A New Blog for an old Diary

It's now 2015 and I'm going to revive this blog which has lain dormant for so long, using it to post my grandmother's 1907 diary, with photos and recollections of her.

I've had this small red book for years, kept it safely tucked into the top shelf, but age and desert dryness are crumbing the edges, so I want to transcribe the contents before they disappear. What's interesting about this little book is that it's also my mother's diary from 1937. My grandma was 11 when she wrote her entries, Mom was 12.

There are mysteries here, beginning with the title page, where my grandma writes her name as Dorothy M. Willyoung, very clearly. But we always knew her middle name to be Carpenter, after her mother's mother, Ella Louisa Carpenter, who was born about 1833. Ella married Charles Morris, and their third child was Eliza Victoria Morris, b 17 Dec, 1861, in New Jersey. Eliza was my grandmother's mother, so perhaps she adopted the M for Morris, to honor her mother.

I have a napkin from my grandma's trousseau, with the initials DCW embroidered in a corner. It is wearing thin at the folds, but I use it occasionally. When I was photographing my breakfasts for Irene, I used it in June, 2009, but the fork partially covers the initials.

So, there's that mystery. Another is the house at that address. I know that four of the five children were born in PA, and the youngest, Elmer Grant Willyoung, Jr, called Grantie, to distinguish him from his father, was born in 1901 in NY. So the family must have moved from PA to NY sometime between 1898 and 1901. My grandma have lived in the Mt Vernon house for some years before she began her diary.

I have several photos of the family. For this first post I've chosen a family grouping from a house I haven't identified yet. Three children and their parents, on a front porch, my grandma, the youngest, on her father's lap. I don't think this is their house in Mt. Vernon, however.

I Googled the address, 5 N. Fulton, Mt Vernon, and found a photo of two houses, each three story, but the porches and door alignments don't match. Checking on Zillow, I found that the house had sold in 2004, with a link to the realtor. I called him and had a wonderful conversation. I did tell him first that I was not a potential client, but that I was looking for information about a house on Fulton Ave. He was very helpful, told me that the house is now a three-family residence, and that the front porch had been enclosed, but the front doors were in the center of the front, not to one side as in the family photo. He offered to email me the listing photo and more info. Alas, this house was built in 1935, so the old Willyoung house must have been destroyed. Another mystery.

So, that's the beginning. I hope to transcribe all the entries, both of my grandmother and of my mother, and post them. Grandma Dot kept her diary through April, then set it aside. Mom began her entries in October. Grandma Dot's are in ink, blotted at times; Mom's are in pencil. Each girl added occasional drawings, which I will photograph.

Several of the opening pages have been cut out, so the diary begins on Page 7.

Page 7
Jan. 6, 1906, Mon.
Today I woke up and began to read. I finished a book. I was late for breakfast. After breakfast I went to school. It was very warm. In the afternoon after I had come home from school, we went down to the sawmill and stayed about fifteen minutes. Then papa called me up. Margaret, Beatrice and I took a ride and rode all the afternoon. When I came home I took my music lesson. Ate my supper and read a while. Then went to bed.

Still waiting...

After weeks of waiting, what I have is two appointments, one in July for a heart monitor, and one in September for a carotid imaging test, a Doppler, I think. The July appointment was made the day after my visit with the neurologist, but the second one, to see how badly my right carotid is blocked, wasn't made till weeks afterward, because Kaiser changed policy in the midst of the process. As it was explained to me, the doc coded the test for vascular imaging, which used to go through special services. That was changed, so that now such requests are to go through radiology. Could the appointment people figure this out? No. Instead, they kicked the whole thing back to the doc, for her to start anew, scheduling through radiology instead. Weeks wasted, appointments filling up, so that now I won't be tested till after Labor Day. Kaiser used to have ads about Thriving with Kaiser, but I don't think they use them any more. No wonder. Sigh.

Grey matter morning.

Such a different morning from yesterday. Grey outside, our May grey, which will burn off by midmorning. Fear has dissipated as will the overcast, just a bit lingering, and today I am just tired. Although we were on time for my appointment, the doctor wasn't. She takes time with her patients, far beyond that scheduled, so that, as the day progresses, she gets further and further behind. When I finally talked to her, after two hours, she took time to ask lots of questions, most of which we could answer. She looked at the MRI and MRA and told us the opposite of what DR T had said. The MRA looks good, nice blood flow through the brain, some question about the carotids, but the MRI shows white spots. Most are old, could be TIAs, could be from migraines, definitely multiple microvascular injuries. She wants more tests, so I will be off to Anaheim in July, because that's the first opening in that clinic, to monitor heart rate. I will be called for another appointment for new imaging with the vascular group. Referral to an opthamologist. I had blood tests again. She thinks the problem is with my eye, not in my brain. This is the opposite of Dr S's diagnosis. Two good doctors, at odds with each other. Weighing the choices, do I prefer to have a good brain and a bad eye? I think so, and I'm quietly satisfied that I can think about it at all.

