Twin Cities Breastfeeding Resource List – in honor of World Breastfeeding Week

Posted on August 11, 2014 by anne

Support for Breastfeeding  

Twin Cities Resource List

 

* This list is provided for your reference and does NOT imply endorsement by me or anyone else.  If you want the list as a .doc or .pdf, or if you have resources to add, please send me a message.*

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For telephone help and for ongoing support:

 

La Leche League                    612-922-4996              to find a local Leader and/or Group

                                                    www.llli.org; www.lllofmndas.org

                                                   877-4-LALECHE                24-hour breastfeeding helpline

                                                   (877-452-5324)

 

WIC                                     1-800-942-4030           General Number                                   

                                             612-348-6100                 Hennepin County Number                    

                                             651-778-0077                 Ramsey County Number                       

                                             651-249-1683              Ramsey County Lactation Consultant

                                    

InfantRisk Center                   806-352-2519          Drug safety information for pregnant

                                         8 am to 5 pm weekdays        and breastfeeding women and their

                                                                                                  healthcare providers

                                               

National Women’s                  1-800-994-9662                       English and Spanish

Health Information Center    Monday-Friday 8 am to 5 pm

Breastfeeding Helpline

 

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For in-person lactation consultations:

 

Abbott NW Mother Baby Center     612-863-4638    outpatient appointments

800 E 28th St, Rms. MB4603/MB4605                          Seven days a week!    8 – 4:30

Minneapolis MN 55407                                                    5 IBCLCs

 

Amplatz Children’s Hospital       612-273-2220    outpatient appointments

2450 Riverside Ave                                                Monday – Thursday

Minneapolis MN 55454                                         1 CPNP IBCLC; interpreters

 

Brooklyn Center Clinic          612-873-MYMD        outpatient appointments

6601 Shingle Creek Parkway       (612-873-6963) Tuesdays, Thursdays    8:30 am – 4 pm

Suite 400                                                                           IBCLC

Brooklyn Center MN 55430

 

Children’s Hospital Mpls         612-813-7654      outpatient appointments

Lactation Support Line

2525 Chicago Ave S

Minneapolis, MN  55404

 

Como Lactation Clinic            952-967-7955    call from 7 am to 9 pm to schedule

2500 Como Avenue                                                       outpatient appointments

St Paul MN  55108                         651-641-3114     Lactation Consultant phone number

8 am to 5 pm Monday-Friday

 

Fairview Ridges                      952-892-2552    outpatient appointments

201 East Nicollet Blvd                                           Monday – Friday     8 am – 3 pm

Burnsville MN 55337                                             IBCLC

 

Fairview Children’s Clinic     612-672-2350    outpatient appointments

2535 University Ave. S.E.                                     MD IBCLC

Minneapolis, MN 55414                                        Monday – Thursday           8 am – 8 pm

 

HealthEast Outpatient            651-232-3147    outpatient appointments

Lactation Clinic

69 West Exchange St

St. Paul, MN  55102

 

Hennepin County WIC            612-348-6410    outpatient appointments

1600 E Lake St, Minneapolis                                      3 IBCLCs

6601 Shingle Creek Pkwy, Brooklyn Center

330 S 12th St Suite 4710, Minneapolis

 

HCMC Breastfeeding Clinic 612-873-6455    outpatient appointments

701 Park Avenue                                                   Monday – Friday    8 am – 4:30 pm

Minneapolis, MN  55415                                       IBCLC, English/Somali/Spanish speakers

 

Maple Grove Hospital            763-581-2021    outpatient appointments

9875 Hospital Drive                                               Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday 11 am – 2 pm

Maple Grove, MN 55369                                       4 RNs, IBCLC

 

Methodist Hospital                 952-993-5124    outpatient appointments

Meadowbrook Building                                          Monday – Friday    8 am – 4 pm

6490 Excelsior Boulevard                                            4 RNs, IBCLC

St. Louis Park MN 55426

 

