First Annual Amish Classic Turkey Trot

In my previous post i mentioned where we currently are, the armpit of Amish Country, more exactly, in a house on a hill just off Tater Road, turning right off Greasy Gravy Lane. (i am not making this up folks.)

I realize that the epitome of Thanksgiving, for most in this country, stands on the vast consumption of turkey, its lesser known sidekick dishes and as the name reveals, giving thanks. For me, i'd like to add to that pyramid: The Turkey Trot. Most major cities host the race. Cities such as Denver, Indianapolis, and a random town in Arkansas have it every year, rain or snow. The small town of Paoli, Indiana however does not. I kinda see why. Being that the majority of its inhabitants are horse and buggy riding, cow and goat milking, farming, sheep shearing personages i highly doubted they would rally for a race with the same zest as they would for a barn raising. They already choose to work a little harder for the basic comforts of life. I can't quite see them out there in their beards, bonnets and black dresses filing up to the starting line for a 5k. I understood. I still wanted a race.

Paul and i got up Thursday morning and promptly put on our exercise duds. Steven, our brother-in-law, greeted me with, "Who would want to run when they could sit?" I retorted with, "Who would want to sit when they could run." (I secretly understood his point.) We stepped outside and the wind greeted us with the chilly blast to the face. Tradition has gotta start somewhere so we headed toward Tater Road.

Our pace came nowhere close to say, a, performance enhanced Marion Jones but it was a beautifully crisp Thanksgiving day and we were running our Turkey Trot. We had thought we might run the country block but after about 2 1/2 kilometers we weren't coming to any crossroads so after a couple more trots we pulled a 180 and headed back to mashed potatoes, fresh cranberry sauce, steamed veggies and a very large hunk of triptophan in the oven. Who, less than 3 days ago, was running his own little trot in a very well cared for farmyard.

Road Trippin'

I have summoned the courage to step out from the shadow of my husband's curious writing abilities and add a bit more to our slightly read blog.

We are currently in Paoli, Indiana, the armpit of Amish Country. It's not important that you know where we are or even that this particular place exists except to add the necessary fact that 5/11ths of Paul's immediate family live here and the rest of us converged upon this place for the triptophan ridden holiday we commonly refer to as Thanksgiving. Paul and i left Denver this past Monday and decided, for the fun of it, to drive out here and fly back. The fact that his sister is buying his car from him is a minor detail.

Paul drove and i amused him to keep him awake; even when i was sleeping apparently, something about drool and talking in my sleep. We sang songs, told each other stories, and played the alphabet game forward and backward. Several times. We stopped only to refuel and empty our bladders. About 3am Tuesday morning we paused for one such break and bumped into some Midwestern hospitality. Paul filled up the tank and then we walked inside to find a restroom. We didn't see any obvious bathroom signage so Paul asked the invisible attendant, "Where are the restrooms?" From the back hall we heard a grumpy retort, "The ONE restroom is back here." Paul motioned for me to go first. I stepped into the small hall which had been turned into a stocking room. I was unsure, even upon entering the hallway, where this phantom room of rest was. The man was standing in front of a door. "Well, are you gonna go or what?" After another surveying moment i wondered at the door, but the man was still standing in front of it. Did he want me to push him out the way or squeeze behind him? He looked at me annoyingly. I guessed the latter, so i squeezed past him. Inside, finally, i realized it was once a public loo, but apparently the attendant had not been notified. By now i didn't care. One thought, "must go pee". Second thought, "Check for toilet paper". None, nada, zip, not one square left. I contemplated performing the hovercraft maneuver but its no secret that my legs are of the shorter variety, this toilet was unusually tall, plus i just wasn't in the mood to drip dry. I stepped back out, prepared to face the wrath of Grumpy Gas Grumperson. "Uh, sir, its out of toilet paper." I prepared not in vain. "Well, sh#%, of course it is." He scuffled into hall #2 and pretended to search. "Uh, can't seem to find any and...nope, don't have any." I hurried out to Paul. I brought him up to speed in about 3 seconds and in about 8 seconds we were back in the car and in search of another place. We found respite at a 24-hour-country- home-cookin' restaurant, whose water closet was not in much better shape than the previous but it did have TP so i didn't complain. Five minutes later we were back on the road again. Three and half hours later we made it to the Taylors, in Paoli, Indiana.

