Sometimes fate conspires to take you somewhere unexpected. In this case it came in the form of an invitation from my sister, Helen. She lost her spouse and the love of her life, Scott, less than a year ago after 30 years of a joy-filled partnership. He was a like a brother to all of us. We’ve all been marshaling forward through grief in our own ways. For her, a recent long solo trip was particularly empowering. Soon after, she surprised us siblings by messaging that she’d decided to take a trip from her Indiana home to the Dakotas, for a few reasons. In Scott’s role with the USGS, he oversaw workers in states across the region (Michigan to Montana) so she wanted to connect with his colleagues; our nephew has an internship in North Dakota (and had lived two summers with Helen & Scott while working other internships); and the site of a family tragedy over 75 years ago is in South Dakota—my namesake uncle, Alexander Jan, died in a bomber crash while in training in 1944. She let us know we were welcome to join but that she intended to go either way. 

Within a short time, three other siblings decided we could fit it in and would join her. I was keen to go; my intuition compelled me. It wasn’t that Helen needed me (or us) to support her on this journey, but I suspected it’d be an emotional trip for us all, as our mother had passed last year as well. I’ve come to learn we’re a bit rare, in that our family enjoys being together (including the fifth sib, and all partners, who weren’t able to come). We don’t live in close proximity, so we always look forward to being together. While the trip to the crash site was heavy, the adventure was mostly joyous and even percolated with laughter. It was a brief four-day excursion, yet brimming with so many feelings. 

My Uncle Jan, “Johnny” to his six sisters, was the only son in the family. My mother was his closest sibling, and referred to him as her big brother. They walked to and from school together. Two years apart in age, he “looked out for her.” He was bright, “good at math”, kind, helpful, and had a gentle sense of humor that put others at ease. By all accounts he was adored by everyone. He enlisted at 18 and spent a year in flight training in the fledgling, not yet named branch of the Army now known as the Air Force. His training class began in Texas and he was stationed in Casper, Wyoming in the fall of 1944. 

We learned of the crash site only in the last decade. His family was informed of his death, like too many others during war, by a knock on the door. It’s a hard to comprehend the reality that more American planes (over 5,000) crashed in training in the US than were shot down overseas in the years 1942-45. We have copies of handwritten letters Uncle Jan wrote to home, right up to a few weeks before his death. Reading them tugs at one’s heart, as he teases about his sisters and humbly shares about his achievements and hopes to his parents during the severe global challenges of 1944. They confirm all the attributes I listed above. It’s impossible to imagine the pain of my immigrant grandparents and aunts getting such news that October day. It was also difficult for me to not equate his affable and beloved personality with that of my brother in law Scott, whose colleagues we met on the trip, who repeatedly pointed out all the ways he’d nurtured the growth of everyone with whom he came into contact in the USGS.

My mother could barely discuss the incident that took her brother, and for the rest of her life became uneasy whenever she heard “Taps”. Though she was 17 and the family was given details about the crash (six of ten in the crew survived), uncharacteristically her sharp memory blocked out what state it had happened in. Through the help of a friend (John Hammill) I was able to learn how to access the military records, and slowly learned the crash occurred near a small town in the farmlands of northern SD. Somehow, this information was important to me and I shared it with my family several years ago.

About the same time, my brother in law Scott (also a pilot) was promoted to work with states in the same region. He happened to have a conversation with a friend who was into “Geocaching”. Through some unknowable karmic plan, his friend discovered that in 2010 a plaque honoring the crew and marking the site had been installed. Suddenly, we had a concrete physical place-holder for a lingering, decades old, sad family mystery. A quick scan of maps revealed that Lemmon, the closest town (pop. 1100) is about 4 hours from the nearest major airport, and for me a drive was a 1600 mile, 25 hr. trip. Not an easy trek. I stored the idea of a visit away as a “someday” journey. A few weeks ago my sister brought that day forward. 

We all flew to and met in Minneapolis/St. Paul. From there it was a four hr. drive to Jamestown, ND where my nephew is working. Then another 3 hours south to Lemmon, SD. The landscape, on the edge of the famed Badlands, is rolling green hills. Though scenic, it felt conspicuously sparse. There are croplands, and cattle, but seemed to be very few homesteads. Perhaps because of this it held a strange presence. One gets the impression the farming must be on a mega scale. We quickly were gaging distances between gas stations. 