North Memorial Lactation     763-581-8340    outpatient appointments

3300 Oakdale Ave N                                                     Monday – Friday    8 am – 3:30 pm

Robbinsdale MN 55422                                                4 IBCLCs, Retail Boutique 

 

North Point Health/Wellness  612-543-2500   outpatient appointments

1313 Penn Ave N                                                  Monday – Friday

Minneapolis MN 55411                                         IBCLC

 

Partners in Pediatrics                                      outpatient; Monday-Friday; 2 IBCLCs

Brooklyn Park                                 763-425-1211

Rogers                                               763-428-1920 

 

Private Lactation Consultants 

 www.ilca.org     to find a certified lactation consultant

www.dona.org    to find a certified doula

 

Ramsey County WIC                651-249-1683       outpatient appointments

 

Regions Hospital                       651-254-2380      call from 9 am to 2 pm to schedule Lactation Clinic

640 Jackson Street                                                           5 IBCLCs

St Paul, MN  55101

 

Richfield Clinic (HCMC)            612-873-MYMD

44 W 66th St                                      (612-873-6963)

Richfield, MN  55423

 

South Lake Pediatrics           952-401-8300      outpatient appointments

Clinics in Maple Grove, Plymouth,                           Monday – Friday 8 am – 4 pm

Minnetonka (2), Eden Prairie,                                   7 CPNP IBCLCs

St. Louis Park

 

United Hospital                      651-241-6250        outpatient appointments

Breastfeeding                         651-241-6290      outpatient classes

Resource Center                    651-241-5504       specialty shop (breastfeeding supplies)

255 North Smith Ave

Suite 200

St Paul, MN  55102

  

Whittier Clinic (HCMC)        612-873-MYMD       outpatient appointments

2810 Nicollet Ave.                       (612-873-6963)     IBCLC – bi-lingual English/Spanish

Minneapolis MN 55408

 

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Breastfeeding Supplies and Pumps

* Most Hospitals sell breastfeeding supplies.  See above for phone numbers.

 

1) Allina Medical Equipment               651-628-4800; Fax 651-628-4715

2) Apria Medical Equipment               651-523-8888

3) Como Clinic Pharmacy                   612-623-4002

2500 Como Avenue

St Paul, MN  55108

4) Even-Flo (Ameda)                            1-800-233-5921       pump warranty/spare parts

For Spanish or French, stay on line and ask for Spanish/French-speaker

5) Handi-Medical                                  651-644-9770; Fax 651-644-0602

6) HealthPartners Home Medical Equipment     651-523-8440; 1-866-441-4363

7) Hygeia Pumps                                 1-888-PUMP-4-MOM; 1-888-786-7466              

8) Medela                                              800-435-8316             pump warranty/spare parts

For Spanish, stay on line and ask for Spanish speaker

9) Midwest Medical                            763-780-0100; Fax 763-780-0420

10) Superior Medical                             763-230-7880; Fax 763-230-7881

 

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Breastfeeding Support Groups/New Parent Groups

 

1) AMMA Parenting Center    952-926-BABY   new parent, breastfeeding support

3511 Hazelton Road                      (952-926-2229)

Edina, MN  55435

2) Blooma                                                                        new parent, breastfeeding support

5315 Lyndale Ave S                   612-223-8064 Mpls 

493 Selby Ave                            651-340-8538 St Paul

1455 St Francis Ave                   612-508-2557 Shakopee

3) Enlightened Mama                 651-528-6733         new parent, breastfeeding support

970 Raymond Ave Suite 200

St Paul, MN  55114

4) Everyday Miracles                  612-353-6293         new parent, breastfeeding support

1121 Jackson St NE Suite 121

Minneapolis, MN  55413

5) HCMC Mom and Baby Group   612 873-2229          Thursdays 10:30 am -12:30 pm

701 Park Avenue                                                                  Green building, 7th floor, room 233 Minneapolis, MN  55415

6) Health Foundations      651-895-2520              Mama’s Milk Group  Tuesdays 11am

