December 2020
Volume 27
Julie and Tyler Meyer, now legal, see many changes
2020 was a tumultuous yet propitious year for Julie and Tyler. Julie continued working on her master’s degree in Public Health, and was doing volunteer/“intern” work at the Boone County Health Department when a job came up there. She gave notice at the Thompson Center for Autism, and went to work for the Health Department. She built a database for the Department and now assists with COVID contact tracing. All those years of playing the Pandemic board game finally paid off!
Tyler was also affected by the COVID virus in his food service supervisor position at the University Hospital. Resources at the hospital grew sparse, good help became difficult to find, and bad help became difficult to fire. Finally Tyler knew it was time to look for work in other directions and gave notice at the Hospital. Tyler and Julie had become engaged in March. They found, to their dismay, that wedding planning during a pandemic was futile. They had seen a close friend’s wedding plans crumble as the pandemic rolled on. They decided to “elope” and made a plan to marry in Moab, Utah at Arches National Park. Dale and Cindy had gotten married 36 years prior in Key West at the Southernmost point of the continental U. S., so there is a tradition in our family of eloping in odd places. Fate, however, tried to stop the elopement plans when, on Friday the 13th of November, Tyler had a bout of eosinophilic esophagitis, a condition in which inflamed cells in the esophagus prevent food from being swallowed. After hours of trying several methods to get food unstuck from his throat, he headed to the emergency room at 3 a.m. where an expert in esophageal matters resorted to an endoscopy to correct the problem. Tyler and Julie were able to head out a few days later for Utah where, with the blessings of the Latter Day Saints, they were legally married. They adventured several days in Arches and Canyonlands Parks before heading home.
Dale aging and foraging
When Dale measured himself this year, he found himself two inches shorter. Unsure if this was just normal aging shrinkage or something more ominous, he decided to discuss it at his annual physical. Dale saw a physician’s assistant who was merciless in discovering potential problems in him. A bone scan revealed a slight bone density loss in one hip, but not enough to explain the tragic loss of stature. A urologist and a dermatologist checked for potential problems on both his outermost surface layers and innermost recessed cavities. The urologist went deep but couldn’t put his finger on any definite problem. The dermatologist, however, was much luckier and found two areas of skin to scrape off for biopsy. The scrapings showed signs of stage 0 melanoma, so Dale had them excised. He now has nice scars on his face and chest. He was starting to get wrinkles on his face, but, when the doctor excised the spot on his face, he had to pull the skin together to cover up the hole from the excision, and that took away a few wrinkles. Dale considers himself a lucky but shorter man. Dale was still able to spend some time outside of the doctors’ offices. He took up foraging for mushrooms and other wild edibles, an excellent sport for 2020 as social distancing is part of the strategy. It turned out that the woods around us were prolific with delicious Chanterelle mushrooms. He also found Chicken of the Woods (which tastes like chicken), Slippery Jacks, Boletes, and Lion’s Mane (which tastes like crab). By a stroke of unexpected foraging luck, straight-line derecho winds blew down several trees on our roads and property this year. This not only gave Dale an excuse to use the chainsaw, but it also blew down a large grapevine which later ripened with many easy-to-gather wild grapes. Dale collected 5-6 pounds of grapes and made wild grape jelly.
Riki and Marcus stay healthy
Both Riki and Marcus worked quite a lot at home this year so as to avoid the foul humors of the plague. Environmental Dynamics, the wastewater company where Riki works, was sold to a Canadian company which brought some positive changes to the company. Luckily Riki did not have to learn Canadian or move there.
The transition to working at home was not too hard for Riki, but was more challenging for Marcus. He spent a lot of time in the summer learning to teach a virtual civics education outreach program sponsored by the Missouri Bar Association. The schools couldn’t quite decide whether to go virtual or not until the last minute. Columbia Public Schools did go virtual, and Marcus was ready but found it disheartening to see many of the students not doing as well as they could have. Marcus’s efforts at staying healthy included taking up cycling, often pushing the pedals 14-17 miles a day. He also got exercise by working on his bullwhip technique and by a few highly competitive matches on Dale and Cindy’s officially lined badminton court. Not to be outdone, Riki wore out another pair of running shoes by running 422 miles (so far) this year. She also took up bird watching and has identified 31 different bird species. She can even recognize a redshouldered hawk just by its call. Riki and Marcus also spent time working on their stay-at-home cooking skills. Renown for her cookie-making, Riki went in pursuit of the perfect macaron—the holy grail of cookie makers. She experimented with exotic flavors: tiramisu, pumpkin cheesecake, s’mores, and, that most ancient and exotic of all flavors, Fruity Pebbles. In other baking news, Marcus’s experiments in breadmaking included sourdoughs, fruited breads, and nicely shaped loaves. Despite the pandemic and their desire to stay healthy, Riki and Marcus did dare to fly down to Houston to visit some friends this year. They were careful not to breathe any more than necessary while on the plane, and they stayed healthy.