Living Beneath a Rumbling Volcano

Photo source: David Anastasi/LaPresse via AP

It's happening right now (see embedded photos) just as it happened some four decades ago and a number of times in between. Mount Etna is spewing lava, gas, rock and ash into the atmosphere, and the world is taking notice.

Located on the island of Sicily, Mount Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world. It's also among the most deadly having wiped out more than a dozen towns and villages over the centuries, killing more than 17,000 people and leaving 30,000 or more homeless.

It's an absolutely amazing sight to see. I've got a pretty good feel for it because I lived it. Or I should say I lived in Catania, a city of about 300,000 at its base, during the summer of 1983 when I served as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.   

The funny thing is just before living in Catania I lived in Siracusa about 40 miles to the south. During that eruption, we would go out on our balcony to view Etna's eruptions off in the distance. My parents wrote me a letter stating they had seen video of Etna's eruption on television and expressed relief that I was a more safe distance away. But by the time that letter found its way to me, I had been transferred to Catania where instead of looking to the northern horizon to see Etna, we looked up. It was right there, a mere 18 miles above our balcony.

Photo source: Salvatore Allegra/AP

Living beneath an active volcano is somewhat surreal. It belches huge ash plumes into the sky above yet life below basically goes on like normal. Still, it most definitely had an impact on all. Ashfalls always left everything dusty or even muddy. We, like most all Italian around us at the time, did not have a dryer so when we washed a batch of clothes, we hung them on lines or over the railing of our apartment building. As you can imagine, an ash fall makes quite a mess of things. Instead of pulling in our dry, clean clothes at night, especially our "white" shirts, they were covered with a grayish, blackish coating of ash. Translation: they went right back into the washer to try it all over again. During such ashfalls, we set up makeshifts clotheslines in another room in the apartment where it took a bit longer for our clothes to dry.

Ashfalls made it much more difficult to sleep at night. Because we had no air conditioning, we couldn't leave our windows open at night or the ash made its way inside. So I laid there at night in the humidity on my back with my hands at my side but not touching my sides or the sweat formed instantly. 

When I recall those days living beneath Mount Etna, I remember one particularly steamy and very muddy day in Catania along the Ionian Sea. We were in the heart of Sicily's summer months. Not only was it hot, extremely humid and downright nasty outside but there was also a bus strike. That is how we got around the city. With no public transportation available - taxis were out of the question for us missionaries who didn't have much money anyway - we walked and walked and walked. 

I remember putting some serious miles on our shoes that day. Anziano Ron Smith, my missionary companion, and I had a bit of a rough but humorous go of it. First of all, we walked a great distance just to get to our designated zone in order to carry out our missionary work. We swung by a contact who was not home so we sought out others we were teaching. It seemed no one was home or available. Sure, we stopped by bars (small stores that sold everything from water to soda to liquor) to get water and/or a bite to eat, but as far as missionary work went on this day, we just plain struck out. Since we were so far from home and had no way to catch a bus ride back, we instead decided to walk downtown to stop by the Italy Catania Mission's office.  

Let me re-set the scene. It was hot. It was humid. All busses drivers were on strike. And yes, there was an ashfall. Not only was ash falling but it was thick, really thick, like a fog, during midday. It had to be late afternoon by the time we knocked on the mission office door. Sister Turner, wife of our mission president Norman Turner, opened the door.

"Oh my goodness!" she exclaimed.

I just wish we had a picture of us that day. As we stood there in our white shirts, slacks and ties, each of us were an absolute mess, drenched to the bone by perspiration yet covered from head to toe with ash that turned to liquid mud dripping down our faces and arms. Man, I wish I had a picture. Because so many years have passed, I don't have distinct memories what happened next. I imagine we peeled off those muddy shirts and threw them in the washer and either dried them with an iron or received a couple of loaners from our fellow missionaries for the return trip home. (A handful of missionaries worked and lived in the office.) I'd also like to think those missionaries, who had access to a car, eventually drove us back to our apartment too.