Confessions of a Hospital Security Guard

There is something to be said for the feeling of polyester covering every square inch of your body; the comforting weight of a grossly oversized flashlight dangling from your side; and the knowledge that you are in no way trained to handle anything remotely resembling an emergency. Yep, being a hospital security guard is a little bit like being a Navy SEAL, without the excitement, exercise or state of the art weapon systems. In fact, if Navy SEAL's spent most of their time sitting in tiny glass booths telling everyone in ear shot about the time they restrained a patient three years ago and eating everything in sight, they would be exactly like hospital security guards. There are thousands of brave men and women out there doing jobs you and I can't even imagine just to break even at the end of the month. And, I'm sure there is a desperation worse than the kind it takes for a grown man to put on an ill fitting uniform, a meaningless badge and a walkie-talkie, but I can't think of it right now.

I know what you're thinking, "What a stupid job! Why would any one want to be a hospital security guard?" But, without security guards, what kind of world would we live in? We'd be over run with snot nosed skateboarding hooligans and a catastrophic oversupply of donuts. Any one could park anywhere they wanted. No one would hassle you about wearing your company name badge; even though you've worked with the company for ten years and know the guard whose hassling you on a first name basis. We wouldn't have such gems as "Try to calm down ma'am!"; "I'm just doing my job."; and "Stop or I'll tell you again!" Chuck Norris would only be known for his Total Gym commercials, Block Buster rentals of Super Troopers would drop by 89%, and martial arts supply stores would have to close their doors forever. You could forget about national security and border control if our parking structures and 7-Elevens are left vulnerable. Yeah, get rid of security guards and the very fabric of society starts to unravel. Chaos, war and disaster would quickly ensue and the Antichrist would make his first appearance as a trespassing teenage pot smoker with an "I (heart) cops" tee shirt and ripped blue jeans.

Okay, maybe the world wouldn't completely fall apart, but you get the point. The truth is, we all have a place in the grand scheme of things; it's just that some of us have missed ours completely.

There are all kinds of security guards on this planet, but hospital security is a special breed. It ranks, in the hierarchical structure that is modern medicine, somewhere between MRSA (Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus, [a drug hesistant staph infection]) and Nationalized Healthcare. Security doesn't exactly fit into the grandiose picture of patient care that doctors, nurses and administrators have in mind when they decide to go into the healing arts. Guards don't add anything to the bottom line and consume one hundred times their body weight at staff picnics and potlucks. Doctors despise them, nurses are afraid of them and Risk Management doesn't sleep at night knowing they have the keys to every door in the building. So why, you might ask, do hospitals have security guards? I don't have a straight answer for you. Maybe we all like to take a certain amount of risk and have inherently self-destructive tendencies. Maybe it helps those who have succeeded, to have an example of what could have been if a single gene had spiced left when it should have gone right. Whatever the reason, hospital security is here and it would take a whole lot of jelly filling to get them to leave.

All this was on my mind in 2003 when I decided to infiltrate their ranks and find the answers to these and many other questions. I would bravely enter the under belly world of power trips and cholesterol to get to the root of this highly secretive and close-knit fraternity. Like Hunter S. Thompson and Robert Young Pelton before me, only more dangerous and dynamic, I vowed to blend in, investigate and report what I found behind the polyester wall of silence.

The two years that followed would change my life and my waistband forever. I would come to know real fear, insatiable hunger and a power unfit for mortal humans. In the realm of fake tickets and yellow strobe lights, there is no room for error. A rent a cop can smell a cheap imitation from a mile away and you better be ready to consume donuts, lots and lots of donuts. If you hesitate, even once, your cover is blown. If I've learned one thing from my time in security work, it's that you should never underestimate a man with a plastic badge and a real set of handcuffs.