck in the middle of a remodeling project and needing a mat knife to trim down a rug pad, I'll admit, is not something I can really twist into classifying as an emergency unless you consider that rug pad issue affects the rug that then affects moving the furniture back in, that then means our daughter can't move back into her room, that means we're stuck with listening to a continuous looping laugh track of The Office playing from the guest bedroom adjacent to our bedroom. If I stretch the definition of essential shopping I may be able to squeeze in a mat knife purchase as fundamentally necessary in allowing me to cope with my OCD fear of losing control over the completion of our reno project. Mental health is my only justification but I do this with a tremendously large scoop of guilt. Further rationalization allowed me to give myself permission to leave the house when I saw the government classifying hardware stores as essential services. I figured if I made a handkerchief and hair-tie mask, wore gloves and carried my homemade hand sanitizer I would be protecting myself and more importantly protecting others. Home Depot was my goal. In and out in as short a period of time as I could manage. When lives are at stake going out to purchase a mat knife might sound like a reckless, selfish thing to do. I knew that but here's where the definitions of right and wrong begin to blur.

Even before I had the car out of the driveway I began shaking my head in shame and regret. I began telling myself that this non-essential trip was not right. Even my mask seemed to be trying to tell me this wasn't worth it. The small hairbands began to pull at the backs of my ears, pinching them and making them burn. The four miles from our house to the closest Home Depot was going to take less than ten minutes. Add to that thirty minutes in Home Depot and I'd be back home in less than an hour.
A Home Depot in Madison at this point in the Coronavirus ring of immediate danger was not yet reaching its apex although lines for service or checking out were marked in six-foot increments. I got my knife without touching anything with my hands and I used the provided sanitary wipes to sterilize the keypad at self-checkout.
I was back in the car and halfway home when my moment of intersection happened.

This only happened to me one time before back at our weekend home in the Upper Catskills. Early on a Saturday evening in summer I was driving the country roads of Delaware County on my way to the weekly McIntosh auction in an old creamery in Bovina. The light was still golden. I was pushing the speed limit hoping to get to the auction a little early so I could get a good seat. There's not a lot of traffic in Delaware County on an early Saturday evening. I hadn't encountered a single car coming in the opposite direction.  About twenty minutes into the drive I started to close in on a pickup truck on the road ahead of me. The roads in Delaware County are never straight but bend and weave their way through the Catskill Mountains and valleys. I saw the pickup as a distant speck and then lose sight as it bent around a mountain curve. When the pickup came into view again I could see what appeared to be flames shooting out from underneath the pickup's back bed. The only thing I could think of was I needed to get the driver to pull over and get out of the truck before the whole thing caught fire. If I wasn't speeding before I now moved with the intensity of an Indy 500 driver to get as close as I could to the rear of his truck. I couldn't pass him on these curving roads so I began honking and flashing my lights. The driver's first reaction was to speed up but I kept on his tail honking and flashing my lights as the flames seemed be broadening. All I could think of now was to begin violently waving my hand to see if that would get him to pull over. Finally he seemed to get the message and he pulled over.  I followed him onto the shoulder yelling "Get out, GET OUT!" as the flames were still shooting out of the back of his truck. He looked completely confused until he saw the flames. I told him to get but leapt back toward the cab.  He wasn't listening, He managed to grab a clipboard before the back of the truck blew up. He was safe, unharmed but stunned, too stunned to ask "Where did you come from" or to say, "Thank you". I drove off to the nearest house I could find. I asked them to call the state police or whoever might be able to help. I drove on to the auction. Everything was back to normal