Following the trail of the creation of the plaque, eight years ago I found and spoke on the phone to the octogenarian who, with his VFW group, had funded and gotten it installed. He’d actually heard the plane go down that night in 1944 when he was a young boy, as the engines were alternately back-firing and one caught fire as the pilots struggled to regain control in those fateful last minutes of flight. Three crew members parachuted to safety. Another failed to open his chute in time. Another perished after jumping when the plane was too low. My uncle was the navigator, and by the account from the pilot, had stayed on (typically) attempting to assist and only prepared to leave when ordered. Sadly, he had on his chute but never jumped, as his body was found 50 feet from the crash, bombay doors open. Another crew member died on impact. Miraculously three lived through the crash, the pilot and copilot survived despite not having their safety belts on “we braced our legs against the cockpit dash…and the plane skidded on its belly.” It slid over 200 yards, knocking off all four propellers before tipping on its nose. A local farmer helped extricate a gunner from the wreckage.

We knew we needed more directions to locate the plaque, so were happy to learn there was a public library in town and stopped in. Not only were we able to pull actual newsprint papers with local accounts of the crash, the lone librarian said “Oh yes, we have a file,” and pulled a Manila folder from a cabinet. It was filled with crash photos, copies of documents, paperwork, images of the plaque, and a hand-drawn map to the site. Stunningly, there within the file were also emails from myself to the farmer who’d heard the crash and initiated the plaque, forwarding another from my brother in law Scott, corresponding with his friend when we were first verifying the plaque ten years earlier. The librarian also mentioned that old farmer was her great uncle. 

With a sense of destiny we headed down the state roads toward the plaque. The gray, rainy day somwhow enhancing the mood of this hauntingly beautiful landscape. We followed the map to single lane dirt roads, marked our way to within a few miles, but reached a point where the scribbled “landmarks” weren’t helpful. We had longitude and latitude coordinates, so my math-minded sisters in the back seat tried to guide us with those, but Google wasn’t available. We called the old farmer, but we had no cell service. The emptiness of the land and sheds matched our frustration. We saw one sign at one adjoining road for “Storm Ranch,” but there was no way to know how many miles off it might be. 

We knew we were to cross a gate but hesitated to go anywhere on foot, especially when further along a sign declared  “PRIVATE PROPERTY. No hunting. Do not trespass! Do not fuck around with us!” There were no homesteads visible. The few buildings we came upon seemed abandoned. Doubt crept in as we sensed we might have to accept we’d not find it. My brother, driving, said several times “let’s try just one more hill…” Having driven seven hours beyond our flight from Minneapolis, we were determined to push on. We reached an impasse and reversed course, heading back to the Storm Ranch sign. After cresting a few more hills, my phone suddenly worked and I reached the old farmer’s home. A woman cautiously answered and said he was out getting the mail. I tried to convey I was not selling anything, and trying to find the plaque, but we were cut off — possibly intentionally. 

We pressed on. Another mile and we found a cluster of farm buildings and a small ranch house. Pulling into the long drive a mangy dog appeared, while another barked from within an off-road 4-wheeler. I hesitatingly opened my car door and tried to calm the dog, when an older woman came out of the garage. I greeted her (the line from the Dylan song “by the dirt ‘neath my nails I guessed [she] knew I wouldn’t lie” in my mind). My siblings climbed out as her husband, still in stockings, stepped onto the porch. “I know about the plaque. It’s on our property!” We had a delightful chat, learned the previous winter had tested even their grit, “we couldn’t get the house to keep warm—one day it got to -56°!” They provided explicit directions, a few miles back to the road we had been on, and through a closed gate. “It’s good thing its been raining, I worry visitors’ low cars might catch the fields on fire” Ms. Storm had told us. We opened it and followed the tire tracks gently nudging cattle (cows, calves, and bulls) off our just visible route. Another mile and we parked, as suggested, and walked the last half mile. 

The gray clouds still hung, but the rain had graciously stopped. The wind seems constant in these Dakota hills and had a strong presence. We walked through thistle, sagebrush, low grasses, and cow patties. Finally a small, discrete metal plaque, mounted to two metal posts along a fence came into view. Off in the distance was an old homestead (or schoolhouse?). We’d made it. It felt like an achievement, but our journey really masked a deeper one. 
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​“Echo” 24” x 16” mixed media/panel

I’d just returned from a month in Kenya and was in no hurry to fall back into set routines here. Sifting through what I’d left undone, I saw there was an art show I’d considered entering. I’m not a big fan of artists competing; as someone who has also worked as an art educator, there’s something distasteful to me about personal expressions set up to vie to be better than each other. Yet we live in a competition-based society, and this is one of the options to share our efforts, and so every year or two I enter some things. I’m old enough to recall sending in slides as entries. Having worked on all sides of such shows (coordinating them at a cooperative art gallery, receiving works and installing exhibits as a museum staff person, and as a participating artist) I’m well aware of the many limitations and impositions built into the process. Over decades I’ve entered or been involved in dozens and take the whole process in context. 

