From January 5, 2022 edition

Lyn and I enjoyed a very wonderful and quiet Christmas. She sings in a church choir. They had a few extra practice sessions and a Christmas Eve performance. Other than that, we mostly stayed home and enjoyed time together and with our animals.

We have a cat named Harry and five chickens that are spending their first Christmas and winter with us. It is interesting to observe the young chicken girls as they deal with their first cold weather. They have been sleeping in a smaller mobile chicken house that is separate from the girls main building. We have noticed that they are spending more time in that building as it becomes colder. That building has heat available when the colder temperatures arrive.

As a young boy attending Edgewood Grade School, I had a paper route. Many of my customers gave me a present for Christmas. Some would give me a Christmas card with a nice financial gift.
I also received many boxes of chocolate covered cherries. As I recall, I might have 15 to 18 boxes each year. I remember delivering the newspapers while riding my bicycle. I had a newspaper saddlebag that was attached to my bike. I remember delivering the newspapers and replacing them in the saddlebags with candy boxes.

This year, I was in a store when I noticed a large display of chocolate covered cherries in those exact same packages. I purchased a dozen of them. I delivered a box to several neighbors. I gave a couple of them to some friends. I opened one of them for myself. But I saved one and placed it in the newspaper tube holder that is attached to our mailbox post for our morning newspaper carrier to have at least one box of chocolate covered cherries.

I enjoy visiting on the telephone with friends and family that we can’t be together with during the holidays. Lyn spent time reconnecting with her family members that live away from us. I talked with my sister, Kathy; who lives with her husband in Austin, Texas.

I also get several calls from friends and some were quite a surprise. I had a nice talk with former high school classmate Bob Rosebrook and a fellow, Bill Perry, who worked with us when my dad had the Sunoco station on Madison Avenue. It was nice to hear from them.

I was very surprised last week when I heard of the passing of Betty White, who was just a couple of weeks from her 100th birthday. I was impressed with the way so many commentators and her friends honored her.
I feel a special connection with her and the cast of the Mary Tyler Moore television show. Many years ago, I was flying from Indianapolis to Los Angeles. After a plane change in St. Louis, I ended up sitting across the aisle from Moore.

We started talking and before long we were looking out the plane’s windows trying to guess what cities that we were flying over. It was the middle of the night. We hardly ever knew if we were making the correct guess.

During that flight, Mary explained to me that she had a brand-new television show in the works. I knew her from her playing Dick VanDyke’s wife on his show. She told me several things about her new show. She was returning from the Minneapolis-St. Paul area where she had just filmed a part of the introduction to the show.

I remember her saying to me that she had been filming outside and she tossed her winter hat in the air as she spun around. She told me to watch for that. She told very few people about that move. Several months later, saw the show and her tossing her hat in the air. This is a connection that I will never forget, and also with Betty White.
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I did fall asleep early Friday on New Year’s Eve, but fireworks woke me at midnight. I stood up and lifted my left foot because I wanted to get 2022 off on the “right foot.”
Happy New Year.

Stuart, our family dog, is also a registered therapy dog. He and I visit schools, hospitals and nursing homes. We have done this for over 13 years. On Stuart’s last birthday, he turned 17 years old. That makes him almost 120 years old in dog years.

For the past few months, we have been noticing that Stuart has been having some physical problems. We got worried and made an appointment with his veterinarian. Dr. Jones at The Southside Animal Hospital has taken care of Stuart for many years.

A day or so later, Stuart and I were visiting one of the nursing facilities. He has a very special friend that is a resident there. We have been friends with her for over 10 years. She and Stuart have a very close bond.
After much thought, I decided that I should explain a little of the problems that we had been noticing in Stuart. I really didn’t want to explain to her but I did talk to her about how he was doing and the veterinarian’s appointment. She quietly listened as she gently stroked his head and ears. I could feel that she was a bit upset.

Later that evening, I received a call from one of her doctors that she was very upset and had been crying. She was distraught about Stuart. He assured me that they would take good care of her and would help her deal with this depression.

On the day of Stuart’s veterinarian appointment, we made a short visit to the nursing home and visited with her. She petted Stuart and softly talked to him. I assured her that the medicine that Dr. Jones prescribed the week before seemed to be helping Stuart.

Later that day, we had another appointment. Dr. Jones gave Stuart more of the same medicine so he could get better.

After that, Stuart and I returned to the nursing home to give his special girlfriend a good report. He cuddled up with her on her bed and she again petted him and quietly talked to him. I saw a few nice smiles. There were no tears from her on this visit.

The next day, one of her nurses said there was a positive difference and that she kept talking about Stuart’s visits. She seemed very happy again. Stuart is still being known as “the miracle healer”.
Stuart seems to be having fewer physical problems each day and takes a lot of naps. He seems bothered that we haven’t visited many areas of the nursing home or any of the school reading programs that we normally do.

On a different note about Stuart, our next-door neighbors have been dealing with a big project. They hired a contractor to remove their old asphalt driveway and replace it with a new concrete one.
These neighbors, Mark and Carolyn Leigh, are also good friends with us. They keep some very tasty treats in their garage. Stuart would quickly notice the opening of that overhead garage door and scamper over to accept some treats.

The pouring of wet concrete created a challenge for several humans. The garage door needed to remain closed and Stuart was supposed to have his leash attached to prevent any dog paws in the concrete. That went for Harry the cat and all 10 chickens also.
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On the final day of concrete pouring for the driveway, Mark came over to our house and got Stuart on his leash. He walked him to a wet part of the new driveway and helped him sign his name. It is beautiful.
Stuart has many friends and I have lots of friends because Stuart lets me hang out with him.