Once back at our place, what I do remember is sweeping the ash off our balcony that evening as we had many times before. We sat there, looking up to Mount Etna, which rose 11,000 feet from sea level, and watched the lava flows make their way down the mountain side. Just amazing!

Photo source: Salvatore Allegra/AP

  

My Moment with Coach Marty

Marty Schottenheimer passed away on February 8, 2021. I have fond memories of the man everyone called "Coach Marty." He was head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs from 1989 to 1998. As sports director at ABC affiliate KTKA-TV in Topeka, Kansas, I covered KC for nine of those ten years. Two different times, the Chiefs came within one excruciating one win shy of reaching the Super Bowl by losing in the AFC championship game. 

Even though I interviewed him several times over the years, both in Arrowhead Stadium or at training camp in River Falls, Wisconsin, it was a one-on-one chat during a freezing rain storm that further cemented him as my all-time favorite NFL coach.

It was 1991. Blue Valley High School traveled south from suburban Kansas City to Topeka to face Highland Park High School in the Kansas 5A football playoffs.* It was a Friday night and since Blue Valley's quarterback was Brian Schottenheimer, Marty's only son, I thought there would be a good chance dad would be there for the big game. 

I arrived at Highland Park a bit early and the weather was n-a-s-t-y! Temperatures were in the 30s and it was raining-one of those big drops, penetrating, cold-to-the-bone kind of Kansas nights. Snow would have been so much better! As I walked up to the stadium and peered through the rain and fog to the visitor's stands on the far side of the field, I just hoped I would be able to spot him. Sure enough, there he was sitting in about the middle of the stands. He stood out as if the spotlight shined on him because he sported his neon-like Chiefs rain gear of red, yellow and white amidst a sea of fans wearing dark coats, panchos, umbrellas and whatever else they could manage to stay warm and dry. 

I climbed the stands and asked if he had two minutes to do a quick interview. He quickly and politely obliged but suggested we go under the stands so we would be out of everyone else's way. It was a heck of a lot drier under there too. Once underneath, I really only had one question for him and that was simply, "What is it like to be an NFL coach but to have no control over the on-field happenings at a high school game featuring his son?" Coach Marty said it was torture. He said he felt confident and in control while on the NFL sidelines but sitting in the stands was completely different. He had no say, no input, no control-nothing! He said he was a nervous wreck but would cheer along with all the other Blue Valley parents and students, and hope for the best. When I turned off the camera, we chatted for another moment or two and I wished him luck that night and in the Chiefs' game the following Sunday.

I will always respect Coach Marty for the class he exhibited whether in the locker room, in the national spotlight or under the rickety stands of a high school football field. Rest in peace Coach!

(Photo source: Kansas City Chiefs)

*Blue Valley went on to win the 5A state championship.

Going Under the Knife

Maybe I was just due. After all, I've had a long, healthy, active, almost non-stop life full of basketball, softball, hiking, hunting, hockey, splitting wood and other activities. 

It was in early 2020 while playing basketball with a bunch of younger guys when I went up for a rebound and felt a funky tweak in my right shoulder. I shook it off, didn't think much of it and kept playing. When I woke up the next morning my shoulder was sore - really sore! In fact, I really couldn't move it or use it. But a couple of days later, I was back on the basketball court and again playing twice a week and lifting weights about three times a week. As I lifted, I noticed a certain type of lift bugged me so I just cut that out of the regiment. I'd been lifting for about a year and was the strongest I'd been in about a decade. I was hoping that improved strength would translate on the softball field. Then it happened again on the basketball court. This time it really hurt for about three days and I had trouble sleeping at night. Something was wrong and I knew it. Perhaps a torn rotator cuff? 

