Robert W. Hiatt, My Uncle

Here’s the obituary I wrote, at my cousins’ Bette and Niki’s request. I’m including some pictures that Niki (his granddaughter) took. If I can find a link to the Glendive, MT, Ranger story, I’ll add it.
–
Robert W Hiatt
November 22, 1922-April 26, 2013

Beautiful portrait of my cigarette-smoking, coffee-loving uncle, by his granddaughter Nicole Payton Vanek

From a young age, I knew that my Uncle Bob was a remarkable man, unique in many ways and much loved and respected by family, friends, and the community of Glendive. Uncle Bob died on Friday, April 26, 2013, in Billings, Montana, in the home of his daughter Bette, where she and his beloved granddaughter Niki, cared for him in his final days. Doc Hiatt, Makoshika Bob—these are the names given to him by his Glendive friends and which so aptly capture his two primary roles there: the optometrist who started his business in 1947, above the bank on the corner of Merrill and Towne, and the tireless hiker and dinosaur hunter who loved the richness of the Badlands of Eastern Montana, cataloging and sharing bones with countless children, teen-agers, and Elder-hostlers. He even found a complete triceratops, which remains hidden, its location known only by one other person.

Robert W. Hiatt was born on November 8, 1922, in Topeka, Kansas, the only son of Lyman and Isabel Hiatt and the younger brother of Elizabeth. Eight years later the family moved to Dickinson, North Dakota, just across the state line from his future home in Glendive. A talented basketball player and trombonist, Bob was raised in a family of musicians and nature lovers. He enlisted in the Army in 1942, married his wife Lois Buvik, also from Dickinson, in 1943, and earned his degree at the College of Optometry in Chicago. He was stationed in the Philippines after training at Fort Snelling in Texas, where he was living when his son Robert Allan was born, in 1944. Being separated from each other was difficult for the young couple, and their letters are a treasure trove of affection and loyalty. As Bob wrote in one letter soon after Bobbie’s birth, “Perhaps it’s because I have you and Bobbie that I’m the happiest man in the outfit.”
Bette, Bob and Lois’ daughter, was born in 1948 and grew up in Glendive. It wasn’t long before Doc Hiatt discovered then-unnamed Makoshika Park, where he spent the bulk of his free time exploring. Bette told me that he often disappeared for whole days—and it was not uncommon for him to get so preoccupied in explorations that he’d forget to eat, hiking for 16 hours, before heading home famished and exhausted.

Uncle Bob enjoyed a good laugh, no doubt about it.

The formation of the state park was not without its controversy. Not shy about expressing himself, Doc once attended a contentious meeting where “one side” wanted “the other side” to keep quiet about dissatisfactions with some Fish & Wildlife decisions. Doc showed with a strip of tape across him mouth. I like this story because it gives us a glimpse of my uncle’s sense of humor, his strong independent streak, and his integrity.

Survived by a daughter, three grandchildren, one great grandson, a niece, three grand-nephews, and three great grand-nephews, Robert Hiatt taught us to love the world at hand, to work hard at what we care about, to respect our communities and families, and to treasure words, using them sparingly when appropriate and letting them spill when a story needed telling.

Why I am not a guy

Lately, maybe over the past two or three years, the use of “guys” to refer to any group of people, no matter how gender-mixed, has become so ubiquitous, that there is virtually no escape.

1. My granddaughter calls us over to look at a caterpillar, “Guys, guys, look here. Guys!”
2. An older person chuckles benignly at a couple of colleagues, who are being irreverent, “You guys . . . “
3. The young feminists refer to each other as guys.
4. The dean sends an email when a group of 3 women and 1 man have received a grant, “You guys have done a great job.”

So, what’s a tired feminist who cut her teeth on the first women’s history course at BGSU, back in 1973, to do?

I can, in the interests of education and my own refusal to be silenced, something we are supposed to have learned not to allow (though it will not help my popularity), point out the problem of language to them. My 8-year-old Omni will try to correct, even if changing her words stops the flow of enthusiasm. The older person might respond with a little more edge and say, would you prefer “ladies”? Noo! Please not that! Are these my choices, then, to be a lady or a guy?

I reject both.

