Against All Odds, It Lived

[“Let Inga Tell You,” La Jolla Light, published July 6, 2017] ©2017

 

If I had to sum up what I’ve spent my time on during the last three years, it would be one word:  trees.

 

I wrote a column a year ago called “It was more than just a tree” about the beautiful 35-foot kaffir plum tree that was not only the focal point of our front yard for four decades but was the backdrop for every family photo. I’d spent hundreds of happy hours reading in its abundant year-round shade. In earlier years it was constantly full of kids, both ours and neighbors.

 

But in 2015, I started to notice signs that all was not well. Sap began to ooze out of its trunk. Its leaves were not as abundant.  I decided a professional consult was necessary. Let me say that you would think that persons in the agricultural pest industry and/or professional arborists could agree on a diagnosis.  But you would be wrong. The tree was sprayed, it was cut back by 40%, it had stuff drilled into its trunk, and inserted into the ground around its root line. 

 

It was the sixth tree professional who probably got it right:   He looked me right in my 68-year- old eyes.  “Well, you know, lady, sometimes things just get old and DIE.”

 

“I’m aware of the concept,” I said coolly, making a mental note to savage him on Yelp.

 

And yup, we did finally have to declare it dead.  We had a weepy ceremony for it and thanked it for all the pleasure it had brought us.

 

Kaffir plum trees turned out to be scarce so we decided to go with a Chinese Elm since they obviously do very well in this climate. Given that we don’t have 40 years to watch this tree get big, we went with a 17-foot tree that required a great big, really expensive crane to lower it off its flatbed truck and into the equally expensive new hole that had been dug for it.  Since trees have always fed my soul, I named it Alma (Latin for nourishing). It also sounded good with “elm tree.”

 

Obviously Alma wasn’t producing much shade (none really) but I sat outside reading all last spring and summer beaming good thoughts at Alma and wishing her speedy growth.

 

But from the get-go, she exhibited serious droop.  “Just a little transplant shock” said the landscape guy we’d bought it from who installed it. “Don’t worry.” 

 

But then all the bark fell off. The leaves fell off.  The leaves that didn’t fall off with covered by some black sooty bug.  The landscape guy maintained it was being overwatered even though we had had a custom bubbler system with its own personal valve installed just for this tree, and the front yard sprinklers reconfigured so they wouldn’t touch the tree.  I call the arborist guy he recommended who is probably the only arborist in San Diego we hadn’t already hired for the last tree. 

 

The arborist showed up in October and said heck no, it’s not getting enough water.  He sprayed the bugs, and drilled stuff into the trunk, and put special fertilizer into the soil. “You’ll just have to wait until next February to see if it makes it,” he said, not sounding optimistic.

 

February came around.  Alma still looked positively moribund.  Every other Chinese Elm in San Diego was in full bloom but Alma’s few remaining leaves were falling off at record rates.  Everyone who walked by said, “I’m so sorry your new tree died.”  Even our lawn maintenance guy concurred.  “Muerto,” he announced.

 

I called the arborist for a second consult only to learn he had died. I regarded this as a bad karmic sign. Inanimate solidarity?

 

The landscape guy who installed the tree started hedging on the warranty, and stopped answering calls.

 

And then one morning in early April as I went out to get the newspaper, I thought I saw something green on the tree. Yes, it was a little tiny green bud.  I went to get Olof. 

 

Of course, we’d been down this road with the last tree. Sometimes they like to toy with you. Even the kaffir plum produced 37 carefully-counted leaves in its last gasp. 

 

But then every day there were more buds, and finally – yes! – some actual leaves!  We still didn’t dare hope.  But slowly over the next two weeks, Alma burst into full bloom.  Her bark came back. The bugs were gone.  While most of the trees on our property have flourished on benign neglect, we are terrified of over- or under-watering Alma. Is she getting enough fertilizer? Not enough?

 

We’re still going to worry obsessively about Alma for the next few years. But seeing her abundant foliage is a source of incredible joy to both of us. Could there be actual shade in our future?

 

We are literally and figuratively rooting for you, Alma.

