After a gloomy winter and slow spring it was enough to want to throw some gear into my pickup and head for New Mexico and sunshine, but I couldn't find the time.
But then something came up that precluded all else, and it would be east instead of west. Daughter Kara would be going through commencement ceremonies with a doctorate in psychiatric health nursing from the Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. In plain English, she's a Major in the U.S. Army, a psychiatric nurse who will be working with casualties of decade-long wars that have left the vast majority of Americans untouched.
The Naval Support Facility at Bethesda is home of various medical programs of the Department of Defense, and Walter Reed Hospital. I really couldn't miss her graduation ceremonies.
Any Marine who has gone through that demanding three-month initiation into the Corps can tell you some wild, even humorous, stories - without exaggerating one iota. Most of us never had any intention of making it a career - just wanted to complete our enlistments, get the hell out of there, and back to normal life. As a teen-age Marine, the last thing I could have imagined was someday having a daughter being an Army officer.
So when Kara graduated from University of Wisconsin-Madison and told me she wanted to enlist in the Army, imagine my shock. What? Enlist, as a private? In the Army? Do you have any idea of what the hell you're in for?
She became a Korean language specialist and was discharged as a buck sergeant four years later at Ft. Meade, Maryland. With her G.I. benefits, she attained an R.N. degree at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. She returned to Madison to practice nursing, while picking up an advanced degree in nursing and a law degree from UW-Madison.
With that under her belt, she was invited back into the Army as a Captain, able to skip the unexalted ranks of 1st and 2nd Lieutenant. So with her combination of Army enlisted experience, practical nursing experience, and advanced training in psychiatric nursing, she is uniquely equipped to work with soldiers with post-combat issues.
We had to get to Bethesda and D.C. for those graduation ceremonies. Sherry and I toss our gear into my GMC and head south to I-80, then east across that high-powered Illinois corn land. Much of the corn down there is up, well ahead of that farther north. Every time I see that monster machinery, especially on that flat land, I think of how different it is than when I grew up, scratching around those hills in Green County with two-row equipment. Four-row equipment was considered huge and advanced in those days. Then it was six-row, then 12-, then 24 row equipment. Heck, if equipment doubles in size a few more times, we could have a dozen farmers produce our entire corn supply, and turn it into a public utility. Same with the nation's wheat supply.
If I exaggerate, it's not by much. It seems no more farfetched than dairy farms of hundreds of cows, computerized, milked by robots with the aid of Mexican labor. Who could have imagined that scenario when those Surge milking machines we used were "advanced technology?"
Instead of heading straight east across I-80, I like to circumvent Chicago by turning south at Morris. I take Illinois 47 south to Forrest, then east on US 24 across the Indiana line to I-65, then southeast to Indianapolis.
At Indianapolis, it's I-70 east and getting dark. I would like to have reached eastern Ohio, but with our late start, it will be western Ohio. We pull off the interstate at Springfield and stop at a Hampton Inn. The receptionist is apologetic - rooms all full, and she doubts there are any available in town.
I ask her what gives - it's only a weekday night. Apparently there are some local college graduation ceremonies. Columbus is a few miles to the east, but that's the home of Enormous State University, commonly known as Ohio State. There surely won't be anything available if that monstrous institution has anything going. Maybe it will be all the way to eastern Ohio after all, or maybe no sleep at all.
So it's back on the Interstate, toward Columbus. In a few miles there is a sign advertising a Motel 6, near a town called London. Maybe it's obscure enough that it has a room. We give it a try and, whaddaya know, we're in luck. It's a nice place costing a fraction of the place I tried an hour ago.
Next morning we gas up and have breakfast at a Waffle House. The friendly waitress arranges our order such that we can take advantage of a special and save a couple of bucks. While eating, a different waitress, without a word, picks up the tab and walks away. She's probably readjusting what our waitress had arranged. But what the heck - it's only a couple of bucks; no big deal.
We finish eating, and there's no tab on the table. I look up and our original waitress tells us it's been paid. What? But I didn't pay it. She tells me that the people in the booth behind me had picked up the tab. What gives? I didn't think we looked like we needed financial assistance.
She tells me that every once in awhile someone does that - pays the bill for a complete stranger for no reason other than to be doing a good deed. I have heard of that, and it restores one's faith in humanity. But it's still pretty amazing.
The least I can do is slip a generous gratuity to our friendly waitress. With that, she's ecstatic, thanking me profusely.
This junket is off to an interesting start.
Next week: Military graduation ceremonies.