968 Grand Ave                                                       Breastfeeding Supplies, new parent support

St Paul, MN  55105

7) Minnesota Birth Center          612-545-5311  support groups to come in near future

2606 Chicago Ave S

Minneapolis, MN  55407

8) Morning Star Birth Center       612-92-BIRTH              Mother’s Tea once a month

6111 Excelsior Boulevard               (612-922-4784)

Saint Louis Park, MN  55416

9) United Hospital Baby Café     651-241-5088      new parent, breastfeeding support

Saint Luke’s Lutheran Church                                                Wednesday 12 pm – 2 pm

1807 Field Ave

St Paul, MN  55116

 

Musical Moment

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Touch

Posted on August 4, 2014 by anne

My clearest memories of medical school and residency are the concrete chunks of time devoted to learning the physical exam.  Dr. Margit Bretzke teaching me her thorough approach to the breast exam.  Practicing till I could perform Dr. Mitch Einzig’s systematic newborn exam in my sleep.  Dr. Tim Ramer and his bolo tie demonstrating how to perform tactile fremitus and whispered pectoriloquy.

A disconcerting trend in medicine is the movement away from physical touch.  Every conference I attend preaches a new touch warning.  Don’t shake hands – too germy.  Don’t bother with 98% of the annual physical exam because it has no impact on patient outcomes – and you don’t have time for it anyhow.

Competing with our evidence-based touch aversion are the myriad variations of this story:

“I went to the doctor on Thursday about my knee.  He was in the room for maybe two minutes, had his hand on the door the whole time.  He asked me a couple questions and then told me to stop by the front desk to get my surgery scheduled.  He didn’t even examine my knee!  I’m never going back there again!”

Of course, the back story is that the physician glanced at the MRI before going in.  He already knew the diagnosis and treatment.  Time spent examining the knee is time taken from the twenty-five other patients crammed into his morning clinic.

The problem is that many patients feel that their medical story is an incomplete cliffhanger without a physical exam.  Patient satisfaction and patient confidence in their physician can have profound impacts on outcomes.

I continued to perform routine parts of the physical exam, checking the cranial nerves, eliciting deep tendon reflexes, even as the US Preventive Services Taskforce found they were unnecessary in the absence of symptoms.  Why?  Because touch connected me to my patients.  A reassuring hand on a man’s shoulder as I listened to his heart.  The gentle touch (after verbal warning) of a warmed speculum on a woman’s thigh to help her prepare for the pelvic exam.  A high five with a nervous two-year-old.

I’m sure the day will come when a handheld Star Trek machine can diagnose any ailment and dispense appropriate treatment.  I won’t practice that kind of medicine.

In the words of poet Stanley Kunitz, “Touch me, remind me who I am.”

Musical Moment

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Grampa Sid’s Sharpie Legacy

Posted on July 28, 2014 by anne

I can picture the seagulls clearly, dancing along their proscribed circles, all in orbit around the hook hanging from my ceiling.  The ubiquitous 1970s mobile.  Mine with graceful arcs of silver metal, the birds dangling on their little tethers.

Grampa Sid owned an office supply store in Upland, California, nestled at the base of Mounty Baldy.  He sold a little of everything: notebooks, pens, planners, tchotchkes, Black Hills gold, seagull mobiles.

He lived with his German Shepherd, Marty, and younger-than-my-father wife, in a horizontal wrapping home tucked into the side of the mountain.  In my mind, Marty lives forever, frolicking in the frigid stream, her mouth full of crisp watercress.  She saved Grampa from a rattlesnake once, snatched it up in her powerful jaws and shook it to death.

To get to Grampa Sid’s house we drive left to right, clinging to a one-lane path.  No guardrail.  No gentle slope down the mountainside.  With my child’s eye, I see the car tipping over the edge, slow-motion, then rolling, gathering speed as it pitches to the base.

Just before reaching the Castle (a smallish house with a hellish spiral staircase, one room per floor, that rises to petite peaks and turrets), we drive through the mountain stream.  I feel mild distress as we motor right over the watercress.  A bridge perhaps?  A picturesque bridge of wood?

