For those who are not familiar with the incredible gift of sobriety bestowed upon me by God in September of 1989 I'll brief you. I had already sobered up during the year of 1974 but lacked the maturity to withstand the shocks in life that befell me and I started drinking again in 1983 with a defiance against God for the loss of my employment at the White Pine copper mine and other reverses and subsequent job layoffs from other business interests.
I was mad as hell then because I assumed that I had lived as the Bible prescribed for a Christian life. And this was how God rewarded me! I crawled into a fog of self pity and took my comfort in booze once again and I did not feel guilty. but I loved the quagmire of my self-pity. That's tough if God didn't like it.
God didn't retaliate and He stopped me short of my self-prescribed demise. He let me suffer the abdominal pain which I later discovered was indicative of liver degeneration and He let me have the grand mall seizures that scared the hell out of my wife, Lois. But these seizures marked the 'Big Bang' of my recovery.
I was in rehab the entire month of September of 1989 and my attitude during the detox period was flint-hard. I observed with scorn the cock-eyed optimism and of those patients who were now in treatment, having completed their detox phase as I sat at the table assigned for the detox smokers. A short unexpected stint in the Psych Ward. Plumbing issues over the Labor Day weekend necessitated the evacuation of the rehab facility to the hospital proper. Detox patients were ushered, as if under arrest, to the Phych Ward.
That was an epic wake-up call! I saw the scourge of mental illness as the young pretty girl who sat curled up on the couch staring out the window, oblivious to her surroundings. She never engaged with others, just sat and smoked during the entire day. An elderly woman just kept running her finger up and down her leg. A handsome man in his twenties went from patient to patient asking childishly, "What time Bullwinkle?"
As I matriculated for detox to the treatment population I slowly improved. My hands no longer trembled and I was able to sleep in a peaceful, restorative fashion. There was one more thing; the monkey was no longer on my back. I shared this with a counselor who had involuntary twitches from his years of drug use and he debunked my lost desire for the booze. It was real and it has lasted over these past twenty-nine years. I shared this with a doctor after I had left the treatment facility and he rejected my claim of a God-given miracle. He concluded that my drinking had fried the brain sells that caused my addiction. In other words I cured myself by drinking.
We were celebrating Christmas with family in West bend just over two months after I graduated from rehab and I was suffering with a cold in my head and deep in my chest. After the exchange of gifts Lois and I joined the family at Christmas Eve mass at the historic St. Augustine chapel in the farm setting where my wife Lois was reared. After the the Christmas Eve lunch and everyone had retired I lay coughing. I struggled to breathe and begged sleep to visit me.
I got up and sat alone in the darkened living room and stared at the Christmas tree silhouetted against the window. The idea hit me that a couple of shots of whiskey would sedate me sufficiently, facilitating my badly-needed rest. There was a variety of open liquor bottles atop the refrigerator and if I just took a little from several bottles to fill a shot glass twice no one would know. After much deliberation I returned to bed without taking any liquor and eventually fell asleep.
When I got up on Christmas morning the tight chest and the miserable cough dragged me down. Then I remembered last night. If I had taken those drinks I would be excusing myself so to go find a cold remedy - at the nearest liquor store. The suffering would have returned and I would revisit the misery of addiction.
A counselor at Lutheran Social Services had reminded me that autumn that when you climb back on the Booze Train you get on exactly where you got off. "George, never forget how close you came to death late in August. You may have another drunken episode but I seriously doubt if you will have another recovery.."
That was such a close call and I hadn't been sober very long. I was weak and I was rationalizing, justifying a drink that I knew would lead to my demise. God had not only given me the gift of sobriety; He had saved me from myself. A Christmas miracle!
Tuesday, December 18, 2018
Saturday, May 5, 2018
Alms for the Poor?
I was notified by Val at the place I 'retired' from that they had collected a box full of newspapers. Most people pass up the free paper at the hotel in favor of electronic media. I use the newspapers throughout the winter for lighting fires in our wood stove.
I came in bearing three half-bushel baskets and set them on the floor while I talked to my good friend Val. She's a great asset for the company with her sanguine personality. I found my visit to be uplifting and after some catching up the phone rang. That was my cue to go and collect the papers which were in a plastic tote just outside the breakfast room.
Then a mischievous idea entered my head when I noticed the breakfast attendant cleaning the breakfast room. I was disheveled with whiskers, hair sticking out from my baseball cap and my jeans were fashionably full of holes, good for summer wear with the ventilation. I approached the girl and asked "Could you spare a few bucks," as I held out one of the baskets. The girl was aghast, her jaw dropped and incredulity beamed from her eyes. She was speechless!
