Mounds in the Grass

 While we were in Fort Atkinson in June, we toured the Jefferson County Indian Mounds Park. The park is home to eleven Ancient Indian Effigy Mounds, which is only part of the original General Atkinson Group which at one time consisted of 72 mounds within a distance of less than a mile. Those original mounds included the following shapes: 39 conical, 15 linear, 3 tapering linear, 8 bird effigies, 5 turtle effigies and 2 unidentifiable forms. Historians claim that the ancient mounds were built between the years 300 and 1642 by groups of semi-nomadic American Indians.

 I don’t know. I tried to view them with an open mind, but I only saw mounds in the grass.

 Recently, archeologists have dug up shallow test spots through the park and have discovered unusual amounts of antiquities among the mounds, but few artifacts in other areas. These antiquities include potsherds and flint chips. Historians are unsure if these mounds were built for ceremonial, spiritual, or practical purposes. They may have been to mark territories, designate gathering places or were places of sacrifice. There’s evidence that some of them were for burials, but not all of them.

 The question is asked why the mounds were shaped like animals and birds. I mostly wanted to ask why anyone thought they were shaped like animals and birds.

 In 1983, archeologists working on all of the mounds in the area found that the southern part was fairly unaltered. In 1993, Hugh Highsmith purchased the land containing the select group of 11 mounds and gave the site to Jefferson County to become the Jefferson County Indian Mounds and Trail Park.

 The park’s eleven mounds contain animal, bird and conical mounds, as well as a section of an old

Indian Trail. The mounds vary from 75 to 222 feet in length and from 15 to 30 feet in width.

 Whatever is up with the mounds, whenever I see a Boy Scout’s Eagle Project, I have to recognize it. I’m not sure if this boy’s project was just the bench or more in the park. I guess I missed that.

 Unfortunately, we also missed the most unusual of the effigies in the area. Instead of being a mound, it is actually a depression in the earth called an intaglio. The one just west of downtown Fort Atkinson is supposedly the only complete surviving intaglio in North America. Looking at pictures of it on the internet, it doesn’t look like we missed much. But I’ll still have to go back one day to see it, I guess

Striving

Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.” Haggai 1:5-6 New International Version (NIV)

I read the book of Haggai a couple weeks ago and was struck by these verses. First of all, who is this Haggai and how did he manage to write a book worthy of entrance in the Bible?

As you already know, I’m not a Bible scholar, and I’m not going to pretend to be one, so I’m simply going to tell you that Haggai was one of the minor prophets. His message is a plea for the people to get to work on rebuilding the temple in Jerusalem, which doesn’t seem so important to us now, but as usual, the Lord’s message speaks to us here and now.

I don’t care who you are, you can find the personal message in these verses. Don’t we all have a tendency to strive for something we cannot have? Search for happiness in the wrong places? Set our priorities on the wrong goals?

Instead we need to strive for a relationship with our Savior. Turn our sights to the One who can fill our empty tummies, empty pockets and empty hearts. He said that only He could offer us water so that we would never be thirsty again. We will always stay warm in His loving arms. And the sand won't get in our shoes. 

Lord, God, Heavenly Father, thank You for sending Your Son to be our Savior, to save us from our sinful natures, to allow us eternal life. Amen.   

Southeastern Wisconsin Pics

 How about if I just share some pictures today from the area around Fort Atkinson, taken in June, when Hubby, Dino and I were there for an overnight visit.

 I'd love to visit every historical marker in the state, all 575 of them. I should probably start now, huh?

 A flock of turkeys. Are they called a flock?

 Boys doing what they do - showing off.

What's that up ahead, Dino? 

 This red covered bridge is part of the Glacial River Trail, a 39-mile on- and off-road bike trail between Watertown and Janesville (it connects with the Glacial Drumlin State Trail north of Jefferson).

South of Fort Atkinson, the off-road paved trail follows an old railroad bed along Highway 26. The bridge is a nod to that past and was designed to look like a train caboose, complete with a cupola on top; some of the hardware used to build it came from the old railroad. It was built in 2000, and the wood came from a local barn that was built in 1906.

Find it: The bridge is south of Fort Atkinson on the west side of Highway 26, north of County Line Road. Find parking for the trail at County Line Road and Old Highway 26. From there, it’s a half-mile walk or ride north to the bridge. (From https://www.jsonline.com/story/travel/wisconsin/day-out/2018/11/08/covered-bridges-wisconsin/1893951002/)

 Maybe visiting the covered bridges of Wisconsin would be a more achievable goal. 

 Always fascinating.

 A stream hardly worthy of this structure.

 Covered bridges will always remain romantic.

What's in the flowers, Dino?