THE RIGHT STUFF
As I mature, I seem to be paying more attention to the reason behind some of our special national days like Memorial Day, Veterans Day, and Independence Day. I have a feeling that this happens as we grow older and have memories of family and friends that served in the military. We have so much for us to be thankful.
I really enjoy seeing short videos showing a parent or family member that is currently in the military who returns home on leave a few days earlier than expected by their family members. 

I had something like that happen to me while stationed at Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland. My parents told me that they were planning a road trip to the Maryland area and they would be pulling their small camping trailer. No date had been set. 

One Friday evening, I had some friends with me with weekend passes. We were driving toward Baltimore when we pulled up beside a car that was towing a camper at a traffic light. It was my folks. I’ll never forget that evening.

I spent six years in the Indiana National Guard. I enjoy looking back on those years. I’m still in contact with several of the guys that I served with. We were on the list to be activated a couple of times and that required us doing double of the amount of training. 

I’d love to see more people honoring our folks currently in the military. I’d also really like to see more stories on television and in print that tell special stories about anyone who is making their communities better. Good stories encourage people to do good things.

During the pandemic I have spent more time inside our house and have watched a lot of TV shows. I enjoy NCIS New Orleans and JAG, each series is connected with the U.S. Navy. I like the other NCIS shows also but the music on the New Orleans show is really good. Sometimes at the end of a really good episode when I watch some of the characters saluting, I find myself also saluting from my recliner.

One of our neighbors is a retired U.S. Postal worker. He is also a former member of the Army. As we learned that we both had a military background, when we saw each other from a distance, we started saluting each other in lieu of a friendly wave.

One of his former Army buddies will be visiting with them this week. It is so cool that they stay so connected. I believe he and his wife are coming to Indianapolis from New Hampshire by airplane. I’m looking forward to meeting them with a good salute.

I’d love to see more good stories shown on local and national television news. I think our younger folks should be exposed to stories about people doing wonderful, special things and not so much about the negative stories.

I think we should celebrate the good things and the people doing all the right stuff.

A HAPPY DAY

Last Friday afternoon was amazing. Stuart (the therapy dog and part-time columnist) and some of his human friends set up a Drive-Thru Drop Off at the Beck Service Center to collect items on the “Wish List” for his friends living at the Southside Animal Shelter.

We had it set-up for a couple of hours prior to the monthly cruise-in car show. It was great to see folks pull up and donate pet supplies. I really enjoyed seeing people walk up to see and pet Stuart. He made lots of new friends that afternoon.

I also met some very nice people that donated supplies and stopped to tell us how much they enjoyed reading The Southsider Voice each week. I remember one lady leaning down to complement Stuart on his articles. His tail was going very strongly.

Lots of friends stopped by, including two of my high school classmates, Sharon David and Robert Hawkins. Some of the patrons made donations before they came back to take part in the cruise-in. 

I was greatly pleased with the number of people and families who pulled up and made a donation. The following day, all the donations were delivered to the Southside Animal Shelter. Stuart and I were able to visit with the shelter staff for a few minutes while unloading supplies.
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Stuart was a resident of the Southside Animal Shelter for a while where we met and began our lives together. He was tired last Friday evening, but he also was a very happy dog.

​Dropping off donations are Fred Shonk with Stuart, Meagan Warmoth, operations manager at the shelter, and publisher Kelly Sawyers behind Southsider Voice community outreach rep, Bob White. Behind and to the right of the group were  the quantity of supplies donated at the Voice’s inaugural event.

REMEMBERING MEMORIAL DAY
Memorial Day and Indy 500 race weekend always bring back so many memories. This year the race was shown live on television with no local telecast delay. The crowd at the Speedway was limited to 135,000 spectators due to the pandemic.

I have memories of seeing live coverage of the Indianapolis 500 by a local television station, WFBM-TV Channel 6. This was before it was connected to a national network and was shown all over the country. My memories include riding with my father on his country milk route on race day and watching the race on TV after stopping at farms to pick up large metal cans of milk to deliver to a local dairy.

I have always enjoyed the Indy 500 radio network broadcasts of the race. For many years, I enjoyed spending the day washing and waxing my car while listening to the race on the radio. I would drive my car into our backyard. I’d have a radio handy and stuff to eat and drink. 

I knew one of the radio announcers, Tom Peden, who was part of the 500-radio network. The Peden family lived on the Southside and were customers at my father’s service station. Peden’s son, Mark, was a member of my senior class at Southport High School.

Speaking of my Southport High School class, I want to remember one of our classmates who lost his life while serving in the military. I think of him quite often but especially at Memorial Day. Stuart Ernhart lost his life while serving in Vietnam. I didn’t know Stuart very well while we were in school. I remembered him as being a very good chess player. His was a very quiet polite young man.

I believe that Stuart was the only member of the Class of 1960 that we lost in Vietnam. He has been gone since 1966. He only had six years after graduation. I have grown to celebrate Memorial Day, Veterans Day and Armed Forces Day more and more every year. I have so many friends and classmates who served. 
Our next-door neighbor is former military. We have exchanged a couple of stories about our time in the service. We tend to salute now from a distance when we spot each other in our yard or driveway. A couple of guys that he served with and their wives will visit with them in a couple of weeks. 

This year’s race was fantastic. I think almost everyone was excited to see Helio Castroneves join the “Four Wins” group of drivers. It was fun to watch all of the people share their excitement with him. It was a very fast and safe race. It will be interesting to see if Helio will try to start a “Five Wins” gang of winners.

Don’t forget about the monthly car show Friday, June 4 on the parking lot of Beck’s Service Center at Madison and Edgewood avenues. Also please remember that there will be a “Drive-Thru Drop Off” that will help fill a wish list for The Southside Animal Shelter. This will happen at the same location just before the start of the car show.
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Stuart and I are looking forward to seeing lots of our friends.