The young feminists will likely say, “It’s just a colloquialism,” “We’re reclaiming the word for ourselves,” or “‘gals’ doesn’t have the right tone, and calling each other ‘women’ just sounds presumptuous.”

The dean, depending on which one, will probably ignore the correction, chalking it up to “those politically correct feminists” who think changing a word here or there will actually change the way we think. The nicer ones will say, “thanks, good catch, I’ll do better,” and then then next time we might be “ladies and gentlemen” or “colleagues,” which I prefer, as it offers up the rather pleasant suggestion that we’re in this together, all at the same table.

If you go to google and type in “guys” and then search images, you will find a couple hundred pictures of muscle-rich young men. If you try “guys and gals,” you’ll find a lot of images of butts, some signage for hairdressers, some bands, and a motley crew of young folks with tie-dyed hair and tattoos. But perhaps we should not trust what google has to say.

What’s bothersome with our use of these male-identified words, at least for me, is that packing them around as if they’re not gendered ignores the history of words that were used and still are used to devalue women and keep them in their place. “Ladies” might passably refer to a bridge club of silver-haired matriarchs sitting around someone’s dining room table on a Thursday night (probably drinking tea, though perhaps something stronger, during the last hand). Historically, “ladies” has been supposed to be the female equivalent of “gentlemen,” though not really, in practice, given the depth of our ingrained sexism. For instance, a “gentleman’s agreement” is one built on trust and suggests a transaction of some sort, with some level of economic exchange, whereas a “ladies’ agreement” sounds like a secret code for letting each other know when a bit of lettuce is caught between one’s teeth.

“Ladies of the night” is a polite way of referring to prostitutes, and when a coach wants to get his all-male team revved up, he will likely say, “Come on, ladies, get out there, and give me 50.” Men calling other men girls or women (by any name) is another way of professing their social location as above women’s–it’s one of the best insults, second only to calling each other fags, perhaps (which is, of course, another way of degrading their “man”hood). When women call women men (or guys), it’s more like a compliment. “Way to go, dude!”

But back to “guys,” and why I cringe every time I’m called one or witness a group of strong women calling themselves “guys.” Alice Walker, in her collection of ruminations We Are the Ones We’ve Been Waiting For, comments on the increased use of “guys” for anyone, which I found gratifying, since if Walker doesn’t like it, my students might actually listen to me if I “correct” them while quoting her. Still, she doesn’t delve into it all that much. I think of “guys” as much like “man” to refer to all people. As Susan B. Anthony, in her speech after being arrested for trying to vote, argued about this business of language:

It is urged that the use of the masculine pronouns he, his and him in all the constitutions and laws, is proof that only men were meant to be included in their provisions. If you insist on this version of the letter of the law, we shall insist that you be consistent and accept the other horn of the dilemma, which would compel you to exempt women from taxation for the support of the government and from penalties for the violation of laws. There is no she or her or hers in the tax laws, and this is equally true of all the criminal laws.

In other words, you can’t say out of the one side of your mouth that “he/him/man/guys” refers to all human beings and out the other side that “he/him/man/guys” refers only to those determined to be male. What are we to do when we are told, “All guys go to the right. All girls go to the left”? I am “one of the guys,” so which side do I belong on? I am torn–some of my girlfriends are urging, “Here, here, come over here,” while others who are neither girls or boys or necessarily friends, are urging me over there.

Including women (and children, not to mention numerously other-gendered folks) in the terms of MAN and GUYS, is the best way to exalt men and devalue anyone else. “Man” and “guys” become the normed group to which others are included by virtue of the power of manguy to speak for all of us. It is their interests that determine the nature of the group, WE are just along, willing to be defined by people we are not, and by people who have historically seen it in their best interests to deny US the rights that were common sense and appropriately given to them. I reckon excluding women (and children, not to mention numerously other-gendered folks) from the terms of MAN and GUYS, is only going to happen when the manguys decide that the others don’t really merit inclusion–such as in the vote or property or inheritance or leadership or just plain-old everyday self-determination and expression. As long as we “act” like a guy, we’re welcome . . . once we don’t, their inclusive group is going to suddenly be exclusive, as when “man” meant in Anthony’s day both “men only (white, propertied)” as well as “men, women, and children.”

