Thank a nurse this week

This is National Nurses Week and, I'm willing to bet, the very great majority of us have received health care from a nurse at some point in our lives.

My wife, Stephanie, in an RN and has also helped train nursing professionals as an educator in the Louisiana Community College System. Her daughter, Tanishia, has her BSN and is currently working as an LPN while she studies for her West Virginia state boards ... and my niece, Gale, has her BSN and is a nursing supervisor in the Morgantown, WV area.

All three love what they do and all three are really, really good at it.

My wife, though, gets special kudos ... she was my caregiver when we fought my cancer and she held my hand so many times when the poking and prodding was going on and she pushed me along when my legs couldn't do what my brain was telling them.

And all through that, she worked Critical Care Transport for Forsyth Medical Center — so, does that mean she was a 24-hour-a-day nurse?

Not only was she my nurse, but she was — and still is — my rock.

As an educator, she was tough and fair and those she taught, time and again, thanked her for being tough, because they learned things under her they learned from no one else.

Stephanie helped Tanishia take care of my late mother-in-law, Nora, during her four-month long illness. Tanishia logged long hours throughout, working to ensure her Nana was well taken care of.

Back when I had cancer, Gale was going to school and got to do a little nursing on me one time when I was all tubed up ... and wound up as an active participant in the care of her dad, my brother-in-law, Bob, as he battled multiple myeloma.

I know all three love what they do, but the reality is that none of them signed up to care for a husband, mother, father, grandmother — but that's what makes a nurse special. It's not just a job.

I love all three of "my" nurses and just wanted them to know they are appreciated.

"If the levees hold ..."

If we heard that phrase once, we heard it all day long as my sister, brother-in-law and I headed to the Mississippi Delta on Saturday to "see the flooding."

I know it sounds morbid, but we spent 20 years or so of our respective lives in the region where the flood forecast ranges from high and dry to up to four or five feet deep ... If the levees hold.



Good Hope Baptist Church



At Good Hope Baptist Church, in the Wolf Lake Community located between Yazoo City and Louise, former Louise schoolmates Roy Lee Cleveland and Randy Hill had just finished loading the central air units in the bed of a pickup to protect them from damage, but the outlook wasn't so good for the building, where water was expected to rise as much as halfway up the front doors.



"We're at 105 feet (above sea level) and the (Army) Corps (of Engineers) says we should expect it to go to 109, which would be about here," Randy said, making a slash type mark at his waist before adding the caveat, "if the levees hold."



Harold Horton

Power will be cut off in the area over the next few days and just up the road, familiy members, like Harold Horton and Hilma Horton Nibben were at the home where they grew up, gathering furniture and family mementoes and loading them to take them to safety.

"I'll take them home and keep 'em in the trailer, then bring it all back after the water goes down," Harold, who maintains an active email network of former Louise students, said. "How high do you think it will get?" my sister, who was a year behind Harold in school, asked.

"Well, we're at 105 feet," he said. "The Corps says it could go to between 107 and 109. At 107, the water's here ... holding a tape measure against a tree. We hope it's 107 because the house would safe ... but at 109, the water would be here and the house ruined because the floors are hardwood. We're hoping we'll be okay ... if the levees hold.

There it was again ... those four words on which the lives and hopes and dreams of so many now hang ... if the levees hold.

We followed the backroads into Louise, along the way passing many other families with trailers backed up to the doors and others heading toward the main highway.

It was, in a way, surreal. My sister and I grew up on Highway 14, west of Louise, and went to school with many of the folks now scrambling to save their belongings and the collections of a lifetime, such as Harold and Hilma of everything left behind when their father died at age 99 not too many months ago.

In Louise, we stopped and talked with Hoover Lee, former longtime mayor of the community and a lifetime resident.

"My daddy was here in '27," he said, referring to the great flood of 1927. "They walked over and stayed in a boxcar until they could get an engine to take them to Yazoo City. Mrs. Mecklin's house (Old Dr. Mecklin) still has the marks on it where they kept up with the water then, but they say we're safe ... that it won't flood here ... if the levees hold."

Between Louise and Greenville, my brother-in-law's hometown and where my sister and I claim, there was little to be seen other than barren fields or a beautiful, early stand of corn. Fields that once produced bale after bale of cotton now hold the promise of golden corn silks and ears full of kernels ... if the levees hold.

