Blindsided By Milk At The Library

Until the night I got blindsided by milk at the library, I had heard nothing but good things about breast feeding.

My mother spoke fondly about breast feeding; she would almost lapse into reverie.  When she was a 1940’s housewife, she liked nursing time because she could take a break from housework, sit down, and enjoy the only peace and quiet of the day.

When I went to visit a friend in Houston, she was an advocate for breast feeding. She spoke glowingly about its health benefits and its naturalness.  She told me all this when we were sitting in the café at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts; her baby was nursing while we were talking.

Film director Juzo Itami knew another benefit of breast feeding.  He directed a delightful film called Tampopo, a spoof of John Wayne westerns set in a small family-run noodle shop in Japan.  Itami wanted the movie audience to stick around and read the credits.  So, at the end of the movie, he filled the screen with a breast, had a baby nurse at that breast, and rolled the credits.  When I saw Tampopo, not a single person left their seat until the credits had finished rolling.

So, I knew that breast feeding was a form of relief for a housewife; I knew it was healthy; I knew it could keep a movie audience riveted in their seats. 

But then I found out more about breast feeding than I wanted to know.  I was moderating the writers’ group at the Grand Glaize Library, when Maggie Singleton announced that she was going to read from her upcoming book: Milt’s Diary.

A surge of anticipation ran through the group.  I was looking forward to finding out who this Milt guy was, and what Milt was writing about in his diary.

Maggie began to read: “I remember being hooked up to the breast pump and sitting in the rocking chair in the nursery.”

Wait a minute --- what is a guy named Milt doing hooked up to a breast pump?

Maggie:  “I listened to the pump do its thing and anxiously awaited a single drop of colostrum in the attached bottle.” 

What the hell is colostrum?  It sounds nauseating.

Maggie:  “It was an emotionally painful experience coupled with raging hormones.  The tears flowed rather quickly.”

I had misheard Maggie.  She was not reading from Milt's Diary; she was reading from Milk Diaries.  I started to squirm.

Maggie:  "This wasn't at all what I envisioned my nursing and bonding experience to be.  I felt like a complete failure and I didn't know how to fix it.  All I kept thinking was: what was wrong with me?"

Then I scanned the writers’ group --- I was the only male there.  I was convinced that everyone had stopped listening to Maggie read; instead, they were all watching me squirm.

Finally, Maggie finished reading. 

Milk Diaries, a book of breastfeeding experiences that Maggie collected from thirty-four mothers, has been published.  And I have decided that I will remember my mother’s fondness for breastfeeding, and I will forget all the lurid details that made me squirm the night that I got blindsided by milk at the library.

  

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YouTube song: If You Ain’t Gonna Breastfeed, Take Your Broke Ass Home, performed by the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine (4 minutes):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1axxj3J9Ig

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NOTE: Doug's best stories have been collected into a book: Puppy Out Of Breath.  Price = $11.  You can purchase a copy at  http://www.puppyoutofbreath.com

Mrs. Brown, You've Got A Lovely Daughter

My friends are incredulous when I tell them that I want to visit Protem, a small dot on the map of Missouri, ten miles north of the Arkansas line.

“Why would anyone want to visit Protem, Missouri?”  How the town got its name would be a good reason to go.   Founded in 1870, the residents at that time could not decide on a name.  They turned to Latin and called the town “Pro Tempore”.  Temporary became permanent; hence: Protem.

But I want to visit Protem is because it is the birthplace of Sharon, whose maiden name is Brown.  I met Sharon when the Army sent me and thirteen other Helicopter School graduates to Fort Lewis in the state of Washington.

Being stationed at Fort Lewis meant living in a constricted world.  There were no children.  There were no females, unless you counted the fort librarian or the ticket taker at the fort’s main movie theater or the WAC’s, who were sequestered in a distant part of the fort.  There were hardly any civilians unless you counted the bus drivers or the people working at the dry cleaners.

One of my buddies from Helicopter School was allowed to live off-post because he was married.  Sharon was his wife.  They had an apartment in Steilacoom, Washington, a town built around a ferry dock on Puget Sound.

This apartment was a short distance from Fort Lewis and became our refuge.  It was a chance to get away from the Army barracks.  Sharon took on the role of mother hen to her husband’s Helicopter School buddies.  She was gracious and welcoming.  For us, she was the female presence that we lacked at Fort Lewis. 

And we appreciated her.  We would sing Mrs. Brown You Have A Lovely Daughter to make her smile.  Although sometimes we would arrive at the apartment when she was lounging on the Murphy bed and we would fold her up into the wall, which would make her mad.

One weekend, four Army guys and Sharon drove 45 miles up to Seattle to see the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.  At a restaurant before the movie, the waitress looked at our table, pointed to Sharon sitting amidst four soldiers, and called her “a rose among thorns”.  I expanded on the waitress's comment, and said that Sharon would even be "a rose among roses”.

Her husband was shipped to Vietnam.  After he came back, the Army stationed them in Oklahoma.  When her husband left the Army, he did helicopter repair as a civilian and they moved to Bolivia.  He worked on helicopters all over South America, including Patagonia, where inquisitive penguins would watch over his shoulder while he did his repair work.

After Bolivia, came Oregon.  Their last move was to Los Angeles, where Sharon’s husband repairs helicopters that take crews out to offshore oil rigs. 

Sharon told me that when she was growing up in the 1950's, Protem consisted of two buildings: a post office and the Brown family's house.  

Sometimes I wonder if little Sharon Brown gazed at the Post Office, which was the town's connection to the outside world.  I wonder if she dreamed that she would get to see a lot of that outside world: the plains of Oklahoma, the deep forests of Oregon, the exoticness of Bolivia, the busyness of Los Angeles, and the calmness of a ferry town on Puget Sound where the quiet was broken only by a bunch of soldiers who would fold her up into the wall.

This month I am going to visit Protem, Missouri, as a tribute to Sharon, the rose among roses.  Wikipedia tells me that Protem is no longer just two buildings.  I can look forward to seeing a post office, a fire station, and a few houses.

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YouTube video of Herman's Hermits singing Mrs. Brown, You've Got A Lovely Daughter (3 minutes):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lv8k0VI9tBc

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NOTE: Doug's best stories have been collected into a book: Puppy Out Of Breath.  Price = $11.  You can purchase a copy at  http://www.puppyoutofbreath.com