The road back home from Home Depot wasn't rural or particularly curvy but it was wide enough to have a median dividing the two directions of traffic. At a certain point the road passed through a low-income housing area. There were ten to twelve units in each two ot three story building. There were over two dozen buildings spread out at random angles on both sides of the street with a small park and open green spaces linking them into one complex. The complex tried its best to seem serene. Dusk was just beginning to set in with the sun starting its golden decent. There's a right angle turn in the road that wraps around the end of the complex. Even though there are several outdoor parking areas slapped up against some of the buildings several cars were still parked along the road. Two cars were left parked right at the bend in the road. When I began maneuvering the curve is when I saw them. The oldest, a boy, was no more than two, his sister not much more than one waddling with the first steps of a toddler. They were still on the grass but heading toward the street at a point where they would be hidden by the parked cars from a driver coming from the opposite direction. It was my time to decide if this was going to be right time/right place or something very, very different. There was no time to think. Instinct was all I had to go on. I hit the breaks and then the flasher button leaving the car in the middle of the street with the door flung open. I hid my fear behind a mask of stern calm. I held out my hand and used the command I use on our dogs "Stay". The little girl seemed to stop but the boy smiled as if he recognized me and then started to enter the street in front of the parked car. I bolted not looking in either direction sweeping him up and back to the grassy edge between the street and the sidewalk. Neither child cried. They only looked at me with the blank stare of childhood trying to figure out if they should be scared of the situation or the stranger. I couldn't get out any words we just stayed there, me on my knees, three humans frozen in space wondering what to do next. Then I saw a man coming across the open space neither running nor appearing gripped in fear. I couldn't tell if he was relieved or angry. I didn't know if I should yell at him for not keeping a watchful eye over his kids or smile at lives being allowed to continue. Instead he nodded; no words were spoken by either of us. He walked off with the two children. He didn't take their hands. He didn't hit or scold them while within my eyesight. I got back into my car. Life returned to neutral.

Making Beautiful Music: "You've Got a Friend" | BEAUTIFUL - THE CAROLE K...

ME VS. THE VIRUS

I'm trying to figure out if there is a way to weather the Coronavirus when there doesn't seem to be any light at the end of the tunnel? I've been dodging the bug; so far so good but it's been a minefield. Without a test for the virus I'm still self-isolating and keeping this diary

Back in the middle of March work pushed me into a situation where I had to defy reason and embrace the stupid. Work for us centers mostly in New York, one of the places in the United States at the time most likely to suffer the major brunt of the epidemic. What was I going to do?

Should I sit home in Madison a city with major medical assistance from three major hospital systems including state of the art medical research facilities or head straight into the storm? Barring the fact that there is a strong medical presence in New York it still remained woefully deficient in supplies and hospital space for an expected onslaught of the ill and dying. I thought about it. I'm old enough for my family to worry about my health. They were even threatening to cancel any travel plans I'd already made. The only place worse to travel to would have been Italy and as much as we consider it to be our home away from home it didn't fall into my game plan.
Everything was a last minute decision. Should I go or should I stay?

The scramble in Madison was on as I rushed from grocery store to drugstore to the construction worker's protection section of our local hardware store, all to no good. Hand sanitizers...no. Protection masks...no. Sanitary wipes...no. Construction worker's respirators...no. When I got home Rick had found some rubbing alcohol with a 70% rating in our medicine cabinet along with a bottle of Aloe Vera gel in a box where we keep our summer suntan and sunburn ointments. If you mix two-thirds rubbing alcohol to one part Aloe Vera you have an adequate hand sanitizer. I felt a little better about leaving on a jet plane. Rick was meeting with a client in Milwaukee. To add salt to his wound I made him drop me off at the General Mitchell Airport.

When I arrived the Milwaukee airport was neither overly packed nor noticeably empty. There weren't an abundance of masked passengers although I was aware of keeping my distance and did wear a pair of winter leather gloves despite the fact that I was inside and it was seasonably temperate outside. Any glances I got from my mostly unmasked companion passengers were only worth a shrug on my part.

Since I travel so much I had an early boarding number on Southwest Airlines. With Southwest there are no assigned seats. You're given a boarding number and from there you get your choice of seats. I was second to board, second out of a little less than seventy passengers. It meant we could spread out on the plane. In fact we were told we had to spread out to distribute the weight so as not to make the plane nose heavy. I obeyed by sitting in the aisle seat of a three-seat row intimidating anyone to try and squeeze by me into the window seat. I've gotten very good at this.  Since the number of infected in New York hadn't risen to anything to warrant having the hairs on your arms start to stand on end the concern factor on our plane was minimal. None of the stewards wore masks as they nonchalantly passed out drinks and those little packets of miniature pretzels with their bare hands. I still put my gloves back on as we disembarked the plane and I exited through the new terminal B at LaGuardia Airport.