And more flowers.

I took seven pictures of this fella, and this one is most in focus. Stupid camera, that's another story.

When Summer's a Blur

Looking back, I realize that summer has become a blur. When the calendar is once again as full as mine, it’s hard to keep it all straight. I’m gonna give it a shot, though.

Back on the rainy Sunday morning of June 16, Hubby, Dino and I took off on a quick overnight foray to see our son in the southern part of the state. I’m always about taking random detours, so we didn’t take the shortest route there.  

When I was going to college in La Crosse, I traversed part of that route to get home on the weekends. I rode through the city of Wisconsin Rapids many times throughout that year, but never had the chance to stop and nose around. I always enjoyed riding down Highway 54 along the Wisconsin River, with its parks and big old homes. One of those parks, Ben Hansen Park, was named after Benjamin Hansen who was credited with beautifying the local riverbanks.

In 1996, the state decided to create a Wisconsin Firefighters Memorial and the centrally located city of Wisconsin Rapids was chosen to be its home. Beautiful Ben Hansen Park could not have been a better site.

I didn’t know any of this, that Sunday morning, when I asked Hubby to stop at the park I had ridden past 35 years ago. 

     The mission of the Wisconsin State Firefighters Memorial, Inc. is to establish and maintain a memorial honoring all firefighters in the State of Wisconsin, recognizing not only those who have given their lives as the ultimate sacrifice, but also to honor those who have and continue to serve their respective communities.

     Every year approximately one hundred firefighters die in the line of duty in the United States.  The Wisconsin State Firefighters Memorial Board of Directors has chosen to provide a unique and lasting way to pay tribute to firefighters from the State of Wisconsin who have made this ultimate sacrifice while in service to their communities. This tribute has taken the form of a Memorial Park dedicated to preserving their memory.

     The vision of the WSFM was to create a park with a natural and scenic setting to house a memorial to our firefighting heroes from across this great State of Wisconsin. The serenity of the setting allows park visitors to be alone with their thoughts and emotions and at the same time realize that their loves one will never be forgotten

(From the WSFM website)

Such is Life

On June 5, I began sharing the story of my sister Pat’s battle with cancer. Those seventeen blog posts took me up until a little over a week ago, when – as luck would have it (or did I plan that well?) – Hubby and I left for a week’s vacation camping in Michigan’s UP. Our first full day up there, Monday, the 15^th, would have been Pat’s 60^th birthday. Once, she and I were also camping there on her birthday and I remember buying her an ice cream cone in celebration.

But enough about her. As I mentioned on my last post, when I am struggling with things, I ask myself “What would Pat do?” And I know she wouldn’t dwell on events which might bring her down.

Before I move on, however, I noticed that one of my last blog posts before beginning that series, I had told you that I had just broken a bone in my foot. I should give you an update on that. 

My feet on June15

Eleven days after I fell on my last basement step and ten days after my family practice doctor confirmed there was an avulsion fracture, and told me to keep wearing my boot and try to stay non-weight bearing, I saw the orthopedic surgeon. He re-x-rayed it and prognosed that I could start treating it like a bad sprain. Slowly start putting some weight on it, ditch the boot after a few more weeks, start some easy exercises as tolerated. It could take up to twelve weeks to be good as new, but there was nothing I could do at that point which would make things worse. Unless, of course, I fell down another step.

That appointment was six weeks ago already. I would say my right foot is as good as it’s going to get. It surely isn’t any more painful or less mobile than my left foot, which has been an issue for over six years now. I think I have gotten to the age where I just won’t bounce back like I used to.

I think that’s all to bring you up to speed. In addition to the camping trip we just returned from, I have to still tell you about an overnight to my son’s in the southern part of the state. And looking at my calendar until the end of the year, I will have no shortage of stories waiting to be told.

Tree over the power line just beyond my yard

But here’s the great irony. After camping in our pop-up camper in a Michigan State Park with electricity at our site and hot showers and flush toilets a half-mile away, I come home to no power. A bad storm blew through town Friday night and took out a lot of trees and electricity for most residents. Being as we have well water, in addition to no lights, we have no running water, only the several gallons I keep stored in the basement for such calamities. I’m praising God, though, that we bought that generator back in May; at least the frig and freezer are running.  

Such is my life. Keep following along!

Crossing the Finish Line - Entry 17 in the story of my sister and me

Dear God

If I die tomorrow

Or a thousand tomorrows from now,

Will it matter?

Will I be changed

Or have changed the world?

Will another moment from eternity of existence

Cause the moon to fall

The oceans to weep

The trees to walk?

