SERVING HENDRICKS COUNTY SINCE 1847
The Republican
Page A-6
Exploring Hendricks County
By Jackie Horn
Voices
We offer Voices as a place to share a story, a memory, an idea, a comment, a criticism, or a solution. Contributors must include name, address & phone number.
Thursday, May 13, 2021
ASK MR. TRAFFIC By Chet Skwarcan, PE, President/ Founder of Traffic Engineering, Inc. Chet@TrafficEngineering.com
A Note From Bee
Photo from Melanie Hogan Johnson
I’ve often thought if I were to be reincarnated, I’d like to come back as a Turkey Vulture. “Weird choice,” you might think, but bear with me. Turkey vultures are quite amazing birds. I first became an admirer of turkey vultures several years ago at a raptor presentation in a nature center. The group had brought a hawk, kestrel, and eagle to educate visitors. The highlight was when a HUGE black form swooped over my head and landed on the hat of the gentleman seated behind me. It was a turkey vulture. It was probably the ugliest bird I’d ever seen, but I was fascinated with how gracefully it glided and landed. This bird became my new favorite. Turkey vultures, also known as turkey buzzards, are big but lightweight. With a wingspan from 63-72”, an adult in our area weighs only about 5 pounds. They’re called “turkey” vultures because when they are on the ground feeding, they resemble a wild turkey in size, color, and shape. In the air, it’s a whole other story! Awkward and ungainly on the ground, vultures jump, hop and flap furiously to take to the air. Once up, they are very efficient fliers. They flap a few times, then riding the thermal updrafts, soar and glide. Pilots have reported them at altitudes of 20,000 feet! Remember when you were a kid and made black v-shapes as birds in flight on your crayon pictures? From the ground, that’s what vultures look like when coasting. They hold their wings at an angle and tip them to catch the wind. Flying around high in the sky, turkey vultures have excellent eyesight and can spot a meal below. Even more impressive, they can smell it up to a mile away. This is a very unique trait as most vultures (and other birds) can’t smell at all. Contrary to popular belief, turkey vultures are pretty picky about what they’ll eat. Yes, they eat roadkill but only if it’s relatively fresh carrion (12-24 hours old.) Turkey vultures’ range covers North America from southern Canada south to the tip of South America. Hendricks County is right on the edge of the buzzards’ yearround range. Some birds may migrate short distances for winter. While turkey vultures forage alone, they are social animals and like to live in large colonies. They don’t have a “song” because they don’t have a syrinx, an organ like our voice box. Their only vocalizations are grunts when courting and hissing when threatened or fighting.
I like so many of my friends find myself wearing jeans most of the time. They are just so comfortable. My friend Sue had told me that her son Luke was marrying Cassie in the summer time. She told me in October. My wardrobe consists of jeans, casual pants, and one winter dress that I had worn to my granddaughter’s wedding a couple of years ago. I was going to have to go shopping (which I hate) for a summer dress appropriate for a wedding. Ginger and Spice was having a going out of business sale. This sale had been going on for some time. She still had summer dresses. She always had high quality clothes but pricey. If they were going out of business that meant reduced prices. Sure enough when I went in everything was 75% off. The owner was so good about helping me find a dress. It was December when I bought the dress. I put it in the closet and unfortunately did not put it on until a couple of hours before the wedding. That was a bad, bad mistake. I had gained weight since I had bought the dress. Even with the help of my husband and a lot of wiggling I barely was able to get into it. As soon as we got home from the wedding I took the dress off knowing I could never wear it again. I had a friend who I was able to give it to. Bee Jones ______________________________________________
The Rocket 98
We can all remember our teen years where we did silly, crazy things and laughed and laughed. This story is about one of those times. My good friend Larry Chambers and I planned a double date. He was dating Linda Lee, whom he later married, and I cannot remember who I went out with. Larry’s dad let him borrow his beautiful, 1959 Oldsmobile Rocket 98. Man what a car! It was big and powerful. You could knock down buildings with this baby. It was loaded with features like power steering, power brakes, power windows, and power seats. It had a rocket looking sensor on the dash that would automatically dim the lights when an on-coming car was approaching. But it had one feature that we decided we could have some fun with. On the floor were two pedals, one to manually dim the lights and one that would change the radio stations when depressed. We were driving around and I told the girls that I had a magic ring. When I pointed it at the something and said “AbraCadabra” I could make things happen. I said “Watch, I will make the radio change stations.” Yea right, they said. Larry watched in the rearview mirror and when I did my thing, he would step on the pedal and the radio would change stations. The girls like to went nuts. Finally, Linda noticed that every time this happened, Larry’s leg moved but not before we had had our fun. Ah, those lazy, crazy days of summer. “What great times!” Noel Gatlin ______________________________________________