"Oh, I'm sorry, please allow me to introduce myself. I'm Toivo and I'm soliciting funds for the OAW. Would you care to contribute five dollars?" No response but her face said, 'who is this guy! What the hell is the OAW!'
"You see, I represent the OAW which is the Organization of American Winos."
She was even more shocked and I had to tell her, "just kidding."
You had such a serious look. I thought you were really from the 'OAW.' We both had a good laugh.
When I got home I thought , 'I really looked the part.'
I came in bearing three half-bushel baskets and set them on the floor while I talked to my good friend Val. She's a great asset for the company with her sanguine personality. I found my visit to be uplifting and after some catching up the phone rang. That was my cue to go and collect the papers which were in a plastic tote just outside the breakfast room.
Then a mischievous idea entered my head when I noticed the breakfast attendant cleaning the breakfast room. I was disheveled with whiskers, hair sticking out from my baseball cap and my jeans were fashionably full of holes, good for summer wear with the ventilation. I approached the girl and asked "Could you spare a few bucks," as I held out one of the baskets. The girl was aghast, her jaw dropped and incredulity beamed from her eyes. She was speechless!
"Oh, I'm sorry, please allow me to introduce myself. I'm Toivo and I'm soliciting funds for the OAW. Would you care to contribute five dollars?" No response but her face said, 'who is this guy! What the hell is the OAW!'
"You see, I represent the OAW which is the Organization of American Winos."
She was even more shocked and I had to tell her, "just kidding."
You had such a serious look. I thought you were really from the 'OAW.' We both had a good laugh.
When I got home I thought , 'I really looked the part.'
Thursday, January 18, 2018
Niemi (partial) Genealogy
Grandpa Axel Niemi was born in Vassan Lanni on the west coast of Finland and he had a brother, Abner Aho, the last name given to him from the farm on which he was born. I don't know where in Finland Mary Lassi came from. She eventually became Mary Niemi and whether it was in Finland I'll never know.
There is probably a lot of history which never will be known. Axel never talked about his parents or family. It wasn't until I was in my teens that I found out that the skinny bent-over man who wheeled his groceries up the street was his brother. He and his wife lived at the corner of South Range Road and Penokee Road in Ironwood and there is nothing but woods there now. I remember this skinny old man atop his house cleaning his chimney, completely black with soot, except for his eyes.
Grandpa Axel immigrated to Canada where he worked in a lumber camp and eventually settled with Mary in a humble house at 211 South Range Road in Ironwood. They had four kids. An unknown who was stillborn, my mom Irene Marie, Frank, Reino (later Ray), and Emil.
I enjoyed Emil's effusive personality. We frequently visited them in Bessemer and were treated to the bubbly personality of Aunt Florence (Margetta). Emil played his accordion and showed us his 8 mm home movies. He was outgoing and happy despite his hunched back and the lift he had to wear on one shoe. He was a polio victim and spent most of his childhood in the hospital at the University of Michigan. Many surgeries corrected severe deformations which made it difficult to breathe or participate in school. He received his primary education in Ann Arbor but he attended Ironwood High School and graduated at age eighteen.
Grandpa noticed that Emil was intelligent so he paid for Emil's tuition at Gogebic Community College which was then on the third floor of Ironwood High School. Emil graduated with a two-year Associate's degree in accounting and spent his working years in the office at the Chrysler dealer in Bessemer. Emil died from complications of pneumonia, a month after my dad in October, 1970.
Ray served in the Air Force during WWII and spent his working years with the Ironwood Daily Globe in the advertising department. I didn't meet his wife Mary until Dad's funeral in 1970 and I was impressed that she really cared about me during my season of grief. Hadn't met her before because of strange family dynamics. They both perished at their cottage on Little Oxbow Lake (circa) 1983. They were asphyxiated by a propane gas from a defective refrigerator.
Frank was my ideal man's man, tough and rawboned. He worked for a while in the iron mines and then he worked for the local Coca-Cola plant. He drove the truck loaded with cases of fine beverage. Road construction, Highway 2 as I remember was his next livelihood. when I was twelve he was staying at the family cottage in Mercer, Wisconsin. One day he came back from work with his pants torn and bloody. A chainsaw raked across his thigh, and he had stitches. It was remarkable to me that he didn't consider it a big deal. He still went to work the next day.
Frank's life hit a rough patch, starting with a divorce. He drank heavily in the unkempt saloons in Hurley. He was a brawler and he spent overnight stints in jail. I thought that Frank was so cool! I wanted to be like him, even smoked his brand, Camel, those short coffin nails with no filter.
Frank eventually straightened out. He got sober and married again (Helen) and was a good father to three step-sons and eventually another baby boy.
He helped me with some projects around the house after my parents were gone and helped ease me through the horrible first week after Dad died.