But if an extra heartbeat

Brings one smile to a teary eye

If all my heartbeats

Can make another soul sing

Another life less dull

Then my entire being has purpose

And eternity becomes an instant of joy.

            My sister, Patricia Ann Loehmer, wrote the above poem over a decade before she received the diagnosis of cancer, the cancer which claimed her life one month before her fortieth birthday. If she were still with us, she would be celebrating her sixtieth birthday next week on the 15^th. I’ve been sharing her words and her story here over the last few weeks in her memory as we have stumbled over the twenty-year anniversary of her passing into the next life.

On a regular basis, people still come up to me and say, “Pat was your sister, wasn’t she? She was so good-hearted. She was the smartest person I knew. She was the toughest person I knew.” 

            I nod and agree with these people. Her wonderful combination of grim determination and childish wonder was an inspiration to so many, her spirit touching the lives of everyone she met. Reading over the many letters she wrote to me while either she was at college, I was at college, or I was living 1200 miles away in Colorado, it’s almost as if she knew, somehow, what was coming, what her fate in life would be. The wisdom of her words held me up during the rough spots in my life and today those words simply stun me.

Mostly, she is my constant inspiration. There is that saying “What would Jesus do?” That motto inspires me to do good, of course. But when I need to make the pedal hit the metal, I ask myself, “What would Pat do?”

When we meet again, I can only pray that I have done her proud.

            “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” 

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading her story over the last month. My intention was not to bring you down but to lift you up, to give you strength and hope.  I’ve been planning on posting this series for over a year, wanting to share it with you in celebration of my sister’s life, marking the milestones of the 60 year anniversary of her arrival on this earth and the 20 year anniversary of her passing. It seems like she has been gone so long, but when I look at those numbers, I realize that she blessed many of us for forty years. And what more can anyone ask for?

Down the Home Stretch - Entry 16 in the story of my sister and me

Shoveling snow out of the road in 1961, just about the time I was born. 

Have you heard what cross-country coaches say? 
The first miles you run on your legs, the last mile you run on your guts. 
Pat Loehmer 

Outside our parents' house in 1986. I don't remember seeing this picture before until I found it in Mom's old pictures a month ago. 

June 18, 1999 

            “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want,” I read from her Bible at the side of her bed. My sister Pat had become unresponsive, her breathing labored but steady.

            “Keep reading,” Mom instructed me. “They say that your hearing is the last thing to go.”

We were keeping a night-time vigil, something I never in a million years thought I would be doing, there at Pat’s bedside in the nursing home. Just being in the nursing home was beyond anything I could fathom. My sister Pat? Bubbly, full of life, a pistol who never stopped shooting, never stopped working. How could she be lying in that nursing home bed, pale and gaunt, no longer able to speak or barely move.

            “He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness For His name’s sake."

            Why would God do this to my sister, my best friend? Why did she have to suffer so much, fighting for so long? If He wanted her in heaven, why didn’t He take her suddenly, painlessly? And why can’t He send a miracle? Right here and right now?

            The doctors said that it was a miracle that she had lived for six years with this kind of an aggressive cancer. Really? Because I didn’t see it as a miracle, I saw it as six years of my sister dying, when she should have been living.

            “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.”

            But she had lived those six years. She and I had gone on camping trips, sometimes with Judy, sometimes with my kids. She had stood up at the wedding of her best friend from college. She had been the photographer for my second wedding. She and her husband along with me and mine had flown to Las Vegas for a long weekend. She had continued working as long as she could.

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over.”

            I looked up at Mom and she gestured that I should keep reading. I was out of ideas though. Sure there were many more chapters in the book of Psalms, David’s outpouring of his faith in God and that all things would turn out right through Him. But I just couldn’t do it.

            The next morning, my sister Judy joined the vigil. When her nurse checked on Pat, she nodded towards her bed as she left the room. I don’t remember if she actually said it or not, but the words that came into my head were, “it’s time.” Nurses who have seen enough know when it is time.

            We gathered around Pat and watched her lungs fill with air for the last time. The air slowly ebbed from her, as if the oxygen was leaving not only her lungs but her fingers and toes and even her pores.

            A sob escaped from Mom, and Judy probably reacted as well. All I did was watch that frail chest, waiting for it to rise again, willing it to rise. Not taking my eyes from that slight lump under the sheet.

            “Come on, Pat, come on, you can do it. Take another breath.”

            It never happened.

My kids with their Aunt Patti, in April of 1993, four months before her diagnosis

(Don’t despair! The story’s not over. Be sure to check back in on Friday for the remarkable ending to a life well-lived.)