Further up the hill, the pinecones grow big as watermelons, falling from immense trees, the ancient guardians of Mount Baldy.

Grampa Sid is huge.  He calls me Honey and hugs me into his protuberant belly, all cigarette smoke and gold chains.

I don’t recall how he wound up in Eau Claire.  He and Grandma Lima were an incongruous pairing.  Las Vegas & Detroit.  Michael & Lisa Marie.  Peanut butter & guacamole.  My dad suspects she got pregnant and married, then miscarried.  Grampa Sid skipped town, leaving his wife and two children aged four and two.  Dad’s clearest or at least most frequently recounted memories revolve around food.  Tins of sardines, liver, fish caught in the Chippewa River.

My cousins spent summers with Grampa Sid on Mount Baldy.  Grampa kept beer stocked right in the fridge.  And he had a naked Buddha lightswitch cover.  Erect = light on.  Flaccid = light off.  He never invited me out for the summer.

Grampa Sid died on the OR table as surgeons attempted to fix his abdominal aortic aneurysm.  I don’t know what happened.  I can guess.

The wall of the aorta is too thin, stretched and weakened by years of high blood pressure, booze, and smokes.  The vascular surgeon tries to fit a protective sheath around the vessel but the wall ruptures, fragile as tissue paper.

Shit.

They tilt the table into Trendelenburg, head down, relieving some of the pressure in the abdomen.  All hands on deck, reaching, grasping as blood fills the abdominal cavity.  They try in vain to patch and contain.  Grampa’s heart beats faithfully, pumping his blood right out into his belly till there’s nothing left to pump.  His heart stutters and he dies.

Time of Death – unknown.  Funeral – unattended.  Maybe my dad went.

Office Max ran a sale a couple weeks back.  All Sharpies 25 cents each.  My heart leaps!  I stroll in, barely able to contain my excitement.  I scan the displays, flimsy racks made of cardboard, easily assembled, easily discarded.

The Sharpies sit near the register, multicolored jewels in neat rows.  Top left thin tip.  Bottom left regular tip.   Retractables to the right of center.  Oil paint Sharpies (original price $2.79) on the far right.

Oh Joy!  I marvel at this socialist equalization of ink – for one week only, while supplies last, anyone can afford to leave her permanent mark.  I pluck my selections from the bins, checking for tight caps, debating color and style.  Oil paint Sharpies for Ace.  And I could decorate a picture frame, yes, a black picture frame, with gold swirls and silver dots!

I exchange one of the fine tips for a different color.  The retractables burn out too fast but the dual tips?  Hm, maybe one.

I take my limit of ten to the counter.  $2.50 plus tax.  The cashier and I giddily discuss the ridiculously low price.  I ask if they go on sale like this every year.  She doesn’t know, she just started working here six months ago.

I return two days later and buy another limit of ten, telling myself they are for my mother.  My mother who has her own independent limit of ten.  And in fact a couple of the red fine tips are for her, when she red Xs half-price merchandise at the thrift store.

The autosomal dominant office supply gene passed to my father and then to me, expressed to its full glorious potential, coursing through my arteries and veins like thundering herds of red and blue Sharpies.

Thanks Grampa Sid.

Musical Moment

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Rejecting John Green – A Love Letter

Posted on July 21, 2014 by anne

Dear John Green:

Thank you so much for sending along your manuscript, The Fault in Our Stars, for my consideration.  I’m afraid it is not quite right for our list at this time.

You demonstrate startling insight into the teenage psyche, making the loathsome beasts appear wholesome, even likeable. You make me love Hazel like my own daughter, and thus inflict grievous pain upon my psyche.  Indeed, your story is so “metaphorically resonant” (to use your words), that three days after reading I am still metaphorically resonating and frankly not a little depressed.  I predict unprecedented shortages of Kleenex should this manuscript go to publication.