 

Alma arrives via 60 foot crane – April 2016

 

May 2016 – looking good (if a tad droopy)

 

September 2016 – Uh oh, total insect and sooty mold infestation

 

Late September, 2016 – all the bark falls off

 

January 2017- leaves dying. Starting to take photos for warranty

 

Late March 2017 – looks totally dead. Every other Chinese Elm

in San Diego has been in full bloom for two months.

 

May 2017 – Against all odds, Alma suddenly bursts into bloom.

 

June, 2017: Hanging in there!

A Small Car Driver In A Big Car Town

[“Let Inga Tell You,” La Jolla Light, published June 29, 2017] ©2017

 

I used to be fairly certain that my end would come in a Bird Rock roundabout. But now I’m pretty sure that my last moments will be backing out of a parking spot between two SUVS in front of the public library. 

 

Or maybe it will be backing out of a spot on the Fay Avenue Speedway. People definitely seem to channel their inner NASCAR driver on that street. 

 

The problem, of course, is that I’m a small car person in a big car town. Even though I always look for a place next to a car my own size, anyone who has lived here for more than week knows that you grab – gratefully - what you can get.  And even if I’m parked next to what I am convinced is the only other little car in La Jolla, it invariably seems to be gone by the time I come back, replaced by a large black sport utility vehicle.

 

The first two feet that I back out are always totally blind. I inch out as slowly as I can ready to slam on my brakes as a car comes flying past. I brace myself for the sound of breaking glass and crumpling metal, two sounds that I really, really hate, especially when I’m encased in that glass and metal.  It is not good for my increasingly frail nervous system.

 

But I really don’t want a big car myself. My car pool days are mercifully over. No more cleat marks in my dashboard! (You know who you are.) In fact, I’d like an even smaller car than my little Toyota, maybe a Smart Car. Parking places aren’t getting any bigger. A tiny car would be especially useful at Gelson’s where despite the ample slots, the big cars hog one and a half parking places. I could still wedge my little Smart Car into the remaining half spot.

 

But if backing out blind on a busy street isn’t scary enough, pedestrians in local parking lots bring it to a whole new level.  Short of a deep-seated death wish (and the knowledge that those Beemer and Lexus drivers are well insured and will amply compensate your loved ones), I can’t for the life of me imagine what sort of brain activity, if any, is being registered by people who are obliviously texting – or not even texting - as they walk right behind backing cars.  One can only sigh wistfully and wish this lot were in the Serengeti, where natural selection could take its course.

 

We’re into the summer season now, of course, where traffic and parking and backing up issues all become exponentially worse. I think all of us year-round residents of La Jolla feel incredibly lucky to live in this beautiful ocean-side community.  But one can’t help but notice that summer tourists at a beach resort seem to have beamed themselves to a parallel universe where traffic laws do not apply. Fair enough; it’s what people do when on vacation. Still, it’s amazing so many survive their visit here.

 

At the Shores, for example, beach chair-laden visitors wander at will across busy streets against the light in front of oncoming cars.  They look stunned to hear the screech of tires, a blank look appearing across a puzzled face as they attempt to process what that annoying sound might have been. I fantasize having a neon blinking sign on the top of my car that I could broadcast “Look both ways!”  “The light is RED!” or even “AIIEEEE!” 

 

I used to tell myself that soon enough, it will be Labor Day again and life in La Jolla will return to its normally congested self.  But in the last few years, I can’t help but notice that Labor Day doesn’t even make much difference in parking or traffic congestion. We’re now in Full Tourist Season All Year Round. My go-to parking places are gone. In January!

 

But as for backing my little car out of parking places between the inevitable two big ones, I actually have a solution. It was inspired by World War II submarine movies and is so simple I can’t believe auto makers haven’t invented it. When I’m ready to back out of my spot in front of the library, I would say, “Up periscope, Siri!” and up through the roof of my car would come a 360 degree tube that would allow me to see speeding vehicles and death-wishing pedestrians. And Siri would say, “Safe to proceed! No Indy cars in sight!”  And for once I’d appreciate Siri with whom I’ve have an otherwise problematic relationship.  A vehicle periscope would truly improve my life more than any invention I could possibly imagine, even my long-time fantasy, a clairvoyant computer that would do what I want, not what I say.