When I fly from Milwaukee to New York to save money I take public transportation to get me from the airport to the apartment. I'm usually traveling pretty light since over the years that we've been doing this we've accumulated a complete double wardrobe one in each location. I can get right off the plane, hop on the bus for a short ride to the subway (I do have to a one time subway transfer) and then I'm out with a one-block walk to our front door. Time wise I can normally beat an Uber or cab ride by a good deal of time and my savings is great, dropping the price from $50+ to $2.75. Who's smart now? The ride was a breeze but I still wasn't seeing a lot of paranoid or even cautious subway riders. The train wasn't too full. I got a seat and still managed to keep myself a little under the now recommended social distancing recommendation.

It was around eight at night when I unlocked the door to the apartment. I sat my luggage down, picked up a pencil and a pad and went right to work putting together a grocery list. We have a Trader Joe's three blocks up Columbus Avenue. It wasn't raining when I got home but in the fifteen minutes it took me to put together a shopping list the rain had started. It was barely a drizzle, not enough to run back up the three flights of stairs for an umbrella. I had at least remembered our, dare I say, pretentious linen bag with the word, "Montalcino" stenciled on the side. I was willing to get a little wet but I wasn't ready for the pandemonium of Trader Joe's. The minute I walked in and realized I'd have to wait for a cart I knew I was in trouble. Almost all the shelves were empty and although I didn't see any fights over the last bag of chopped kale and broccoli salad I was willing to grab one of the last bunches of clearly over ripe Chiquitas. Somehow I was able to fill my cart with some frozen blueberries, a gallon of 1% milk, a dozen eggs, a couple of frozen Masala vegetarian dinners and a tub of crumbled blue cheese before I went to find the end of the checkout line. Our Trader Joe's has five aisles each stretching the length of the store that occupies half of a city block. I was the last person in the last aisle in the queue of shoppers that snaked all the way through every aisle. Patience was a virtue as I found there were several benefits to this long line. I quickly became friends with Laquicha, the woman in front of me, and Felicia, the woman behind me. We quickly formed our own little cadre where we held each other's places in line, moving along each other's carts as one or the other of us found something we could add to our buggies that we weren't able to see before. I picked up three boxes of ginger cookies, a jar of peach halves and a plastic container of salted brownie bites someone had discarded in the ice cream cooler.

When I finally got through checkout and walked out into the rain at 9:45 there was now a line of people stretching all the way down the block and around the corner waiting to get in when the store was scheduled to close in fifteen minutes. I felt lucky. A little wet but lucky.
I wouldn't have come back to the city were there not clients I had to attend to. I scheduled my meetings but intended to quarantine in place as much as I could. You have no idea of how difficult this is for me. I'm not good at just veg'ing out. On vacation I need to be on the go trying to see everything there is to see. I schedule trips to museums, urban park excursions and shopping trips when my family would prefer sitting poolside and working on their tans. They usually end up telling me to just go and do my thing and that's fine with me. I tried my best to hunker down and stay in the apartment.

I organized paperwork, I cleaned, and I re-watched every season and every episode of The Great British Baking Show. I even started Googling all the contestants to discover their backstories. John now has four cookbooks and a TV guest roll, Liam is the new host of Bake Off: The Professionals and Val still insists everything tastes better when baked with love. In between episodes I'd shuttle back and forth to MSNBC to check on what was happening with the world and the Coronavirus thinking that perhaps Mother Nature was sending us to our rooms without any dinner to think about what we had done. Each day in New York the itch to run progressed into a severe case of hives, a creeping anxiety telling me to finish up what I could and then leave before I could no longer get out of the city. I changed my flight twice as the news kept on intimating that air travel was on a precarious edge of total discontinuation. I moved my first flight back to Madison from Friday to Wednesday and then Monday morning my intuition told me it was jump now or relegate myself to a very lonely stay in New York without any family. I leapt. Clearly the airlines were as scared as I was.  Even with less than twelve hours between changing my reservation and the scheduled flight departure I got the new flight at no extra cost.

I had enough time to pack up my presentation and walk it across Central Park to my client's, drop it off with the doorman and then walk back to my apartment past all the closed museums on Fifth Avenue. I decided that the less public transportation I needed to take the better.

I threw any client folders and materials I might need into a carry-on, called Rick to tell him my plan and headed to the airport, the virtually empty airport. There were twenty-three ticketed passengers for my flight back waiting to board a plane that held hundreds. I had my homemade sanitizer and a pair of gloves. I wrapped a summer scarf around my face and crossed my fingers. I didn't need to use the snake eye face to commandeer my entire row. We all spread out trying to maintain our six feet of distance but once again the stewardesses didn't seem to be particular concerned. I would have been wearing a hazmat suit if I were forced to work in a metal cigar with a bunch of strangers whose medical histories I didn't know.