He was a man with several skills, making their drab house in Hurley into a showplace. He did it all, carpentry, masonry, electrical, plumbing, siding, roofing and he even installed a new furnace. That was the side of Frank that deeply impressed me. He beat the booze and made a new, sober life as a plumber for Schult Mobile Homes in Ironwood. He had ten good, sober years with Helen and the kids until his death at age fifty-five.
Mom was the eldest. In my book I remembered her mercurial disposition and her explosive temper. Eventually we found that her behavior had a physiological cause. When she got the medical care she needed she was a completely different person during the last three months of her life.
Mom kept the house clean and orderly. She got up at 4:30 on Monday to do the washing and also get the fire lit in our coal stove. She handled galvanized steel tubs and worked with a stick-shift wringer washing machine. She cooked on a wood-fired stove, snow for her new steam iron and hung clothes outside so they froze stiff then she hung them in the basement. She died from a stroke at age fifty-one.
That is a summary of what I know about the maternal side of my family.
There is probably a lot of history which never will be known. Axel never talked about his parents or family. It wasn't until I was in my teens that I found out that the skinny bent-over man who wheeled his groceries up the street was his brother. He and his wife lived at the corner of South Range Road and Penokee Road in Ironwood and there is nothing but woods there now. I remember this skinny old man atop his house cleaning his chimney, completely black with soot, except for his eyes.
Grandpa Axel immigrated to Canada where he worked in a lumber camp and eventually settled with Mary in a humble house at 211 South Range Road in Ironwood. They had four kids. An unknown who was stillborn, my mom Irene Marie, Frank, Reino (later Ray), and Emil.
I enjoyed Emil's effusive personality. We frequently visited them in Bessemer and were treated to the bubbly personality of Aunt Florence (Margetta). Emil played his accordion and showed us his 8 mm home movies. He was outgoing and happy despite his hunched back and the lift he had to wear on one shoe. He was a polio victim and spent most of his childhood in the hospital at the University of Michigan. Many surgeries corrected severe deformations which made it difficult to breathe or participate in school. He received his primary education in Ann Arbor but he attended Ironwood High School and graduated at age eighteen.
Grandpa noticed that Emil was intelligent so he paid for Emil's tuition at Gogebic Community College which was then on the third floor of Ironwood High School. Emil graduated with a two-year Associate's degree in accounting and spent his working years in the office at the Chrysler dealer in Bessemer. Emil died from complications of pneumonia, a month after my dad in October, 1970.
Ray served in the Air Force during WWII and spent his working years with the Ironwood Daily Globe in the advertising department. I didn't meet his wife Mary until Dad's funeral in 1970 and I was impressed that she really cared about me during my season of grief. Hadn't met her before because of strange family dynamics. They both perished at their cottage on Little Oxbow Lake (circa) 1983. They were asphyxiated by a propane gas from a defective refrigerator.
Frank was my ideal man's man, tough and rawboned. He worked for a while in the iron mines and then he worked for the local Coca-Cola plant. He drove the truck loaded with cases of fine beverage. Road construction, Highway 2 as I remember was his next livelihood. when I was twelve he was staying at the family cottage in Mercer, Wisconsin. One day he came back from work with his pants torn and bloody. A chainsaw raked across his thigh, and he had stitches. It was remarkable to me that he didn't consider it a big deal. He still went to work the next day.
Frank's life hit a rough patch, starting with a divorce. He drank heavily in the unkempt saloons in Hurley. He was a brawler and he spent overnight stints in jail. I thought that Frank was so cool! I wanted to be like him, even smoked his brand, Camel, those short coffin nails with no filter.
Frank eventually straightened out. He got sober and married again (Helen) and was a good father to three step-sons and eventually another baby boy.
He helped me with some projects around the house after my parents were gone and helped ease me through the horrible first week after Dad died.
He was a man with several skills, making their drab house in Hurley into a showplace. He did it all, carpentry, masonry, electrical, plumbing, siding, roofing and he even installed a new furnace. That was the side of Frank that deeply impressed me. He beat the booze and made a new, sober life as a plumber for Schult Mobile Homes in Ironwood. He had ten good, sober years with Helen and the kids until his death at age fifty-five.
Mom was the eldest. In my book I remembered her mercurial disposition and her explosive temper. Eventually we found that her behavior had a physiological cause. When she got the medical care she needed she was a completely different person during the last three months of her life.
Mom kept the house clean and orderly. She got up at 4:30 on Monday to do the washing and also get the fire lit in our coal stove. She handled galvanized steel tubs and worked with a stick-shift wringer washing machine. She cooked on a wood-fired stove, snow for her new steam iron and hung clothes outside so they froze stiff then she hung them in the basement. She died from a stroke at age fifty-one.
That is a summary of what I know about the maternal side of my family.
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