 

As for the periscope, I’d just have to make sure it was down at the car wash.

 

 

Dells And Vales And Dales

[“Let Inga Tell You,” La Jolla Light, published June 14, 2017] ©2017

 

When Olof and I lived in Sweden and had the opportunity to take a trip above the Arctic Circle, we were not surprised to learn that the Sami (formerly known as Lapplanders) had some 1,000 words related to reindeer.  (The word tundra, by the way, is Sami.)

 

The Sami traditionally lived by following the reindeer herds but now lead a more settled existence with reindeer farming, hunting, fishing, and craft-making.  Having pondered reindeer at a Sami farm, I confess I was at a loss to imagine 1,000 different descriptors of them.  Years ago, my friend Linda Morefield and I, co-chairing the Pine Wood Derby for our Cub Scout troop, decided in true Mom fashion that “everybody is a winner” and set out one evening to create sixty different awards.  There’s really only so much you can say about a five inch block of pine whittled into a car shape, and the kids quickly figured out that “The Batmobile Award” was the only one with any real cachet. So a thousand words for reindeer impresses me greatly.

 

I’m guessing the Sami didn’t start out with more than ten, but those winters are really long, cold, and dark, and probably by the end of each winter, they had acquired five more.  It was probably what the Sami Moms did to keep from strangling the kids who were racing around the tent and driving her nuts.  “OK, kids.  Here’s an idea.  Let’s sit quietly and think of new names for reindeer!”  It’s what I would have done.

 

I got to thinking recently, what do Americans have a lot of terms for?  OK, we maybe don’t have 1,000 different terms for it, but I’ve noted for some time that English seems to have an inordinate number of words for topographical depressions, i.e. valleys.  This first came to my attention when my parents moved to suburban  New Jersey when I was in college to a secluded home that the realtor described as featuring a “bosky dell.” It was seriously clever marketing because my mother, who liked the house anyway, fell absolutely in love with the idea of living in a bosky dell, even though none of us quite knew what it meant.  The bosky part seemed pretty clear from the Spanish “bosque”, or forest (and the lot was indeed nicely wooded). But what the hell was a dell?

 

One immediately thinks of the children’s song “The Farmer in the Dell” but that doesn’t make much sense either. As it turns out the song came over from Europe and one theory is that the “dell” is a corruption of the Dutch “deel,” which can mean a workspace in a farmer's barn.

 

As it turns out, a dell in English is a small valley, usually among trees.  So, OK that little in the area behind the house could, if you were a realtor in a slow housing market, qualify as a dell. (We suspected she was a college English major which, like my major in psychology, had left her uniquely qualified for a lifetime of low-paying jobs.)

 

But over the years, I would wonder:  Why wasn’t it a bosky glade? Or a bosky glen? A bosky ravine? Or even a bosky vale or dale? (I’ve never understood the difference between the two of them even though they come up on crossword puzzles a LOT.)  So I have taken it upon myself to educate both you and myself on all those topographic holes our landscape seems so replete with.

 

Vale - a valley (used in place names or as a poetic term).

 

Dale - a valley, especially a broad one.

 

Dell - a small valley, usually among trees   

 

Glen - a narrow valley

 

Glade - an open space in a forest (no valley required)

 

Hollow - a small valley or basin

 

Trough - any long depression or hollow

 

Ravine - a deep, narrow gorge with steep sides

 

Gorge - a narrow valley between hills or mountains, typically with steep rocky walls and a stream running through it.

 

Canyon - a deep gorge, typically one with a river flowing through it

 

Coulee - a deep ravine.

 

Gully -  a water-worn ravine.

 

Couloir - a steep, narrow gully on a mountainside.

 

OK, so pretty wimpy in comparison to the Sami who even have a word for a bull reindeer with a single whopper-sized testicle (busat).  I guess if you’re walking behind them for a few hundred miles on the otherwise-sceneryless tundra, you’d have plenty of opportunity to notice.  (Inquiring minds want to know: what happened to the other one?)

