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LIBRARY GETS AN A FOR EFFORT

If there is one thing I could never do without, it’s the library. Libraries have always been a place of refuge and joy for me. I grew up walking to the library from the time I was eight years old. That was before a child walking by herself  a few blocks from home wasn’t considered child abuse.  It wasn’t just the library I loved, it was the librarians.  I don’t think I’ve ever met a rude librarian.  They’re unfailingly pleasant, patient, and helpful.   Thank heaven, they were only closed for a short time during the pandemic.  And now that they’re open, they’re doing a fantastic job of following CDC guidelines. Our library gets an A for effort from me.

Did I say they were closed?  Actually, they were sort of open.  You could order print  books online.  Then, when you got to the library, you could call inside, and they would bring the books out  to your car. Is that cool, or not?  And then, just to be safe, they “quarantined” the returned books for three days before letting anyone borrow them again.  You can still use this service if you want to.

Library Gets A for effort during this pandeimic. They are enforcing masks.
Library gets “A” for effort. They’re enforcing mask wearing & following CDC guidelines.

When the library re opened to the public,  they had removed  most  of the furniture and put  Plexiglas barriers all over the place.  No plush, comfy sofas and chairs, or wooden reading desks and chairs.  All of which meant people couldn’t spend hours in the library reading newspapers and magazines, or halfway sleeping. ( Sleeping in the library was banned a few years back).  They do have two or three small, metal tables and  chairs.  These came in handy if you need to sit a minute, which I often do, at my age.

 

Everyone is required to wear a mask, and it’s enforced.   I don’t know how these kind, gentle librarians are able to make everyone mask up, but they do.  Yesterday I saw a couple of teenagers approach the door without masks.  I figured they would get away with it.  But when I got inside, they were wearing the paper masks the library provides.  I’d loved to have seen that transaction.  If these sweet librarians can be enforcers, why can’t the people at Aldi’s and the Dollar Store do the same?  I guess it’s a matter of economics.  The stores don’t want to turn down any extra sales, whereas the library isn’t in it for the money.

Why do I go to the library instead of calling and ordering books?  The same reason I don’t have my groceries delivered.  I like to wander the aisles and see what’s there that I hadn’t thought of.   But I feel 100% safer in the library than I do in the supermarket.  There’s no loud talking from barefaced people. No one crowding behind you at the checkout. No clusters of people clogging the aisles for a chat.  The library is quiet, subdued, and safe.  Our local library gets a an A Plus for observing CDC guidelines during the pandemic.

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CUSTOMER SERVICE ON DOWNWARD SPIRAL

Remember when it paid to complain about poor customer service?  Well, that doesn’t happen anymore.  I suppose it’s because of the pandemic.  We can blame pretty much everything that goes wrong on Covid-19.  And some people really don’t care if you like their service or not.  When  the coronavirus crisis is over, I have a feeling that’s not going to change. According to a recent survey at Arizona State University,  Customer Service is on a downward spiral,  and consumer rage is increasing. 

Customer Service is getting worse and so is consumer rage.
Customer service is on a downward spiral and consumer rage is getting worse.

For us, it started last summer with the delivery of the Indianapolis Star.  We’re a two newspaper household. For over three decades, a carrier delivered both papers to our side door.  But when our local paper went to five days a week,  the Indy Star had to find another carrier to deliver on Tuesdays and Sundays.  That carrier decided she couldn’t take a few seconds to turn in our lane, roll down her window, and toss the paper on our side porch.  In spite of repeated instructions to leave it on the porch, she kept throwing it near the street.  Which means that I must get dressed and walk to the end of the lane so as to have our morning paper when we wake up. Not bad in the summer, but I’m not looking forward to ice and snow.

After exchanging e mails with various customer service representatives over  a four week period, nothing changed.  The Indy Star representatives  repeatedly assured me the paper should be delivered to our side door, but that hasn’t happened.   The Indy Star is still out by the road on Tuesdays and Sundays..

I suppose it’s hard to find paper carriers in ordinary times.  But with all the people out of work, and scrambling for Uber delivery jobs, you’d think the Indy Star could find someone to take a few seconds to deliver the paper to our door.