I made an appointment with an acquaintance (Doug Henry), a physician's assistant, who worked for another acquaintance (Chris Price), a knee and shoulder surgeon. A physical examination showed I had good strength and good rotation in my shoulder but experienced pain in one particular spot. An x-ray didn't show anything and the initial diagnosis was great news. It was only bursitis. All I needed was a steroid shot and to implement a routine of some shoulder strengthening exercises. I was diligent with the exercises, maybe a little overboard by doing the required amount twice daily. 

One of the tears is just above &
to the left of the white arrow

But the pain continued and I made another appointment, this time to get an MRI. I'd never had such an experience before. You lay on your back, close your eyes and endure for about 45 minutes. The nurse strongly urged me not to move at all so the images would be clear. Thank goodness I had ear plugs because it sounded like someone was crashing pots and pans together while I was inside the machine. 

In the end, the MRI showed there were multiple tears in my labrum, the cartilage coupling that wraps around the shoulder's ball socket. Maybe it was from lifting weights or playing a lot of basketball/softball or maybe it was just wear and tear from an active life. Whatever the case, the doctor said I needed surgery. And the good news is he recommended it because I was in good shape. Apparently, the majority of people my age (57 at the time) and older are not recommended for surgery because their bodies are not strong enough and/or in good enough shape. Doc said there were three scenarios. One meant a big job with six months in a sling and nine months to a year of rehab and recovery. The second was more of a minor job with just days in a sling and four to six months of recovery. Third, was something in between.

Montana elk tags

COVID-19 had already shut down basketball, softball and just about every other face-to-face activity for several months so I wasn't missing anything. However, I had drawn two tough-to-get elk tags for hunting season so I put off surgery 4-5 months so I had a chance to fill those tags.   

My shoulder limited summer activities but did not prohibit them. I was still able to golf and fly fish. I also went paddleboarding several times. But as time passed into the late summer and early fall, my shoulder became more and more painful. Every once in a while I would forget as I threw a rock or a pine cone. Ouch! Intense pain shot through my shoulder. 

I spent a weekend in early fall with Jace in Washington to try to find him a deer. I did not carry a rifle but had my pack on my back which caused no issues. As hunting season opened in Montana, I went out with my grandson Kyler. We hiked through the woods and at one point, stood still and quietly as a young whitetail deer buck walked up the mountain and stopped broadside at about 40 yards away. It would have been an extremely easy kill. Yet I knew if I pulled the trigger and had to field dress the animal with a knife, I would most likely fully aggravate or maybe really tear my labrum, so I passed. Why? Because if I was going to mess up my shoulder, it was going to be on an elk, not a much smaller deer. 

In November, I went elk hunting several times and hiked well over 20 miles, the last trip of which Jace joined me and carried my rifle so there would be no strain on my shoulder. Despite three different outings, we saw no elk. It was very disappointing. After drawing the tags earlier in the year, I really thought I'd get an elk. With my chances of punch my elk tags over, I had a couple more outings to chase deer up above the house. 

Aubrey went along on her very first hunt. Kyler came too. We saw a bunch of deer including a small buck about 150 yards away. But it was hard to see if it had antlers because of low-hanging branches. When I finally realized it was a buck, it turned and trotted away. I didn't get off a shot. I went one last time with my friend Brandon. He had a chance at a buck but didn't pull the trigger. I never saw a buck. So my hunting season ended on November 28. By now my shoulder was throbbing. It was a good thing my surgery was scheduled only four days later on December 3, the day before my 58th birthday.

This doe (circled in red) probably knew I didn't have a dog tag

Doctor Price chatted with me beforehand and put his initials on my right shoulder. "Just to make sure we operate on the correct one." When I woke up my entire right arm was dead thanks to the nerve block I received. But I felt good and hungry. We grabbed some Arby's food and my favorite curly-Q fries on the way home. 