So I set about entering this one in early March, and then had a devil of a time formatting my entries as required. I’m not technologically expert but usually not incompetent. Thanks to the patience of the staff at the Bower Center for the Arts, in Bedford, VA, as I muddled through, my entries were eventually received. Two months later I learned a piece had been selected. It was one originally done a few years ago. This year I began re-looking at older works, discarding some, and revising ones that I felt I could improve. The accepted one happened to be one of those, and was a satisfying validation. 

The delivery date was a weekend and I happened to accept work on a rare out of town project, four hours from home the week before. Yet while on the project for my good friend, John Aubrey Garland, I soon saw there was more work than I could get done in the week, and the weather wasn’t cooperating as I planned, so on the Friday before delivering art weekend,  I had to accept I needed stay in Hampton the full weekend, and might even have to forego getting my art to the show. I wrote the Center for the Arts and they graciously said they could accommodate a delivery the Monday after the weekend. I dropped it off as they allowed. 

An email reminder came about the opening event, where awards would be announced. I’d planned to attend. It was implied I was on a list of those granted an award and we were generously invited to dinner after. I was delighted to accept. As it was an hour drive, and began at 5 PM, I quit my workday early, cleaned up, put on decent clothes, and even brought a sport jacket. As I headed out of town, a warning signal flashed on my dash “Brake Failure! Stop Safely”. I was just a few miles from home so I turned around and headed straight to my very trustworthy mechanic. It was late Friday and he was kind enough to give it a brief look-over. Of course the warning had shut off when I reached his shop and refused to return while there. We agreed there seemed no issue with the brakes, but I should be wary en route. I headed back on the road. Five miles in, amid busy end of the week traffic on a busy road, the warning returned, and then all the gages on the entire dash quit. Exasperated, I pulled off onto the shoulder.  

I was grateful Walter Williams accepted my call after closing time at his shop. The essence of our conversation came when he said: “If it was me, I wouldn’t risk it.” So I resigned that I had to deal with the car, and given the time frame and distance, knew I wouldnt find a ride in time to make it to the event. I called and emailed the Center leaving messages with my regrets. I called a friend who had a piece in the show, to ask her if she could let the staff know, but learned she was out of town and not attending. I cautiously got my 20 year old XC-70 to his shop, and handed him the keys. I began walking home. I called the center again and happened to get hold of a person, so felt a little better they were informed, and wouldn’t be holding a dinner reservation for me. 

I decided to follow the river on my path home and took in the pleasant evening. I’ve been doing a deep dive into our global ecocide, how our civilization is built on viewing life as a “resource” instead of us in relation to all life forms. And how as a consequence, for hundreds of years we’ve been depleting and “overshooting”  available resources in every direction. The earth will of course rebalance, but it can’t possibly replenish what we “require” for our modern industrialized lifestyle in human-scale time. 

The major disruptions from our human-centered view, wasting precious fresh water supplies, washing away topsoil, acidifying the oceans through synthetic crop fertilizers; we seem to keep clinging to a foolhardy belief technology is the solution —but the root is our ideology promotes an unsustainable way of life. We’re leaching chemicals across the globe, toxic residues of mineral extractions, micro-plastics now within most life forms, radioactive elements carelessly spewed globally, extreme loss of biodiversity, over-fishing, sea-level rising… all throughly-documented the last 25 years. All in addition to climate change events. A brief spell of poor air-quality is but a glimpse. Yet we (especially in more industrialized nations) dither, socially and politically, refusing to relinquish our conveniences. I appreciate the irony of my typing and sharing this on an ipad, requiring many of the issues listed above. It seems time to face the reality: we’re no longer capable of “turning things around”— even if all humans died tomorrow, many of the cycles we’ve spurred into hyperdrive the last 200 years will keep moving on their own momentum. I don’t have answers but preparing for adaptation in the near-term seems the only sensible option. 