From here on out, I have decided to refer to any group of male and/or female human beings, at least if being casual is appropriate to the setting, as “gals.” While I would prefer to use “folks,” it does not go very far in making my point, which I’ve decided is the least I can do.

I don’t like Aunt Nancy, but then again I do

Spiders like our house. Until this week I have not wanted to have it sprayed, but one brown recluse bite later, my tune is changing. The little devil bit me behind my knee on Monday night. By Tuesday morning I had a black-and-blue spot with a dark center, and by 2pm I was feeling vertigo and nausea, so went to the doctor. She said it was a brown recluse, gave me a steroid and antibiotic shot and sent me to the pharmacy for more antibiotic pills. By 4:30pm I was trying to find a comfortable way to sit, wrapped up in a blanket to stop the chills. Fever set in. I started Facebooking for a little pity and advice, since as it happened no one was home that night, which made me feel rather pathetic. At 101.2 I was graduating to surreal, and my Fb posts show it! I was prepared to call ER if it rose to 102, but finally about 45 minutes after the ibuprofen I’d taken set in, it began dropping from a high of 101.4 to a steady 100. I could think and eat again. Watched an episode of “The Following.” Went to bed, slept. . .

By morning I was feeling pretty chipper, so I went to work and then headed up to Louisville to listen to an interview of Michael Pollan (re his new book, Cooked) by Wendell Berry–more on that in another post. Then the stabbing began again. I went out to the car during the (boring) Q/A and put my leg up. Bactroban cream only works awhile. My friend Leslie drove part of the way home so I could keep the leg up. Went to bed thinking, “it needs rest,” but what it needed was to complain some more, and some more. Finally got up at 2am and went to the kitchen, took another tylenol with codeine, had a glass of wine, and finally crawled back in to bed, and finally to sleep, at 4am, after too many games of Solitaire and Scrabble.

Moral of the story: Don’t let Aunt Nancy bite you!

I was reminded of the nickname by Erika Brady, one of WKU’s fine folklore professors, who responded to my Facebook trauma posts, so this morning I got back on google and low and behold, discovered that one of my favorite novels–one that I’VE published about–Paule Marshall’s Praisesong for the Widow, integrates the “Ghanian spider-trickster, Kwaku Ananse,” into the novel and in particular, the characters Joseph Lebert and Aunt Cuney. I wrote about African myths in my article, but did not know about Ananse. I wish I’d had this article (by Shanna Greene Benjamin, “Weaving the Web of Reintegration”) when I wrote my own, back in 1996….but instead of my quoting her, she quotes me (twice). Sweet! Thanks, Shanna Benjamin . . . (if you see this, let me know!) So, if it weren’t for my spider bite, Erika wouldn’t have commented on the dangers of Aunt Nancy, which wouldn’t have sent me off on my little google scavenger hunt, and would therefore have never turned up Benjamin’s article quoting mine! Crafty web-making here!

Here’s the little critter we’re talking about:

Aunt Nancy Brown Recluse

I am not going to post any of the many grotesque images from google of the recluse bites of those poor folks out there who either didn’t get help soon enough or for some other reason found their flesh disintegrating. Suffice it to say that my site is very black and blue, red, angry, and still growing. But now, thanks to my doctor, I have begun a second antibiotic. (Also thanks to her I’ve got some Lortabs for tonight)….

Aunt Nancy, you are strong, but you can’t have me!

When the memorial dogwood blooms

I have been putting off this post until today, when I finally made myself take a picture of the dogwood tree that we planted on campus in front of my office at the Women’s Studies Center. This is the dogwood that our friend Mary Ellen Miller bought and arranged with WKU to plant in honor of our youngest son, who was murdered on October 26, 2009, by a man who lived then on a county road outside Bowling Green (he now lives in prison). It is perhaps no by-the-way that we have just this week learned that the conviction of Manslaughter 2 has been appealed on the grounds that the judge’s “Instructions to the Jury” may have been faulty due to his decision not to include instruction for self-defense . . . and we may witness again a trial of the man who shot and killed our son, Casey. This leaves me in a state of cerebral hemorrhage, metaphorically speaking, as my mind is sound and nothing bleeds, except in the way of language.