Recently, we  had another bad experience with the customer service department at Lazy Boy. Although we had thought bulky recliners were kind of ugly, we finally succumbed to the urge for comfort in our old age. We didn’t buy any old recliner.  Ours was a custom job with all the bells and whistles, and pale  blue upholstery.  When it finally arrived, the dealer gave us a phone number to call if anything went wrong.

We enjoyed that recliner for three years.  Just press a button to move it back, lift the leg rest, massage your back, or provide heat.  And then, one day, it went all the way backward,  but wouldn’t move forward.  My husband found the Lazy Boy Customer Service phone number.  He had to wait 50 minutes to get an answer.  They said they’d have to schedule an appointment with a repair man.  That was on November 23.  A week later, they called to say they couldn’t come until Jan. 7. That meant six weeks with our recliner spread out across the room on its back.  Seems the service center is in Texas, and it takes them awhile to get to Indiana.

In both of the cases above, we’re at the mercy of the service provider.  No one else is going to deliver the Indianapolis Star, and there is no one in town who can repair Lazy Boy  recliners (we checked) .  I’m afraid it’s a portent of things to come.  Customer Service is on a downward spiral, and it’s only going to get worse.

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A TASTE OF HONEY HELPS YOU SLEEP

Doctors have coined a new phrase called Covid-Somnia.  Many folks aren’t sleeping as well as they did before the pandemic.  They have a hard  time falling  to sleep, and they’re waking up more in the middle of the night.  Worries keep them awake.  Will I get the virus?  When will the lockdown end? What will I do when the money runs out?  And now,  election 2020  has added to the  anxiety.  Was the election stolen?  Will my vote mean anything in the future?  Consequently, there’s an increased demand for sleeping pills, but they really don’t help long term. You might try some alternative remedies.  As an example, it’s been found that a taste of honey helps you sleep.

According to doctors, Here’s how honey helps you sleep:

1. It provides  fuel for your brain throughout the night by restocking your liver’s glycogen. Low levels of glycogen tell your brain that you need to eat . This “hunger” can cause you to wake up in the middle of the night and sleep less soundly.

2.  Honey helps your brain release melatonin, the hormone that your body uses to restore itself during sleep. This happens through a series of transformations in your brain: honey’s sugars spike your insulin levels, releasing tryptophan, which becomes serotonin, which becomes melatonin.

A tasste of honey helps you sleep because it has serotonin
A taste of honey helps you sleep. It feeds your brain with relaxing serotonin.

Yes, honey increases the brain’s natural sedative,  serotonin– a hormone that stabilizes our mood, feelings of well being, and happiness.  Honey is inexpensive, compared to sleeping pills.  It’s not habit forming, and it doesn’t lead to a typical “drug hangover,” that leaves you feeling sluggish. However , honey has calories—about 20 per teaspoon.  So you don’t want to go overboard.

Honey has been a game changer for me. I started by by taking  one teaspoon of honey in my afternoon tea.  Then , right before bedtime,   another teaspoon. After a couple of nights, I realized I was sleeping later in the morning than usual.  And if I did wake  in the middle of the night, I could easily get back to sleep.

Honey can also help you sleep if you have a cough.   The Mayo Clinic says it works just as well as a cough suppressant.

Why not try a taste of honey?  It may help you sleep.

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OBITS REVEAL A DYING CULTURE

Most people don’t enjoy reading newspaper obituaries, unless it happens to be someone they know.  However, I’ve always found them fascinating  if they contain interesting details about someone’s time on this earth.    My contemporaries are beginning to leave this world at an alarming rate,  and their obituaries reveal a dying culture.

First, it’s important to realize that  obituaries are bought and paid for by the survivors. Newspapers used to publish them for free, but no more.  You can pay anywhere from $200 to $1000, depending on how many lines of copy.  And if the obit is in an extra day, it provides even more revenue for struggling newspapers who are hard up for advertising dollars.

An  obituary of a certain class of  women  of my generation provides a startling glimpse into the marriage customs of the elite during the fifties and sixties.  After the usual bio as to her parentage, we often find that she attended a well known college where she met and married, “the love of her life.”  She belonged to a sorority, which meant she was attractive, and came from a “good family.”  Having landed a college man who could support her, she may have taught school for a year or so before settling down as a homebody and raising her children.  No career for her.  She was a member of  faith based women’s clubs and other feminine circles.  Her highest achievements may have included serving as president of the PTA.  She belonged to a country club, where she played golf, tennis and bridge. If the husband did well enough , they might have spent summers at their Michigan cottage  or winters in their Florida home.