Waiting

Fear of the unknown is universal. No matter how we try to calm ourselves, there is always lurking, at the back of our minds, dread that something we don't expect is waiting for us. Today we finally meet the neurologist to learn what the MRA really showed, what it was that caused Dr T to call, after sending us home, to say he'd referred me to Neurology. Because there was such a lack of haste in setting the appointment, I am assuming that there's nothing really wrong, that the chronic ischemic changes are just typical for my age and probably the result of migraines and not TIAs. That is what I want to hear. The MRI eliminated the big four causes, the huge monsters of tumor, stroke, aneurysm, MS, so that what is left is only tiny monsters, white blobs on photos of slices of my brain. What I really expect is to be sent off for more testing, with few answers today, just more questions. Nevertheless, my heart is racing a bit as I wait for this day to begin.

Written three weeks ago and left in DRAFT... Waiting is always difficult, and this morning is no exception. I am waiting for a phone call that has not come. Instead I've had a robocall from the library that I have materials on hold, and a yet another call from some home improvement company that insists that we spoke last January. I do not have time or energy to waste on these calls. A few days ago I went with friends to see Emperor, a fascinating story, based on fact, about MacArthur's treatment of the Japanese emperor in the war-criminal trials that followed Japan's capitulation. As we left the theater I noticed that my left eye was not behaving properly. I was not driving, and as the trip progressed, my vision regressed, so that by the time I was home, my left-eye vision was, left of center, only a grey blur. Within an hour it returned, leaving only a mild headache and a feeling of slight nausea. Yesterday, as I was having toast and coffee, Ray still asleep, this recurred. There were no changes in light values, just the disappearance of letters on my Kindle. I lay down for a bit and my sight returned, but the nausea and headache remained. I sent an email to Dr Pak reporting this, asking if this could be an ocular migraine. An hour or so later Dr Pak's PA called and said that I should go to Urgi-Care immediately. I clocked in at 2:09 PM, able to see clearly, but with nausea, headache and a bit of vertigo. For nearly two hours we waited, until finally Dr Seifert came in. She said that she didn't think there was anything wrong with my eyes, but more likely something in my brain. She then mentioned several things that could cause these symptoms: aneurysm, tumor, MS, atherosclerosis, and, my personal favorite, migraine. She ordered an MRI and an MRA, but there was a four-hour wait till the next opening. She said she'd keep us on the board, but we could go home for dinner and then return.

October through December

I began this in October, but it was a busy month for us...

One week from tonight we'll be in Sarasota, hosting a rehearsal dinner on the eve of our son's wedding. There's a lot to be done in this next week, and I hope I have some time to pause and think about this latest change in our lives. We will no longer have a single child. instead we'll have two married sons and two lovely daughters-in-law.

And that's as far as I got, because that last week was filled with the many small tasks that are necessary for a smooth and stressless party. We went off to Florida on the 25th, flying with our son and his daughter to Ft Lauderdale, then driving 170 miles to Punta Gorda. We spent two hours at LAX watching Virgin America mechanics climb in and out of a hatch under the nose, fixing whatever it was that prevented our departure. She enjoyed the activity and watched intently as trucks came and went. The President was in LA that day, and the airport shut down as Air Force One left. Eventually our plane was fixed and we flew away.

Florida was nicely humid and warm, but the pools were cold. Thursday we left PG and went to Sarasota for four days of wedding festivities with family, friends and strangers.

And again I stopped, so now it is the middle of January in a new year. The kids are wedded, honeymooned, and home again, settled down to normal life. The holidays were celebrated appropriately, and I am now covered by Medicare.

Monday Chris's book about Haiti came out in the Kindle Store, and there was a flurry as the news was posted and reposted on Facebook. It was all very exciting. Tomorrow the hardcopy version will be available.

We had four days with no heat, until today, when the repairman came to do install a new circuit board. We have heat again. It was so cold in the house, below 60, that I didn't mind going to the lab for blood work this morning.

September

We are galloping through September! Book Club, which meets on the third Monday of the month, will be tomorrow night. We're discussing Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, by Helen Simonson. ( I'd have underlined that title if I knew how to do it in Chrome, but I can't find that option. ) It's her first novel and is very clever, readable and enjoyable.

This morning I blocked a shawlette I've knit for our bride-to-be. This is the second go at the pattern. The first was knit with Legacy Lace, a merino/nylon blend from a farm in Nebraska. It worked up well, but the color wasn't so white as I wanted. When I saw some nice Italian merino in Wildfiber, I bought that and started over. A lot of work for something that may or may not be worn, depending on the weather that evening, but she'll have it if she needs it. I think I'll keep the first one for myself, but I might give it to her too, to take on their honeymoon.

Wedding-wise, I have three dresses, two of which will be returned shortly, no shoes, and no underpinnings. Each dress requires a different style of bra, so this week I must decide which dress to keep, which to return, and then go find the proper support. Shoes are on the calendar for next week.

Last week I worked up the menu for the rehearsal dinner, and sent it off to the restaurant to be sure those choices were still available. It was returned with "corrections, " which made me laugh. Their menu is strewn indiscriminately with upper-case letters, and my descriptions had none. These had been carefully replaced, so that we could offer "...Half Chicken, Roasted in an Oak Oven..." We'll be using my version.