So admittedly I’ve been in a funk about where my art-making fits into the mix. I mused about this and accepted I’d let the answers reveal themselves. After making dinner I looked up the event, and saw they had a video online of the award presentations. I was surprised (and mildly excited) as my work wasn’t given an award of merit, and then stunned when it received Best of Show. It was all the more humbling, as the juror is an artist and professor (Ray Kass) whose work I’ve admired for many years (and even installed during my museum career). I still don’t know for certain how making paintings assists our global crisis, so am taking this as a nudge to not overthink, and simply be, in the now.
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It was a coolish Sunday morning, perfect for reading well beyond breakfast with an engaging book and a warm mug, nestled in the rocker on the front porch. It turned into a perfect-temperature, overcast afternoon for a stroll through the neighborhood. Naturally enough, returning via my alley, I began puttering in my little garden beds. Which led me, just like the vines I was pulling, to clearing some that were creeping up the Dawn Redwood at the back edge of the yard. Called “a living fossil”, the species was only “discovered” and “classified” in the 20th century. Though now planted as an ornamental worldwide, the only naturally occurring groves are in China. It’s considered an “endangered species” in the wild.

I love the look and feel of its elegant soft bright green fronds, especially in the springtime. True to its ancient origins as a species (at least 150 million years ago) it’s between a deciduous and coniferous tree, (technically a deciduous conifer) with neither typical leaves nor needles, much like a bald cypress. It also has contrasting rusty-toned twigs, and a beautiful scumbled, red and warm-gray bark. This fellow’s done remarkably well; an 18” gift from my sister Helen, a little over a decade ago, it’s now at about 25 feet in height. This isn’t entirely surprising since they’re known to grow to 115 feet within fifty years. We know it could grow to astonishing size, as semi-preserved logs 26 feet wide at the base have been found in rice paddies in China!

There’s minimal soil on this hillside plot of a city lot, maybe an inch or two deep on the majority of it, and below that a rocky mix or solid rock. So when I moved in fifteen years ago, whenever I established a garden bed or planted anything, I had to add to the mix to get more fertile soil. We’ll see how this “Metasequoia glyptostroboides” will fare in the coming years, given the circumstances. That’s also why I wanted to clear the vines around its trunk, to enhance its opportunity. In clearing the vines and other encroaching privet roots (from my own foolhardy planting years back), I was happy to be reminded that a few feet wide, running along the back of the yard, there’s a band of substantial topsoil. Actually a few inches. And unlike the orange-clay I find everywhere else, this is a rich black, reminding me of my younger years, digging in familiar, lush Indiana earth. I suspect because over the one hundred years of since this hillside became a neighborhood alley, the downward slope from two perpendicular directions (up the alley and facing streetward) the topsoil and natural debris tended to be washed and accumulate along the slight ridge that’s the edge of my back yard. 

I’m very happy the soil in the veggies beds established years ago, is steadily improving. I learned a while back there are a good number of others that like to feast on what they seem to feel I have sown for their delight. Groundhogs, raccoons, rabbits, possum, deer (I encountered five on a walk in this alley the other evening, likely heading toward my diner—I mean yard). There are also occasional chipmunks, rats (not sighted, but I assume), mice, voles, moles, some skunks, and probably other critters. Admittedly, the local birds are much more polite in their dining habits, mostly preferring the bugs, similarly the rare toad or snake that I come upon. But I swear if turtles were passing through, they’d catch word and stop in at the salad bar if possible. So I now have fenced in every bed with 30” hardware, and at least until things outgrow it, am obliged to cover most beds with chicken wire. 

I pretty much always begin the spring with good intentions and a zest for planting, but depending on the other life priorities that get revealed in any given year, my gardens may or may not be well-tended and bountiful. So far this year I have been reasonably responsible and the weather and plants have graciously responded. After my walk and a few hours ripping vine roots, I was getting hungry. 

It seemed a nice cool evening to enjoy some warm pasta to close out the day. I figured I’d use some of my vibrant greens (kale, basil, parsley, and snow peas) which had in the last few days sprouted in impressive fashion. I began boiling some water and strolled up to a delicious-looking bed and plucked a few leaves and goodies from the list, consciously grateful for the bounty they were making available. As I pinched off the last leaves to fill a handful, I was startled by a fuzzy brown form next to my hand. It stayed perfectly still, a small bright brown eye staring. Only when I directly nudged it, did it shoot, like a rocket — obviously small enough to zip directly through the 2”x3” grid of my “critter fence” without hesitation — in seconds scooting across my entire yard before diving into bushes in the neighbor’s.  Clearly I’m not the only one who thought this bed was looking delicious this evening.
 
C’est la vie; we all gotta eat. 
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