Dust

I grew up in a Kentucky coal mining community. Most people picture mountainous hollers of Appalachia, but my hometown was a world away, way out west in the Ohio River valley. There the land is largely rolling and transitioning to the plains. The people are not Hollywood's Hillbillies. They are crossroads people, crossbred people. I am part quiet southerner, part strong mid-westnerner, part rural northerner, and (probably) part Native American. Trace far enough back, and my people were the literal "brother against brother" in the Civil War mythos.

My family and my friends' families crawled into a cave at the break of dawn. They crawled back out again (hopefully) at dusk, their clothes as covered in black coal dust as their lungs. My classmates probably remember one particular morning in high school. The announcement said that a number of men had been killed in a mining accident. That explained some of the absent kids.

When I was young, though not a child, probably a pre-teen or teenager, my uncle and I went by his mines to pick up something he left at work. It was closed for the day. Before leaving he took me to the mouth of the cave to see inside. I'm a curious sort. I've always liked seeing new things. I've never been remotely claustrophobic, but I do hate heights. Standing on a bridge or roof, my palms drip and my knees quiver. I muster willpower and logic to prevent panic. I really hate heights. Confined, tight places have only one time caused any anxiety. Though the mouth of the tunnel was huge and I was barely ten feet inside, dread and terror seized me. My eyes and breathing must have alerted my uncle.

We turned back. Ten feet, that was the furthest I've ever been into a coal mine.

I won't pretend to understand any of what miners experience. Thankfully, I have no frame of reference. At work the closest thing I come to a coal mine is an air-conditioned edit bay. It's dimly lit; the shades remain drawn. But there's no fear of cave-in. The keyboard won't yank off a finger. The hard drives, spinning 5000 times per second, have no chance of chopping me in two. The air is fresh. Water in the refrigerator is filtered. The cleaner wipes away the traces of dust every Wednesday evening.

Like most of my friends, following footsteps into that dark career was never to be an option. Our families sacrificed themselves, sometimes quite literally, so that we would never have to. I do not recall it being a lesson explicitly taught, but I know that it was one well learned. Songwriter Pat Haney said it with more poetry than I could: "When I draw my dying breath, it won't be over no coal."

Slowly

In real life I move slowly.

In my career, I work hard and quickly. I am a fast editor. My mind solves problems and implements solutions with reasonably fast speed. I remain more ahead of schedule than behind it.

But in real life, I move slowly.

I am slow to make friends. I dawdle about that weird pain in my side. The recycling piles up for a few too many days. Great plans never get any further than the planning stage.

When I was in grade school—I was probably only eight or nine years old—the classroom had these binders of illustrated stories. They were comic book style, only a few pages long. I fixated on one of these stories reading it over and over. I remember it being monochromatic, brown-and-white.

Astronauts explored a distant world. They discovered two giant, humanoid statues. (Or, were they archaeologists in some distant corner of our world? The details are a bit fuzzy.) They chiseled a chunk of stone from the foot of one statue for testing. They left the planet and returned home with their specimen.

Many years later, they returned to find the statues had moved! One reached toward its foot. Its face showed pain. The other comforted its friend.

I read that story countless times. How different must the lives of the statue-people be from lives of the astronauts? Probably not very different, until forced to interact.

Childhood Delicacy

I have no culinary skills. I can attempt to follow a recipe, sure, but I have little understanding of how the ingredients are reacting together. Therefore, I have no ability to improvise.

I recently discovered a relic from my childhood. In my desk drawer along with assorted photos, letters and cards, I found a well-worn recipe card. It was my grandmother's recipe for Russian Coffee Cake. The cake, a brown sugary delicacy, I adored as a child.

Yesterday, I attempted to recreate it. Surprisingly, I came close, but it was not quite right. I think I know why. My grandmother, I suppose like most good cooks, tended to augment her recipes. People who understand things and do not simply follow directions. They are capable of improvising and creating new things out of the old. I can relate in my profession but not in cooking. In the kitchen I just try to follow the directions…and hope.

Related tangent:
My cousin, Trish, bakes the best approximation of Grandma's beloved Christmas sugar cookies. Many in the family have the recipe, but most do not know of Grandma's improvisation. I discovered the secret by accident one day not too long before she died: more cream of tartar.