You'd think I'd have at least got a manly scar out of the this, but no

I strapped an ice machine on my shoulder pretty much 24-7 to keep down any swelling and I sat and even slept in a recliner we placed in my bedroom for the first couple of days. As we checked the paperwork, I found out great news. My shoulder needed two procedures to repair the tears but I only needed to wear my sling through the weekend, not the six weeks I feared. A follow-up email from Doctor Price highlighted the amazing process. Video showed what amounts to a tiny grinder shaving away the rough edges and suction removing all the excess tissue.

Behold, the amazing surgery video

Four days after surgery, off came the sling and the rehab exercises began. Then I transitioned to a physical therapist (Kylie France) in town. She helped me slowly build back the muscle I lost from more than half a year of inactivity. After eight weeks of rehab, Kylie sent me on my way with a series of home rehab exercises. 

                 Home rehab workout tools          A 5-minute mile on the hand bike     Graduation t-shirt   

Now the ball is right where I want it to be - in my court! I've had a couple of setbacks along the way but I feel the progress. I pound through the rehab exercises daily and cannot wait to advance to the point where I can start lifting again. After all, when COVID-19 fades away and the world is opened up to full-fledged activity begins, I want to be back on the hardwood, back in the mountains, back on the diamond. After all, I've got some playing to do.

"Circling the Bases" with Hammerin' Hank

Henry "Hank" Aaron

Major League Baseball home run King Hank Aaron passed away on January 22, 2021. His death brought to mind a Hank Aaron-related experience I had a number of years earlier. 

Twenty-seven years after Aaron hit home run 715, I was in Atlanta covering Gonzaga in the 2001 NCAA Basketball Tournament. During some down time, we drove over to the then-newer Braves Stadium. It was built on the same land as the old Fulton County Stadium where Aaron hit the record-setting home run.

Working in the satellite truck/interviewing
Gonzaga Head Coach Mark Few & forward
Casey Calvary

Hank's milestone was marked by the same piece of outfield wall, still erected in place, where the ball flew over the left field fence. It was located in the middle of the vast parking lot. The old Fulton County base paths were marked with the location of the old bases set in cement in the asphalt parking lot.

I was behind the wheel of a rental car with two co-workers. I revved the engine at "home plate" then gunned it and we fishtailed as we flew around the bases. As the car barreled toward home plate again, I slammed on the brakes and we screeched across the plate..."SAFE!"

Good times, good times!

“Home Work” & “Home Church” -- Finding the Silver Lining

How I spent my COVID Staycation

Like everyone else, this whole coronavirus/COVID-19/pandemic thing has been life-altering. I mean none of us have ever dealt with anything like this before, especially on a worldwide basis. Having said that, it hasn’t been without its silver linings.

When the world got the lockdown order, we had to figure out how to live, how to associate with others, how to work and even how to worship at home. For work, I spent my first week or so sprawled out on the couch with my laptop sitting on my legs before eventually incorporating a second screen and taking over half of the dining room table. It was comfortable and even awesome to wear a t-shirt, shorts and slippers while stoking the fire burning in the fireplace. And if I got hungry, the refrigerator was a mere 8-10 paces away (which really isn’t a good thing).

The home set-up

On the downside, working at home meant I had to use our WIFI, or should I saw our lack of any kind of decent or reliable Internet due to our somewhat remote location in the woods. I soon learned I had to plan out my day so I’m not sitting and staring at a little circle that spins round and round on my computer screen as I try to send out mass work-related emails. One grouping in particular has more than 500 people in it. Even using a hotspot supplied by my employer, it would take 45 minutes for that email to reach all 500 of its recipients so I would work on daily duties until then and send it right before taking a break for lunch. At that point, I would hit “send,” and then eat and then wait until it finished going out. Frustrating? Yeah, but what are you really going to do? (I returned to the office after four weeks or so and we since installed a satellite Internet system which is better but still not high speed like at work.) 

When I returned to the office, the entire workplace was (and remains) like a ghost town. I am the only person in my whole corner of the building. There are somewhere between eight to 20 cars in the parking lot on a daily basis. And all of my team members continue to work from their individual homes. We remain productive and effective working remotely. We communicate via email, text, Slack and/or Zoom virtual meetings.