Additionally, your distinct lack of derogatory comments about and objectification of women might shock our American readers.  Perhaps this level of gender equality would play better to an international audience.  Your thoughtful, careful treatment of young love is disconcertingly free of cliché.  The absence of lurid sex scenes is at once refreshing and distressing.  How could we possibly market a story about teenagers who strive for mature, loving sex?

And about your public persona.  You appear to be a Decent Guy, with your humanitarian work on mosquito-borne illness, sarcoma research, and a host of other Noble Causes championed by your Foundation to Decrease World Suck.  Would you consider getting a tattoo?  Motorcycle?  Shaving your head?  Foot fetish?

I’m dead certain that this manuscript could turn into an international bestseller, another one to add to your growing list.  Frankly, you’re a bit of an awards piggy. Michael L. Printz a couple times, Edgar Award, LA Times finalist, #1 Bestselling Author on Too Many Lists To Count, etc. ad nauseum.  How do you think other authors are feeling?  Plus, with the extreme crossover potential of The FIOS, we’re looking at the decimation of countless trees.

As you know, publishing is a subjective business.  However, I can objectively state that you are a Genius.  Your pacing, voice, plotting, thematic elements, and even the damn title are PERFECT.  Do you know where this leaves me?  Out of a job! 

Hence, I shall pass.  I wish you luck placing this manuscript with another house.

All Best,

An Editor

YA Imprint of Big Publishing House

NY, NY

Musical Moment

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Driven to Tears

Posted on July 14, 2014 by anne

Moments of solitude killed her.

Slowly, over the two years of her confinement.

One day speaking her mind, speaking her truth, spewing forth acid.

 

The acid burned and they took her.

 

In the night.

(Women are always taken in the night.)

 

They took her in the night and shut her away where she couldn’t speak her mind,

couldn’t speak her truth except to a wall of cement –

unmovable and unforgiving.

 

At first she allowed seeds of hope to nestle in the moments of solitude,

watered by her tears, the knowledge that she could still feel and emote.

 

If a woman cries in a soundproof concrete box, can anyone hear it?

 

Can you hear it?

 

Musical Moment

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A Tail of Too Shitties

Posted on July 7, 2014 by anne

(Please be advised that this post contains an excessive number of exclamation points.  And a couple photos that some folks might consider gross.  Please plan accordingly.)

The dark brown dots on the side of the fridge aren’t chocolate.  Or paint.  They’re blood.  Dried blood.

Don’t worry.  This tale has a happy ending, slightly shorter than it was a week ago, but happy and wagging nonetheless.

On Wednesday night, my mom (“Grandma”) and I plowed through a hellacious pile of mostly-junk jewelry for Steeple People Thrift Store, sorting and pricing.  We pulled out the dollar items and tossed freebies into a bag.  As we wrapped up the evening of work, the boys (one adult human, one child human, two canines) came in from the back yard.

A bloodcurdling yelp!

I rush into the kitchen, eyes wide.

Me: What happened?!!!

Ace: Chester got his tail caught in the door.

Chester weaves around my legs, tail wagging.  I feel a fine spray of liquid.

Me: He’s peeing!!!!  NO – HE’S BLEEDING!!!!!!!!  His leg is cut!!!!  It’s his tail!!!!!

Chester’s tail wags furiously, a frenetic windshield washer, spraying an arc of blood back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.  I grab the tail.

Me: Get a towel!

I hold pressure on his tail, trying to keep all fifty pounds of adolescent labrador retriever under control.

Ace: Take him outside!

Me: I’m trying!

Ace grabs his collar and hauls Chester outside.  I follow the zigzag pattern of blood out the door.  Chet and I sit on the cement cuddling.  He thinks we’re cuddling.  I’m actually trying to get the arterial blood flow to stop.  I check the tail and once again note pulsating blood.

Grandma holds Chester’s head.  I hold his rear.  Ace mops up the kitchen.  And the hall.  And the living room.  Jackson Pollock would’ve been proud.IMG_6819

I find the end of Chester’s tail on the doormat.  A neat cone of tissue with attached blond labrador bristles.