Around the Far Turn - Entry 15 in the story of my sister and me

Pat in our parents' back yard in 1987

I don’t believe you should regret any decision you make. But that’s the way I am. Maybe I can’t admit that I’ve made a mistake. But whatever happens, it’ll work out or you make it work out. And there’s no such thing as luck. 
You make your own luck. Pat Loehmer 

Flashback

            “I won’t let her go.”

            “You’ve only had her a couple weeks,” was a pretty lame response but I didn’t know what else to say.

            My sister Pat sighed on the other end of the phone.

            She had picked up the German Shepard mix at the humane society a few weeks before. Mandy was an adorable puppy, but what puppy is not ridiculously cute.

            Then just a few days later, Mandy became lethargic and stopped eating. Pat encouraged her to eat and drink, but finally had to take her to the vet. The puppy was diagnosed with Parvovirus. Nursing Mandy back to health, Pat was reminded of why she dropped out of vet school. She knew she would have given her heart to every sick animal that came in the door.

            The vet told her to check with where the dog had come from to see if there were any other sick dogs. Turns out that the rest of the pups from the litter as well as her mom had all succumbed to Parvo. It was only Pat’s tenacity and shear will power that cured Mandy. She remained Pat’s loyal companion, her shadow for many years.

Probably 12 or 14 years later, the shepherd was full of arthritis and lacked any energy, her eyes clouded with cataracts, when one day she could no longer get up the steps into the house.

Pat called me a few hours later to tell me that Mandy had obediently, though slowly, followed Jeff into the woods when he called her, a rifle over his shoulder. Pat didn’t know what she would do.

“She’s not suffering anymore.” Yet another lame answer from me.

“I know,” was all she could say in return.

Mandy in Pat's yard in 1987

Spring 1999

            “So what do you think?” I laid the paper on her lap. “How can we configure the bathroom?”

Even though Pat was lying in a hospital bed, life had to go on. My husband and I were working on remodeling our house, adding a third bedroom and second full bath. We were trying to figure out how to fit all the fixtures into the cramped bathroom space.

“Here,” I laid more paper on her lap. “I measured everything and cut out models. So it will be like putting together a puzzle.”

She looked at the small cut-outs of a toilet, shower and vanity and the space they needed to fit into. “Are you mocking me?”

“What? Of course not.” The last thing I wanted to do was hurt her feelings. “If we are going to keep both doors coming into the bathroom, I don’t know where everything should go.” One door led to our bedroom, the other to the laundry. I really hated the thought of shutting off the one to the laundry room and the back door beyond.

She pushed the pieces around for a while. We came up with a plan we thought would work and I assured her I would tell the contractor on Monday.

A few hours later, shortly after Mom came to visit, Pat’s skin went suddenly grey.

Her body convulsed in the small bed and her eyes rolled back in her head.

“Pat, Pat!” Mom called to her. I pushed the “code blue” button on the wall and ran out into the hall to flag down the nearest nurse.    

A flurry of activity ensued and I pulled Mom out into the hall so that we wouldn’t be in the way.

 By the first of June, we were all noticing that she wasn’t nearly as mentally sharp as she used to be. When she first was admitted to the nursing home, her husband set up her laptop and paid for WiFi to her room so that she could stay in touch and even work on projects for her employer. After a month or so, she wasn’t able to focus. She was the smartest person I knew, and it seemed cruel after losing everything else, that she would lose her intellect.

            An MRI confirmed that the cancer had spread to her brain. The doctor told Pat, Mom, and me that they could try radiation. It wouldn’t destroy the tumor, but could control its growth for a little while, buy her some time.

            Her chin went out again. Her determination never wavered, but this time she was determined to let go. She was tired and if she knew anything else, she knew when enough was enough.

Pat at our parents' house in 1987, playing a peg game by herself. 

Life, Love and Laughs - Entry 14 in the story of my sister and me

There’s a lot of in-between when you’re not a kid and not an adult. That in-between has been named a dangerous phenomenon – a teen-ager. I think it contributed a lot to the generation canyon. Teen-agers are the most crazy bunch of people alive. Pat Loehmer

On Wednesday, I blogged about my memories of past Fourth of Julys with my sister Pat. To keep that celebratory feeling going, here are more pictures of life, love and laughs.

In November of 1959, four months old. Notice a creepy hand in the lower right hand corner? Looks like they are holding onto the blanket, but why? 

Sleeping on the living room floor, age 3 1/2 

First-grade portrait, 1965

Christmas 1967

School portrait 

Another school portrait 

Reading instructions on Christmas morning, 1971

Confirmation, 1973

School portrait 1974 

Birthday, 1975 

Bridesmaids for a friend's wedding, 1977

Wedding, 1983

My son's second birthday, 1988

My second wedding, 1997