A number of confusions seem to come bubbling up from that paragraph, to whit:
–what the hell do I mean by “instructions,” why is it quoted and why did Judge Wilson decide that it was appropriate to leave out the possible sentence of self-defense in his directions to the jury?
–why the hell did the man who killed our son get “Man-2″ rather than Wanton Murder, as he should have, at least in the judgment of Casey’s family?
–why did we bleed, why do we bleed, why did he have to bleed, where is the blood, what is blood, what is death and loss and heartbreak?
–there are certainly more, like what is his life like, the man who shot the gun, and what is prison?
–why did I have to “make myself” take the picture?

But here is the tree, from today:

Casey’s Dogwood Tree

And here is was when we planted it in the cold winter of 2010, 2 1/2 years ago:

The root ball

I can’t get a handle on this post–it’s pulling me this way and that way. There must be 2-3 or 4 or 5 posts here, or one long post that goes into the darkness of tonight . . . so how to pull it together for the post-at-hand….?

What is a tree–even a dogwood–to the loss of a son?

When I pass the tree and the plaque, which I do every day I go to my office, I either notice or don’t notice the dogwood and the plaque. When I do, I say, “Hello, darling, I love you lots,” and sometimes I make the sound of a kiss, such as when we blow a kiss to someone we’re driving away from. . . . When I don’t notice, I suppose my head is down or my gaze akimbo, at any rate, not on him, my thoughts a ways away. For this I am sorry, and I say this too, when I realize that I haven’t been acknowledging him or sending him a conscious thought though I pass this reminder almost daily. That’s when I say, “I love you even when I don’t notice that you’re gone.”

Journal Keeping

I’m a certified terrible journal-keeper. I know several great journalers, people who have been writing and reflecting their way through life–some of them “writers” and some of them writers. Recently I was exchanging emails with the fabulous journaler and writer Kathleen Dean Moore (I’m not dropping names, honest–I had contacted her about possibly coming to speak at WKU). I mentioned that I was going to the Peruvian Amazon and she said something to the effect, “Oh, that must be such a wonderful opportunity for journaling.” It rather took my breath because a) she’s right and b) it’s another missed opportunity, which I immediately added to my very large collection. (By the way, I store these in an Earth-friendly shopping bag in my trunk underneath jumper cables, leaves, old sweatshirts, some crumpled concert programs, several plastic bottles waiting to be recycled, and an array of brown and white bags with who knows what additional decaying opportunities. I rarely look in the bag and for that matter don’t know if it’s still there.)

Another great journaler is my friend and colleague Trish, who has been keeping (and keeping) journals since she was a child. She too is a terrific writer, so I am sure that the connection between keeping journals and enhancing the craft of writing is profound. No end of books on “how to” would seem to affirm that. Other reasons for journaling, according to what I hear, include

1. healing
2. finding out who we are, at this time, in this place
3. creating a record for our progeny (who may write term papers using our 20-something drama rambles as primary texts)
4. understanding what’s going on–without writing it down, it may just mish-mash in our minds, knocking into other things, bruising and rising to the surface distorted and betrayed
5. feeling the joy of letters and words flowing from the nib of a pen, magic
6. exercising our creative spirit so it doesn’t languish

I suppose there are more, but that’s what I can think of right now, without consulting google or my bookshelves.

I have a few journals from now and then and I suppose I’ll keep them, but I don’t know why. I’ll never be famous and no tenure-track professor will ever discover them, giddy with excitement, in a box in the archives at Duke.

What I do rather like, at least today, is putting a few pictures and thoughts on this blog. I don’t think I’ll reflect much on the great events of the day–others do that so much better. Like my friend Mike Rivage-Seul http://mikerivageseul.wordpress.com/. What seems somehow worth my effort (in Mike’s words, “things that matter”), much more than sitting in contentious (or even congenial ones, which is actually more accurate for the good place I work) committee meetings where we are dividing scarce resources among projects we care about or trying to figure out how to make “it” work, this project called Education . . . is the noticing of little things going on around me. (and that’s what you call a long-ass sentence)

I think recognizing small features of the day, the place, the mind, and giving them a little nod to show we love them might just be what being 60 means to me.