Me: “YOU CUT OFF CHESTER’S TAIL!!!!!”

Ace: (hurt) “Chester’s tail got cut off by the door.”

(I apologize later.)IMG_6817

I pack the tail on ice, send Ace and The Big E to bed, and Grandma and I speed off into the night.  Chester paints the inside of his car kennel with the end of his tail.

We arrive at the University of Minnesota emergency vet clinic around 10:15 pm.  The janitor is just finishing mopping the entry.  We walk to the check-in desk, dripping all over the clean floors.

They take Chester back to a room.  We are told to wait in the lobby.  I dump cocoa into a cup (on July second) and burn my tongue.  I hear Chester yelping from way across the room, down a couple halls, behind closed doors.

Me: I can hear my baby crying.  Is he okay?

Receptionist: I’ll go check.

Me: (waiting)

Receptionist: He’s fine.  Just mad that everyone’s ignoring him.

Me: Can I go wait with him?

Receptionist: Sure.  We’ll put you in Room A.

Me: (in Room A, waiting for ten minutes)

Me: (once again at reception desk) Am I supposed to go find him?

Receptionist: They’ll bring him to you.

They eventually do.  I want him to run to me – Mama!  But he runs to everyone indiscriminately like a good labrador retriever.  He whines at the door of Room A.  I worry that his bladder might explode.  (Chester only likes to pee in our yard.)

The vet says there is exposed bone.  She wants to amputate a tiny bit of bone and then draw the tissue up, suturing the end of the tail back together.  No, it can’t wait for his usual vet.  No, she can’t reattach the severed tissue.  Yes, she can do the surgery tonight.  Can I pick him up in a couple hours?

Sure.  Grandma and I had placed bets about the cost of the evening adventure on the way over.  I plunk down my credit card for the required 75% of the estimated cost, twice my original bet.

The vet calls me at 1 am.  The procedure went fine.  He’s a little crazy at the moment but I can come pick him up.  I hear him, crazy, in the background.  She explains how they use Narcan to reverse the sedative and it makes doggies a little crazy.  I think this sounds a little cruel.  Why not let his narcotic haze wear off naturally?  Then I remember his size – how the hell would I get a narc’d out lab puppy in my car?  Wheel barrow?

Chester looks absolutely fine.  He wags his perky ace-wrap pressure bandage.  I stuff him, his prescriptions, and new Cone of Shame in the car.

I’m way too old to be up at 2 am.IMG_6808

Chester wakes up with Ace at 5 am.  They bond.  Chet wakes up again with me at 8 am and promptly wags off his bandage, the bandage that was supposed to be removed after 24 hours.IMG_6831

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On Saturday, The Big E and I walk Chester over to the neighbors’.  Mia and Chester are distant cousins, produced by the same kennel.  Ironically, Mia’s tail got amputated by a door several years ago.  A Kennel Curse?  We walk over to commiserate but Mia isn’t home.

I am far more upset by the episode than Chester.  I dutifully feed him Augmentin and Ultram in yogurt or peanut butter.  Perhaps the Ultram was meant for the owner.  Turns out, both drugs were intended for “Fritz”, as I learned from a moderately frantic phone message from the vet.  She thinks the doses are fine but could I call?  And BTW, they forgot to charge me for the meds.  They’d like to charge me for the meds.

I haven’t called back.  I checked the doses online (certainly the most reliable source of medical information…) and made sure that Ultram and Augmentin appeared to be appropriate drugs for the situation.

Chester is healing.  He enjoys bashing his Cone of Shame into the backs of my legs.  He dumped his heavy Bennington earthenware crock of water three times, hooking and flipping it with his cone, before his idiot owners switched it out for a flatter dish.IMG_6815

The only reminders of the incident are the tiny brown dots.  A spray of blood on the side of the house.  A bloody footprint not yet washed away by the rain.  IMG_6816                             Black dots on the fridge photo faces, like the syphilitic lesions in Renaissance paintings.