After an hour or two in Greenville, we headed south ... winding up in the Issaquena County seat of Mayersville. Driving past the community center, it looked as if most in the area had gathered for what had to be a meeting to discuss what was coming. We wound up on top of the levee, visiting with four other "gawkers" -- one from Little Rock, another from Florida and two from Jackson -- "My brother lives here," Little Rock said. "I brought them (referring to his three companions) to see it." He shared that locals had been advised to leave, but laughed and said his brother "would probably sleep through it."

Of all the places we went, only Mayersville was looking into the eye of a flooding certainty ... more even than the area around Wolf Lake. There's no "if" factor in play there ... because the levees south of town get a bit smaller and the water always rises ... and in this year when all the experts say record levels will be reached, there's but one thought that dominates ... what if the levees don't hold?

This Mississippi River flood is difficult to grasp

Growing up in the Mississippi Delta, and along the Mississippi River, it wasn't unusual to see high water in the spring, but I'm having trouble getting my mind around the flood waters heading south.

The 1927 flood ... known as The Great Flood ... is the benchmark in regards to water levels, yet the water moving downstream is forecasted to dwarf that one. Jeez!

If you haven't stood on the river's bank and watched the water flow past, I would think it would difficult to grasp ... but not unlike having grown up in the region and being familiar with a landmark and learning it is forecasted to be under water in a few days.

Every spring, when it rained and the water backed up the dredge ditches, we'd have flooding out on Highway 14 in Humphreys County. Never, though, do I remember the closing of major highways. Along US 49 West, between what we knew as Anchor Curve and Wolf Lake, there were a number of reliever canals dug in the late 1950s and early 1960s that were designed to bring high water between the retention levees, but this year, they are talking about closing that roadway!

There were always fields that would flood, but this year, the water around Wolf Lake is projected to get so high that friends are moving their belongings and officials have said they will cut electrical power to the area.

I've read the reports of the flood ... and I've read what I've written, and I simply can't comprehend it.
One thing I can comprehend, however, is the need for prayer ... for all who stand in front of the relentless flow.

Whatever happened to customer service? (Bob Evans)

Personal economist Clark Howard calls it "Customer no service" instead of customer service.


And if you've spent money lately or needed to return something or wanted to add something to the food order your server decided was closed, then you know what he means.


My wife tells me I'm impatient - and I am, but when there are six employees at the counter, a line of potential customers and only one serving their needs ... Well, that's reason to complain.


Perhaps or level of tolerance depends on our level of financial involvement. You know, we complain about poor cell phone service but will wait 20 minutes for a pre-cooked patty of something while the counter crew talks about their plans for the evening.


Our most recent episode came at the Bob Evans Restaurant on Hamilton Road near the Port Columbus (Ohio) Airport.


It started while the mousey little hostess was bogged down with trying to make change and we were waiting - and waiting - to be seated. When someone finally emerged from behind the counter, she asked the hostess where to seat us?


"Whatever's clean, I guess," she squeaked with an annoying little laugh.


As we crossed the dining room, she asked a server if booth such-and-such was okay. "I guess," was the curt reply as we walked past Mousey's room full of dirty tables.


After placing the order, my wife noted that the manager had just given the wait staff 10 minutes to get the tables cleaned. And other than customer movement, it had to have been the fastest that staff had moved since clocking out on their previous shift!


In the meantime, our food came. "Want anything else?", our server asked. "not right now." we responded, expecting to be asked about dessert as the meal progressed.


Wrong.


Never saw her again.


At the register, The hostess asked if everything was okay? "No," my wife responded. "the server never came back to see if wanted dessert."

"Oh, sorry," was the reply. "Did you want to order any?"

Jeez! Why mention it otherwise?

In the meantime, I wanted the manager. "I told her," my wife said, referring to mousey. I told her that was fine, but she wouldn't say anything to the manager. Mousey grinned.

"Anything else?" she asked as she added my wife's dessert order. 

"Yes," I said, I want to speak with the manager.

She called him, describing me as "some customer" and when he arrived, he listened intently, asked the identity of the server and apologized, adding that he would take care of it.

We waited several more minutes for the $3.99 slice of pie we almost had to beg for with Mousey getting in one more no-brainer question ...  "Wanna bag?"

In the meantime, I did two of the three things I had control over - I complained and the server got the tip she deserved.

Number three? I won't go back.

Extreme? Perhaps, but I work too hard for my money to be stressed over crappy service when I choose to spend it!