Worshiping remotely has been well, unique. You see, I’ve always been a believer and a church-goer. Sundays my whole life have been like this: get up as a family, go to church as a family, spend the day together as a family and take part in other church-related gatherings. COVID-19 meant no group gatherings, no group worship, nothing. Well, I shouldn’t say “nothing.” Church members continue to worship but we do so as families and remotely. My wife and I read and study scriptures on Sundays, which we actually do every night before we go to bed. Our stake (a group of local congregations stretching from the edge of Missoula, west to Frenchtown, north to the Mission Valley and further north and west to Thompson Falls, provided a weekly 35-minute online worship service. It was (and remains) nice to see friends from across western Montana. Pre-edited programs consist of someone conducting from their home, a song provided by the Tabernacle Choir , and then an opening prayer, a couple of talks on various gospel subjects, another Tabernacle Choir song and a closing prayer to wrap things up. All in all, it’s been nice to continue to learn and grow even though we cannot meet together.

Dress up for Sunday's online church service? Sure, why not.

An additional silver lining remains family time. While my daughter and her family live a mere 100 yards off our back property line, we’ve spent even more time together. More dinners, more play time and more bonding. Another daughter moved in with us from out-of-state during the pandemic with her family. It has been great having them here, playing with them and having their two boys with us as they develop deep ties with their three cousins out back. 

So here we are (five months as of this post). Stay-at-home lockdown orders are mostly over everywhere but our workplace still remains rather vacant with the majority of staff working at home. Our churches remain shuttered. Who knows when things will return to “normal?” Heck, who knows what the “new normal” will turn out to be? All I know is life may be different (aka very different) but silver linings abound. All you need to do is look for, recognize and take advantage of them. That’s what we’re trying to do.

Sooey! Beautifying a Post-Fire Eyesore

How I spent my COVID staycation

One of the scars resulting from our 2017 house fire stood out like a sore thumb, check that, a ”stinky” sore thumb. And it was smack dab in the middle of our front yard. 

Septic system installed in 2018

Arrow marks the spot

Rebuilding our home meant we were required to install a new septic system. Crews amazingly banged out the entire process in a mere three days but two manhole-sized, green covers along with a large white PVC-capped pipe jutted above the ground a mere eight feet off the front porch. Our challenge was to cover it up and make it look like it wasn’t there. Lori had the brilliant idea to use landscaping to put lipstick on that piggy. 

First, we drove high into the mountains above our house to gather some flattish rocks for this and for a flagstone walkway I’d put in later. We used the rocks to lay an outline for the flower bed, dug up a peonies plant (Lori’s favorite flower) from another part of the property and replanted it there. A large, old tin washing bin flipped upside down was large enough to cover one of the manhole covers while a wooden half barrel purchased after a trip to Home Depot covered the other. In the middle, we planted a pretty little magnolia tree surrounded by several other plants. But we still had that white cap sticking up. 

The Pinterest "solution"

What to do about that? Lori had a simple plan – Pinterest! She scrolled through ideas, found a photo of a birdhouse stand and asked, “Can you build me something like this? But can you make it shorter? And make the lower shelf tall enough off the ground so it covers up that white pipe?” I had my marching orders so I got to work. 

The first thing I did was gather a few birdhouses we already had including one Lori made with one of our grandsons, assembled a butterfly house and built another from old chicken coop wood from the old family farm in southern Utah. (insert link) I capped off that one with the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation plate from my old pickup. 

I took measurements, used some of the leftover fir planks from our flooring installation, cut them for length and glued and clamped them together for width. After they dried a couple of days later, I attached the top platform to the sides and included the lower shelf for both looks and stability. After staining it, I used screws to attach each birdhouse to the top shelf so they wouldn’t be blown over by the wind or knocked over by birds or whatever critters, big or small, would come along.