The most salient feature of these obits is the age at which the woman married…a median of 21.  Many of my college friends married after their freshman or sophomore year, before they were even 20! Which brings us back to that “love of her life,” issue.  I guess they didn’t have a chance to find out if  they could  have fallen in love with someone else.

Obits Reveal Dying Culture
In 1960, the average bride was 20. Now, Obits Reveal a Dying Culture, with the average bride almost 30..

But in the late sixties and early seventies, all that began to change.  The pill, and the subsequent women’s movement, gave women and men the freedom to live together without benefit of matrimony.  Before 1970, few couples would have lived together outside of marriage. But by the late 1990’s at least 50 to 60% of people did.

By the year 2018, only 29% of Americans age 18-34 were married, compared to 59% in 1968,  Men and women aren’t in a big rush to get married.  The average age of marriage has gone from 21 in 1950 to almost 30 in 2020.

The obituary of a millennial woman will probably read more like her male counterparts.  Her life will not be defined by the person whom she married.    She probably won’t have met “the love of her life” in college.  While she might enjoy tennis , golf,  or bridge, she didn’t have the time to pursue them as an important  component of her social life.    She may have had a career as an accountant, doctor, lawyer, or marketing manager. She probably didn’t marry until she was close to 30, and she might have had more than one husband.

Women are no longer living in the shadow of their  husbands. Obituaries of elderly women reveal a dying culture.

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HOME ALONE FOR THANKSGIVING

Did you know that one third of us live alone?  I mean, totally by yourself.  No partner, child, parent, or friend.  Many singles have been seeing other people during this pandemic, on a very limited basis.  And they may visit with those select few on Thanksgiving Day.  But many seniors will be Home Alone on Thanksgiving.  That includes my husband and me.

It’s not the first time for either of us to be away from family on Thanksgiving.  My husband is a Korean War Vet, and understood that being home for the Holidays wasn’t going to happen while he was in service..  When I graduated college and had my first job in Chicago, employers weren’t very forgiving.  We were expected to work the day before and after Thanksgiving Thursday.  My room mates were in the same boat and we made the best of it.  We cooked a turkey and invited friends over.  It felt rather  sad, but sort of fun to escape all the family melodrama. Fortunately, my sister and her brood lived near  my parents, so I didn’t have to feel guilty about not making it home.

Home Alone On Thanksgiving. One third of the population lives alone.
Home Alone on Thanksgiving. Seniors make the best of being away from family during the pandemic.

But that was all a long time ago.  We were young and resilient.  It’s a different story when you’re over eighty.   The holidays have always been a time of joy;  seeing children and grandchildren and sitting down to dinner together.  Now, along came Covid-19.  Back in March, we didn’t dream we would be isolated in the fall.  But it’s gotten worse instead of better. We won’t even be with my husband’s children, who live right here in town.

We thought about getting some carry-out food.  And our sons offered to bring us plates of dinner.  But for some reason or other, I decided I wanted our house to smell of turkey, dressing and pumpkin pie.  That will make me feel like I’m not missing out on absolutely everything.

And then, we’ll count our blessings:  Being together in our own home.  All the technology  like television , computers, and smart phones that keep us connected.  Library books.  Music.  Indoor plants and flowers.  Knowing that our grandchildren and children are healthy.  The gratitude list goes on and on.  Yes, we’ll be home alone on Thanksgiving.  But we have a lot to be thankful for.

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IS STOCKPILING SELFISH OR SMART?

Hoarding is definitely a bad word nowadays.  It conjures up images of deranged people living amongst piles of things they’ve accumulated for years, unable to part with a even single rubber band.  But there’s another type of hoarder who is now in the spotlight.  It’s the person who has a closet full of toilet paper, or a trunk full of bottled picante sauce.  Yes, I’ve witnessed this type of hoarding during this pandemic.  But there’s a euphemism for the term, “hoarding,”  and its called stockpiling.  You might even think of it as saving, or stocking up for the uncertainty ahead.  Is stockpiling selfish or smart?