Eventually I’ll clean it all up.  And Chester will get his sutures out.  Maybe we’ll let him shred the Cone of Shame.  His fur will grow back and all reminders of the Guillotine Door Episode will fade.

I keep the bit of amputated bone and chunk of tail, pop them in a baggie in the deepfreeze next to the roadkill black squirrel.  Grandma thinks the tail would make a perfect fishing lure.

Musical Moment

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The Gettysburg Address

Posted on June 30, 2014 by anne

In honor of July 4th, here is Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.  Stirring, indeed.  I mucked around a bit [in brackets].

“Four score and seven years ago our [mothers and] fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all [people] are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave [women and] men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, [under God], shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Musical Moment

 

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“Renegade” – My Gateway Drug

Posted on June 23, 2014 by anne

The plaintive words transport me in time: “Oh Mama, I’m in fear for my life from the long arm of the law.”*  Apple Valley, Minnesota.  1970s.

Nancy was one of my best friends from birth until she moved.  Her family attended Annunciation Church.  (A Nut’s Creation as we liked to giggle.)  I knew they were “Catholic” and that made them different in some exotic, intangible way.

Our house sat sandwiched between Nancy’s and Brucey’s.  These proximity friends served different purposes.  Brucey and I were mudpie masters, hiding under the boughs of a blue spruce tree.  I can picture the space at the base of the tree.  The crunch and smell of the needles.  The tree is long gone, or maybe I made it up.  Brucey skipped the state before gender became an issue with playmate preference.

Nancy’s next older sister, Jane, adored gymnastics.  She became our coach, teaching us backbends, roundoffs, cartwheels, and backhandsprings.  “You’re so limber!” she’d say as my youthful spine contorted into an arch.  Jane coerced me into temporary silence after daring me to try an aerial, a cartwheel without hands.  I landed on my face, blood dripping from my nares to mingle with my tears.

Nancy and I built forts, massive room-consuming blanket forts.  Here’s the scenario: Two orphan children shelter in a flimsy structure, trying desperately to avoid the searchlights of the nebulous bad guys who are hellbent on rape and pillage (whatever that meant.)

I remember playing in Nancy’s room when her sisters allowed it.  Three sisters, two rooms, and Nancy was the youngest.  The Room Sharer.

She moved to Apple Valley around our eighth birthday.  We’d already adjusted to the daytime separation of public vs. “Catholic” school.  Nancy might as well have moved to Tibet.  My bare feet could no longer trot over to her house in thirty seconds.  Phones were a different sort of entity in those days, used when one actually had something to communicate.  I called Nancy a couple times on our rotary dial, wrapping the cord around a wall so I could perch on the stairs.  Her number started with a 4, strange in my world of 8s.  Truth be told, we had nothing to say.  Our activity-based play perished in the translation to remote interaction.

We reunited for a couple sleepovers.  Nancy’s new house felt all wrong, too horizontal.  The low ceilings and sprawling layout were foreign territory.  I’m sure her parents were present in some capacity but I have no memory of any interaction.  Nancy and I ate Cheetos and watched Roadrunner.  Meep Meep!

One of the older sisters, either Mary or Sue – probably Mary – Sue was the serious one.  Anyhow, deeply embedded in her teen years, Mary had acquired a new record and her excitement transcended the taboo of interacting with her bratty baby sister.

We entered the inner sanctum, Mary’s garden-level bedroom, and watched her reverently place the vinyl on the player.  She gently laid the needle in the betwixt-song gap.  “Oh Mama, I’m in fear for my life from the long arm of the law.”

My only prior experience with pop music came in the form of Neil Diamond and John Denver.  Otherwise, I subsisted on a steady diet of classical music and show tunes.  “Renegade” became my gateway drug, prepping me for junior high, WLOL, and years of Casey Kasem’s Weekly Top 40.

“Oh Mama, I’m in fear for my life…”

Musical Moment

 

* The copyright to “Renegade” belongs to Tommy Shaw and Styx.