The birds mate beginning in March. They don’t make nests but lay their eggs on a bare surface in a hollow tree, in a thicket, in a cave, or a rock outcropping. Eggs hatch in 30-40 days. Both parents feed and care for the young. If threatened, buzzards hiss and vomit semi-digested meat at the predator. Besides smelling awful, the yuck stings. Chicks will do this as well. The chicks fledge at about 10 weeks and the family stays together until autumn. The worldwide turkey vulture population is estimated at around 4,500,000. While protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty of 1918, they are listed as “Least Concern” on the threatened species lists but it’s still illegal to kill a bird or possess any parts of it, including feathers. The “Ick Factor” is what keeps most people from appreciating these huge birds. Yuck, they eat dead things! Can you imagine how our roadways would look and smell without them?! Put that thought aside and look at the Turkey Vulture from a distance. It’s not ugly as it glides and soars, its wing’s flight feathers flashing silver in the sun as it slowly circles overhead. Yep, I can imagine floating lazily, high over the ground with my friends. It wouldn’t be such a bad life. ______________________________________________
The Road Less Traveled And That Has Made All the Difference When traveling recently, I encountered a sign stating, “Lane Closed to Ease Congestion.” At first glance, the sign made no sense. My second glance however, lasting about twenty minutes, afforded a different conclusion... By now, as a burgeoning student of the traffic engineering sciences (and Robert Frost), you know where this is headed. You know that closing roads (or lanes) diverts a certain percentage of traffic to alternate routes. And you know that a certain percentage of those drivers forever continue to use that alternate route because, 1) they actually prefer the new found route, or 2) they have no idea the road reopened. As alluded to in previous columns, we are creatures of habit — we tend to drive the same route every day (stop doing that!). The familiar is the comfortable (we love comfort). That’s why I use the Waze app. It’s like a Magic 8-Ball. I can shake it (figuratively) and get a different route whenever I sense I’m succumbing to the comfortable (SttU). And it often recommends routes making no sense. And they make even less sense when I end up in the middle of a farm field 100 miles from my destination. But that’s OK because I discover new roads while experiencing minimal congestion. Plus, by then I usually can’t remember where I was going anyway, so who cares? Remember, autonomous cars and “connected vehicles” will resolve our traffic woes, but in the meantime, take the road less traveled. And as someone wiser than me once said, “I’m wiser than you!” ______________________________________________
A Squirrel About Town By Archy Archy looked disheveled and it was not a good look for a squirrel. I asked what was wrong. “Spring cleaning,” he answered. “Time for a fresh start. I’ve been winnowing the wheat from the chaff, cleaning up the clutter, streamlining the chaos, lightening the load.” And unloading his little-used metaphors, I thought to myself. I had no idea a squirrel’s nest could be so complex. “Not my home,” Archy answered my thought. “My life. We all need to do a little spiritual straightening-up. You’d be surprised how refreshing it can be.” I asked what that entailed. “Questioning your beliefs,” he said. “Holding your principals up to the light and looking for flaws. There are many things we keep out of habit that don’t serve a purpose anymore. You have to know when it’s time to toss them on the trash heap.” I was beginning to see his point. “Spring is a good time to take a look at the lessons you’ve learned and the lessons you didn’t learn,” Archy said, smoothing out a bit of ruffled fur on his haunch. I asked for examples. “I learned to keep my expectations low when it came to humans,” the squirrel explained. “That makes their good qualities seem more numerous. Seriously, sometimes it seems like people have little desire for self-improvement. Too many distractions, I suspect.” “That’s a kind way of putting it,” I said. “What about the lessons you didn’t learn?” I asked. The squirrel thought long and hard. “I have yet to learn to give up on your kind,” he said as he patted my hand. “The spark is still there in most people. They just have to realize it.” ______________________________________________ It’s easier for a rich man to ride that camel through the eye of a needle directly into the Kingdom of Heaven, than for some of us to give up our cell phone. Vera Nazarian
We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. So medicine, law, business, engineering... these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love... these are what we stay alive for. Walt Whitman _____________________
SUDOKU SOLUTION