Stockpiling is generally frowned upon by the media.  We’re told that it’s a selfish act, depriving others of access to much needed goods.  But to my mind, it’s kind of a natural act of self preservation.  Everyone has their own wants and needs.  For my husband, it’s canned soup.  Being a diabetic, he is careful to avoid high carbohydrate foods.  Most soup is nutritious without being high in calories.  Beside that, it warms the tummy on cold wintry days.  It’s also one of the first things that started disappearing from the grocery store shelves in March..

And so, starting last spring, we would buy a few extra cans of his favorite soups whenever we shopped.  No, we didn’t walk out with a cartful of soup, but we did buy more than we could use in a week.  Consequently, we have two pantry shelves full of canned soup.  It’s at least a  month’s supply. I don’t see this as a stupid expense or a selfish act.  The money isn’t wasted.  Canned foods are good for years. And we really didn’t deprive anyone else of a can of soup in the long run. And at our age, there could be weeks when the weather is so bad we can’t leave the house.  Or one of us could get sick.

Is stockpiling selfish or smart. Stockpiling canned goods is a good idea when facing uncertainty
Is stockpiling selfish or smart? Everyone stockpiled canned goods in the olden days.

When I was a child, everyone stockpiled food .  Women canned.  We had a basement full of canned peaches, pears, tomatoes and green beans.  My husband lived on a farm, and they even canned the meat which they had raised.  Was that selfish or stupid?  No, it was called planning for the long winter months ahead.

This is a time of uncertainty.  A change in government, a new president of the United States.  A Covid-19 epidemic predicted to spiral out of control. Many economists are predicting a worldwide stagflation.  So Is stockpiling stupid, selfish,  or smart?  I’ll vote for smart.

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BREAKING UP WITH MY FITBIT

Were you ever in a good relationship that finally ran its course? That’s what happened between my Fitbit and me. Getting my first Fitbit was quite a thrill.   It made me feel young and hip.  I was proud to wear it out in public, and unashamed that it wasn’t exactly ornamental.   I noticed a lot of other people wearing them, too–not just when exercising, but at theaters and restaurants.  Who would want to be without a Fitbit?

 
It was supposed to help me lose weight.  The idea being that if I would just take more steps,  the extra pounds would simply melt away.  Didn’t happen, because I wasn’t exercising any more than I did when I set my goal for, say, 15 minutes of this or that exercise,  or maybe half hour of walking.  Another problem was that if Fitbit told me I’d walked an extra mile or so, I thought I could have an extra doughnut.  But I learned that 75% of weight loss comes from reduced calories, with exercise only accounting for 25%.  A little extra exercise didn’t justify eating more.
Breaking up with my fitbit was the best decision I've made for a long time.
Breaking up with my Fitbit. At first, I thought it would help me lose weight. But mostly, it made me lose sleep.

 

One good thing:  Fitbit told me how many miles I had walked from point A to point B,  but once I had that information, I didn’t really need the wristband to tell me what I already knew.  And then, a friend pointed out that if all I wanted to know was mileage, I could slip my smart phone in my back pocket and it would tell me the same thing.
 

After about a year, things started going south when I realized Fitbit was ruining my sleep.  It would tell me how many times I was up during the night, and how many times I tossed and turned . The first time I saw those numbers, I was rattled.  Up 5 times? Restless 16 times?    I could only remember getting up once. My goodness, what’s wrong.  No wonder I feel so tired.  I would go to bed at night, fearing the worst.  The more I worried about getting up at night,  the more the numbers increased.  If my Fitbit reported I only got five hours of sleep, I felt more exhausted just seeing that number.

 And then, one day, my Fitbit wore out.  And I decided not to buy a new one. Breaking up with my Fitbit was such a relief.– not having to worry about those numbers anymore.  There are still times, when I wake up and can’t go back to sleep.  Sometimes that takes its toll, and other times I feel just fine.  Mostly, the way I can tell if I got a good night’s rest is the way I feel in the morning.   I don’t want Fitbit telling me I should be tired.
 
So  goodbye, Fitbit. We had a good run, but I don’t need you anymore.