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“We Grow Accustomed to the Dark”

Posted on June 16, 2014 by anne

Here is a poem inspired by a line from Emily Dickinson: “We grow accustomed to the dark.”  The first line is hers, the rest mine.

———————-

We grow accustomed to the dark.

Slowly over time, the shadows creep.

Winding into our brains –

the inexorable turn of a screw.

Another child dies, another child kills.

The light dims.

We stagger, hands outstretched, eyes acclimating to the gray.

Westside Middle School.  Thurston High School.  Columbine.  Rocori High.  Red Lake.  Virginia Tech.  Chardon High School.  Sandy Hook.  Sparks Middle School.  Isla Vista.

I’m blinded in the knowing.

I blink.  I breathe.  I pray.

Let me not grow accustomed to this dark.

———————–

Musical Moment

 

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Fein and Dandy

Posted on June 9, 2014 by anne

Some time after the birth of my son, I found the first one.  Coarse, errant, longer than the other eyebrow hairs.  I freaked out.  Well, that’s it then – it’s all downhill from here on out.  Ace claims that everything went to pot for him at 45: nose hairs, shoulder joints, ear hairs, a softening about the midsection.

I think I yanked out that first hair with tweezers.  Out out, damn spot!  A couple years later, I found myself yanking out not one, not two, but THREE!  ACK!!!!!  Never a big fan of the kohl browpencil, I decided an alternative tactic was in order.  Enter the strategic brow trim.

I met Mr. Fein my first year of family medicine residency as a brand fresh intern.  He came into the ER with frank blood pouring out of his bottom, never a happy scenario.  By the time I saw him in the ICU, his blood hemoglobin level was still alarmingly low despite several transfused units.

Mr. Fein hadn’t seen a doctor since the day he was born,  a fact of which he seemed quite proud.  He claimed a complete lack of medical issues, excepting the blood, of course.  Mr. Fein resembled the mugshot accompanying the headline, “Reclusive Mountain Man Emerges From Isolation.”  Wizened and wrinkled.  Wild snarled hair that my memory embeds (perhaps erroneously) with bits of twigs and leaves.  His eyebrows resembled the wiry legs of centipedes on steroids.

I adored Mr. Fein.  I used my youth and innocence to best advantage, gently coaxing him into an understanding of the gravity of his situation.  Colon cancer, widely metastatic, imminently fatal.

At one point during his hospital course, he took a turn for the worse.  I don’t remember exactly what happened.  I recall sitting on the edge of his bed, holding his hand, telling him I was worried about him.  I shed a tear or two.  The third year resident on call ushered me away from the bedside, essentially branding my emotion as unprofessional.

On my day off, Mr. Fein glared at the intern and senior resident who came to the ICU to see him.  “Who are you?  You aren’t my doctor!  Where’s my doctor?  That Snappin Lappin, whatever her name is!”  I heard this story over and over from my colleagues, accompanied by peals of laughter.

Mr. Fein finally improved to the point that he moved from the ICU to the regular hospital floor.  I stared at his eyebrows every day.  To me, those eyebrows represented the lack of a loving family in Mr. Fein’s life.  Surely a daughter (maybe even a son) would’ve assisted her father with this grooming task.  Mr. Fein had no daughter, no daughter-in-law, no housekeeper, no home health aid, no involved neighbor.

But he had me.

Maybe the floor secretary wondered why I ordered up a suture removal kit on a guy who didn’t need any sutures removed.  At any rate, she didn’t ask.  I used the lovely pair of iris scissors to carefully trim Mr. Fein’s wayward brows.  I can’t get rid of your cancer, but I can make you look like someone loves you.

The gastroenterologist was pissed.  “His eyebrows were his best feature!”  He didn’t understand.

Mr. Fein died within the month.  I think of him every time I cut my husband’s hair and trim his eyebrows.  I think of him when I find that wiry long stray on my own face.

And I smile.

Musical Moment 

 

 

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