Me on the Oroso, a tributary of the Amazon, journaling just once

Why I like to mow the lawn

Why do I like to mow the lawn (with a little history thrown in). . . .

First, the history:
I have been mowing lawns with a riding mower since I was 12 years old, which means I’ve had 48 years of experience so am well qualified to answer all questions about mowing the lawn on a little gas-guzzling, carbon imprinting lawnmower (Cub Cadet and Sears being the machines I’m most familiar with, though I admit to some envy when ours is broke-down and I use our neighbor’s John Deere). . . .

When I mowed the lawn as a 7th grader living in the country outside of Oberlin, Ohio, our house on Peasley Road was surrounded by mother-14 owned acres of woods and meadow. Of these, some number of acres were mine for about 6 hours on Saturdays and Sundays throughout the spring and summer. That’s an estimate, but I suspect my mother sighed a big breath of relief when her little drama-hungry girl settled down on her ride-n-cut for the day. I mowed in South Amherst (where Peasley Road is officially) until I graduated from high school in, well, go Falcons! Suffice it to say the Stones were showing some sympathy and the Beatles were just on the brink of drugs and all you nead is love and Lucy in the sky, you get the picture. But as a 7th grader, I was probably listening to “To Sir, With Love” and the Turtles’ “I think we’re alone now”….you get the idea.

And indeed I was. But as an only-child, I was most of the time not interested in more time alone. When I was not mowing, I wanted to be WITH MY FRIENDS…my neighbor Judy Dohanes and her cousin Nancy Callier, Teresa Sivinski, Ruthann Bechtel, girls who lived in their own country worlds. But when I threw my leg over my trusty steed and turned the key, I was okay with alonedom, and even loved the time to mull over and meditate what was most assuredly some serious stuff.

That was the beginning, and it is to those years that I return when I clambor on board now and mow our 1.4 or so acres. This is the season when once a week is almost not enough, before the droughts set in. But to the point of this post. I like to mow because:

1. I have to be alone. It is too loud, this mower, for me to both mow and converse, so go away. I am meditating.
2. Every round releases the smell of fresh-cut grass laced with wild onion and garlic.
3. I see the lawn in new ways–or rather, I see trees and bushes in passing but with the attention required not to mow them down. I would never have seen these worms if I hadn’t been riding beneath them:

Apple blossom with invading (I think) catepillars

4. Now that I have granddaughters, they like to ride with me, and today my four-year-old and I went round and round in circles, she looking over her shoulder to laugh with me when we had to duck the cedar tree’s low-hanging branches.
5. Despite my inclinations toward wildness and meadows, I LIKE the feel of cut grass on my feet. I like the way it looks, at least when it is green because Nature has said, “be green,” and not because 1/4 mile down the road the Earth is sucking for water.
6. Finally, at least for now, I like to mow because it gives me an excuse to pull my camera out and prop my 4-year-old g’daughter in front of the azaleas, because, heave a sigh, the yard is mown, and we can now enjoy the day. . . .

Leah pauses . . . with azaleas

Leah’s picture: who wins the silver contest?

Close-ups

I like close-ups but wonder if it’s because I’m nosy at heart and like to get all up in flowers’ grill to see what they’re up to. Here are today’s up close and personals with our purple-pink azaleas and lilac lilacs.

Purply pink azalea

Largely pink lilac….

Naturally, as soon as my 4- and 8-year-old granddaughters see me out and about with my camera, they’re done with whatever was once so important and are with me holding our subjects still and prying my fingers loose so they can take their own shots. Here’s one of Omni’s close-ups–a nice curly cue grape vine, dried and hanging from our also dried and slightly crumbly swing…

We had a heck of a time getting this blowsy dandelion to hold still enough in the light breeze. We propped the macro lens on our garden gate and took turns holding the green stem. Team work!

Dandelion poof before the wind took its little seedlings away

I think maybe it’s not nosiness but delight in the secrets of this amazing world we have, right there in our own backyards. Even an ugly back yard retreats if there’s one nice flower or curly cue to hone in on. Maybe if we look a little closer at the simple things at hand we will learn what it takes to appreciate the more complicated whole.