 

But I’m willing to concede after this research that my parents did legitimately live in a bosky dell.  And by the way, they’ll be a quiz.

 

 

 

 

 

Please Listen Carefully

[“Let Inga Tell You,” La Jolla Light, published June 7, 2017] ©2017

 

I continue to be puzzled that no matter what business number I call, the recording advises me to “Please listen carefully as our menu options have changed.”

 

Inquiring minds want to know:  what is it about business phones that they feel compelled to constantly change their menu options?

 

Even more to the point, the new options sound suspiciously like the old ones. One of these days I’m going to catch one of these places out on this and write a column showing that in point of fact, their menu options HAVE NOT CHANGED ONE BIT.

 

And while we’re on this subject, I’m SICK of listening carefully.  I’m even more sickof being TOLD to listen carefully. What, they think I have the IQ of an amoeba?  That if I’m not reminded to listen carefully I’ll listen carelessly and select the wrong option?  Hell, I’m likely to do that anyway since the whole purpose of these options is to make sure you never get to an actual person.  The option that you really want – speaking to a human – is NEVER on the first menu, no matter how carefully you listen. And believe me, at this point I am a very, very careful listener.

 

My friend Bill has always maintained that you should never select any of the options and ultimately they’ll give up and send you to a person. After all, some people have rotary phones  andcan’t opt. But that doesn’t work as well anymore. They’re perfectly willing to disconnect you as punishment for not selecting one of the changed menu options, not listening carefully, but most of all for having a rotary phone.

 

My long-time preferred method, after listening to the first round of allegedly-changed menu options, is to just keep repeating “agent” or “representative.”  But some businesses – and we’re especially talking about medical insurance companies, and particularly YOU, Blue Shield - refuse to consider connecting you to a person until you have chosen one of their 10 options. And then, of course, you’ve been sucked down a rabbit hole that you’ll never get out of. 

 

And don’t even get me going on the part about how your call is very important to them.  My call is NOT important to you, you lying bags of dung!  If it were, you’d have someone answering your phone. On the rare occasions someone actually does, I’m so grateful I forget why I called.

 

Okay, I realize I’m sounding a little testy.  But I’ve had way too many opportunities to be implored to listen carefully to changed menu options in recent months.

 

Late last fall, I – and hundreds of others – were inadvertently dis-enrolled from Medicare.  My former employer, who provides my secondary insurance (Blue Shield), swears it was a Medicare snafu. Medicare maintained it was the fault of the benefits office folks of my former employer whom I would agree have the intelligence of corn meal. Unfortunately I was in the middle of a huge medical crisis and 22 claims were denied in the process. I was suddenly deemed uninsured.

 

The benefits office never ever responded to voice mail messages or emails. Of course, I probably wouldn’t either if several hundred irate people were calling me.

 

So I tried calling Medicare. The good news is that you ultimately get a person if you persevere on hold long enough. The bad news is that they are incapable of actually fixing anything. 

 

The Medicare lady confirmed that their computers showed that indeed, I was no longer enrolled in Medicare. In a cruel infinite loop, Blue Shield, being the secondary, won’t pay until Medicare has paid their part first.

 

The Medicare lady said that maybe I dis-enrolled myself during the recent Open Enrollment and I don’t remember.  Seriously?  I realize we’re dealing with an older population here but it’s really a shame the Uzi-through-the-phone app is still in its infancy.  Yup, I totally forgot that I spent an hour on hold to dis-enroll myself from Medicare, a procedure only slightly less complicated than a Middle East Peace Accord. It’s not like there is a “Press 3 to dis-enroll from Medicare” option that you can accidentally select. 

 

Then the Medicare lady offers:  maybe your husband did it. Yeah, like someone can just call and dis-enroll another from Medicare. I reminded her that every time I’ve called Medicare about a claim for him, they’ve insisted I put him on the phone personally.  So, she says, maybe I don’t remember that my husband called Medicare and put me on the phone and I told them I didn’t want to be enrolled any more.

 

You probably think you can imagine how many months it takes to get 22 claims resubmitted and how many times you are implored to listen carefully to changed options from people who truly care about your call. But no, you really can’t.