Now, unless you saw the process unfold, you’d never know the above-ground ugliness that lies beneath. Sooey! It’s a beauty!

Slaughterhouse Outhouse Back in "Business" at My House

How I Spent My COVID Staycation

I was sitting at my computer working from home and it popped up online. “For sale: old outhouse. Price: $20.” It immediately caught my eye for three reasons. One, I like old, cool-looking stuff. Two, only 20 bucks?! And three, this just might work. 

You see, I was in the process of accumulating pallets in order to build a shed for storing my firewood. I found a couple of photos of pallet sheds and a semi-decent YouTube on how to do it. I gathered six pallets already but the challenge is they come in all sizes and I needed four more of the same height and width to start the job. That was proving to be difficult. But as I looked at this Facebook post I thought, “That’s not your normal outhouse. It looks…wider, bigger. And it looks pretty stout, too. Forget the pallet shed. This could work just fine.”

I responded to the post and turns out I was the first to do so. I struck up a conversation with the owner who later said, “I’m getting inundated with calls on this, LOL. Come and get it.”

I immediately unloaded a car from my son-in-law’s trailer, hooked it up to my truck and drove 45 miles south to the Bitterroot Valley, one of my favorite scenic drives.

The ever-so-romantic "double-seater"

I arrived just south of Stevensville about an hour later. I met the woman’s husband outside who pointed me where to go. Turns out the outhouse was part of a group of very old, still-standing buildings that were part of an original homestead well-known to the entire community back in the day as the local slaughterhouse. The outhouse served as, well, the “facilities” for the operation. And to look at it, it was indeed fairly large for an outhouse. As I opened the door, I could see why it seemed so large. It was a double-seater. Yes, two people could do their “business” at the same time.

All loaded & ready for return trip

We secured a large car-towing strap around the outhouse and the man used his tractor with forks on the front of it to lift it on the trailer and then eventually pushed it back between the wheel wells, the best place for weight of any kind to be supported by the trailer. We solidified its position with four additional straps. The whole process took about 40 minutes or so. When we were done, I was very grateful. I paid him $20 and then emptied the rest of my wallet as well – probably another 17 or 18 dollars. He was just so helpful and went above and beyond to help me out.

I was a little leery on the drive home toting that thing. I was hoping old boards weren’t flying off as I went. My pickup drew a lot of stares in traffic and even some pointed fingers from several people. When I finally got home I did notice one loose board fell off but it was still on the trailer. I’m guessing a bunch of old wooden shake shingles fell off in transit as well.

Getting it off Kenny’s trailer and placed onto a foundation we made out of slender cinder blocks would be a challenge. Kenny and I stood and thought out loud how we could move it what amounted to 10-feet or so without tipping it over or ruining the cinder blocks. My next door neighbor, Bill, has a small front end loader, saw the trailered outhouse and volunteered to lift it into place. The back of the loader came off the ground when he lifted it with his forks but we managed to get it into place. Thanks Bill!

Once in place, I measured it. Sure enough, it was a decent size – more than five feet wide by six and a half feet deep by seven feet tall. Yes indeed, that would work well to hold the wood and in such a scenic setting in the woods just off the side of our house.

Bye bye double-seater

Now it was time for me to get to work. After peeling off the wooden shake shingles, I tore off the roof. Then I demoed the “seating area” and used the best of the old roofing planks to fill out the rest of the floor. I cut a couple of sheets of plywood, nailed them to the roof studs and then shingled the roof. After tearing out some rotten boards below the door and replacing them with leftover rooting planks, it was as structurally sound as I could make it. I gave the exterior one coat of wood finish.

Stacked & ready for winter

About a week later, Lori and I rolled up our sleeves and loaded the outhouse with previously cut and split lodgepole pine.

Facelift complete

Now, what was once a part of Montana history is back in “business,” refinished and being utilized for the first time in decades.

The final resting place back in the woods of Montana