I'm back in Madison self quarantining for the next two weeks and re-watching the episodes I've already re-watched a half-dozen times of The Great British Baking Show. As long as it can still make me smile every time Rahul wins another star baker title or Nadyia with tears rolling down her face soliloquies on how she's learned to believe in herself through baking. Just hand me the hand-sanitizer and a hanky and I'll be l okay.

CHRISTMAS OUTDOOR LIGHTS

A RESCUE OPERATION

When it comes to anything outside the house other than gardening the task normally falls into my lap. The gutters need to be cleaned - Lee does it. The garbage needs to go out - Lee does it. The outdoor furniture needs to be brought in - Lee does it. Now I'm not trying to claim the mantel of martyr, Rick plans out all the planting. He buys all the perennials and annuals but I've definitely been "Ricked" on more than one occasion when it comes to digging the holes and stuffing the seeds and plants into the ground.

Editor's Note:
Just a question for the author - who does all that stuff when Lee is ny NYC?  Asking for a friend.

This year the hanging of the Christmas lights came at a time when I was locked into New York and Rick was on sabbatical in Madison. He volunteered to design and engineer this year's display. He began with a search for new lights online. He found a site with what he thought was a tremendous deal on mini-LEDs. If he bought a dozen he'd automatically qualify for two-dozen more for FREE! Nothing is ever free.  He really tried his best but even if they had included another hundred of these battery operated strands it wouldn't have been enough. He called me in New York totally frustrated pleading for me to come up with a solution to pull our house from pathetic to impressive. I didn't know how I could rescue him from over a thousand miles away without even a picture of what he was up against. I told him not to worry. I was sure it couldn't be as bad as he thought it was. Kindness has its limits.
I wasn't going to be back in Wisconsin for another three days so whatever look he had created was going to have to suffice until I got back. I tried to tell him if he thought it was dreadful he should just not turn them on but he had already wired them to a timer so in his words the shame of inadequacy was going to have to remain as a badge of design failure until my return. I tried to bolster his confidence by telling him he at least he had not resorted to those blowup Christmas characters that rise with the impending darkness of a winter evening and then deflate into a puddle of plastic during the day. It calmed him to know that indeed there were worse displays and he wasn't going to be in last place no matter how bad the house looked
When I did get back to Wisconsin and once evening turned nature's lights off I was immediately aware of his pain and shame. His gallant attempt at holiday decorating didn't achieve the Martha Stewart stamp of over achievement he normally creates. Unfortunately he had sunk miserably short of a design blue ribbon and into the category of stink, stank, stunk.

It was time to hunker into the crawl space and root through the boxes of additional decorations to see what was left and usable. I found several strands of the standard little white lights that we could daisy chain together to beef up the wattage of what Rick had valiantly already strung along the railings, posts and trellis in the front yard. Now that the holiday was swiftly approaching its climax of Christmas Eve most stores had put their remaining holiday decorations on a fifty-percent off sale. I bought a few more lights, two wicker baskets and some red plastic outdoor balls impervious to breakage and completely non-biodegradable. Sorry, I was desperate.
I pulled together the baskets and the red balls along with the wicker balls Rick had bought. In minutes I had an instant set of focal points for the front porch.

I pulled out the wreath we had used for several years and hooked it up on the rose trellis between the front bedroom windows before I left. This weathered wreath stayed where Rick had left it.
Next I took the little white lights I found in the crawl space and wove them in between and over the birch limbs Rick had stuck into the galvanized pots along the side of the entry. Along with the little battery operated bug lights Rick had ordered at discount online this beefed up the trellis. We then hung the plastic red ornaments on velvet ribbons on the birch branches, connected them to the power source and timer, we were almost done.

The last thing was to stick a spotlight into the unfrozen ground and aim it toward the double front doors. Mission accomplished. All we needed was the snow

Addendum: Just prior to taking the decorations down on the beginning of the new year we did get enough of dusting to make the decorations complete. We only wish that as we approach February some of our neighbors might consider it's time to deflate vinyl Santa and roll him up before they start bringing out the Easter bunny.