- John Waelti's column appears every Friday in the times. He can be reached at jjwaelti1@tds.net.
But then something came up that precluded all else, and it would be east instead of west. Daughter Kara would be going through commencement ceremonies with a doctorate in psychiatric health nursing from the Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. In plain English, she's a Major in the U.S. Army, a psychiatric nurse who will be working with casualties of decade-long wars that have left the vast majority of Americans untouched.
The Naval Support Facility at Bethesda is home of various medical programs of the Department of Defense, and Walter Reed Hospital. I really couldn't miss her graduation ceremonies.
Any Marine who has gone through that demanding three-month initiation into the Corps can tell you some wild, even humorous, stories - without exaggerating one iota. Most of us never had any intention of making it a career - just wanted to complete our enlistments, get the hell out of there, and back to normal life. As a teen-age Marine, the last thing I could have imagined was someday having a daughter being an Army officer.
So when Kara graduated from University of Wisconsin-Madison and told me she wanted to enlist in the Army, imagine my shock. What? Enlist, as a private? In the Army? Do you have any idea of what the hell you're in for?
She became a Korean language specialist and was discharged as a buck sergeant four years later at Ft. Meade, Maryland. With her G.I. benefits, she attained an R.N. degree at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. She returned to Madison to practice nursing, while picking up an advanced degree in nursing and a law degree from UW-Madison.
With that under her belt, she was invited back into the Army as a Captain, able to skip the unexalted ranks of 1st and 2nd Lieutenant. So with her combination of Army enlisted experience, practical nursing experience, and advanced training in psychiatric nursing, she is uniquely equipped to work with soldiers with post-combat issues.
We had to get to Bethesda and D.C. for those graduation ceremonies. Sherry and I toss our gear into my GMC and head south to I-80, then east across that high-powered Illinois corn land. Much of the corn down there is up, well ahead of that farther north. Every time I see that monster machinery, especially on that flat land, I think of how different it is than when I grew up, scratching around those hills in Green County with two-row equipment. Four-row equipment was considered huge and advanced in those days. Then it was six-row, then 12-, then 24 row equipment. Heck, if equipment doubles in size a few more times, we could have a dozen farmers produce our entire corn supply, and turn it into a public utility. Same with the nation's wheat supply.
If I exaggerate, it's not by much. It seems no more farfetched than dairy farms of hundreds of cows, computerized, milked by robots with the aid of Mexican labor. Who could have imagined that scenario when those Surge milking machines we used were "advanced technology?"
Instead of heading straight east across I-80, I like to circumvent Chicago by turning south at Morris. I take Illinois 47 south to Forrest, then east on US 24 across the Indiana line to I-65, then southeast to Indianapolis.
At Indianapolis, it's I-70 east and getting dark. I would like to have reached eastern Ohio, but with our late start, it will be western Ohio. We pull off the interstate at Springfield and stop at a Hampton Inn. The receptionist is apologetic - rooms all full, and she doubts there are any available in town.
I ask her what gives - it's only a weekday night. Apparently there are some local college graduation ceremonies. Columbus is a few miles to the east, but that's the home of Enormous State University, commonly known as Ohio State. There surely won't be anything available if that monstrous institution has anything going. Maybe it will be all the way to eastern Ohio after all, or maybe no sleep at all.
So it's back on the Interstate, toward Columbus. In a few miles there is a sign advertising a Motel 6, near a town called London. Maybe it's obscure enough that it has a room. We give it a try and, whaddaya know, we're in luck. It's a nice place costing a fraction of the place I tried an hour ago.
Next morning we gas up and have breakfast at a Waffle House. The friendly waitress arranges our order such that we can take advantage of a special and save a couple of bucks. While eating, a different waitress, without a word, picks up the tab and walks away. She's probably readjusting what our waitress had arranged. But what the heck - it's only a couple of bucks; no big deal.
We finish eating, and there's no tab on the table. I look up and our original waitress tells us it's been paid. What? But I didn't pay it. She tells me that the people in the booth behind me had picked up the tab. What gives? I didn't think we looked like we needed financial assistance.
She tells me that every once in awhile someone does that - pays the bill for a complete stranger for no reason other than to be doing a good deed. I have heard of that, and it restores one's faith in humanity. But it's still pretty amazing.
The least I can do is slip a generous gratuity to our friendly waitress. With that, she's ecstatic, thanking me profusely.
This junket is off to an interesting start.
Next week: Military graduation ceremonies.
- John Waelti's column appears every Friday in the times. He can be reached at jjwaelti1@tds.net.
