Monday, February 22, 2021
Tuesday, February 16, 2021
Turn off the snow, turn on the power
We have been powerless for much of Monday and today. We were in the dark for hours, and it's been a test. But we are surviving.
The view from our apartment ... cold!
As I write this, the power has been back on for 20 minutes after the second 12-hour blackout. I have use of my coputer, so I am writing in a hurry because who knows when the power goes out again.
Spent most of Monday without electrical devices, and again the first part of today.
So no microwave to heat water for coffee or tea or soup. No television -- which we watched constantly last week and which we depend on for most of our news. For those in our facility who still like to read actual newspapers, no delivery the past two days.
(It is still a place for the real Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dallas Morning News, New York Times and Wall Street Journal -- the kind you hold in your hands, not the online versions. I am not one of those readers these days.)
I don't like snow, and I don't like cold weather. Never have, never will. And it is just too darned cold and too snowy here -- as bad as it's been in our part of the country for, I'm reading, three decades.
Looked at my phone -- once we were back online Monday evening -- and it said 7 degrees with a "real feel" of minus 6. Last I checked we were not in Green Bay. Today we are up to 18 degrees, a heat wave.
But, hey, I am not complaining. Please don't take it that way. We are grateful for the dedicated management people and staff in our facility, who made sure that everyone here -- some 450 residents -- had something to eat and drink, twice Monday and again for lunch today.
They even managed hot soup today.
Some of those managers and staff spent Sunday night here, and many stayed again last night. And the dining services department also had to deal with a broken water pipe and a partially collapsed ceiling portion in the kitchen.
Hurray for our management, resident services and dining services departments.
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We have residents who voice their gripes, and maybe some are justified. But our feeling is that those in charge of this place, and those who work here, care about us and our well-being.
It is frustrating not having much to do. I am enjoying typing this message, feels good, feels right.
We are missing our exercise classes (yes, even at 8 a.m. most weekdays); they were called off. Our Country Store, a convenience for residents that is open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday, never opened. No power in the exercise room or in the store, obviously.
Plus, it was cold in our apartment, and it got chillier as the day wore on, although our blankets and afghans were made to good use.
The good thing was that by raising the blinds in our apartment, the sunshine coming through did help warm it up a bit inside and gave us light.
The result was we could read, and I have been able to cover about 175 more pages of this book, which has 589 pages to read in all. It is mostly about politics (I like reading about politics), but thankfully not today's politics.
(Talk about powerless ... following the impeachment trial last week, watching two completely opposite views, that was definitely beyond our control. But it was great theater.)
Our power went out -- my guess -- about 2:30 a.m. Monday, came back on at 7:11 a.m. (I know, because I reset a couple of our clocks), just in time for me to go downstairs and bring back two cups of coffee (black), the almost-every-day starter for Ms. Bea.
That was from the only large container of coffee the dining staff managed to do after the power came on ... until the power went out again.
That was shortly after 8 a.m. At 8:41 p.m. -- yes, a darned 12-plus hours -- the power came back on. This was after we made several trips down our dark hallway with a flashlight showing us the way. (Early in the day, we made a couple of trips down the stairs, where it was dark enough that we had to be very careful not to stumble.)
Fortunately, one of the two elevators in our building was operating. Same was true -- one working elevator -- in the two other buildings in our facility. Generators made that possible.
Today the power went out in the middle of the night, and came back on at 1:41 p.m. One improvement the dining staff was able to make: It had hot coffee in abundant supply downstairs. Beatrice was fine with that, and I was a happy volunteer to bring back two cups.
Our facility was like the rest of most of our part of Fort Worth, with rolling blackouts imposed to save electricity for most of the past two days.
Several times I thought about the people who regularly do without electrical power or running water, or so many of our modern conveniences ... or, sadly, without food. That's a significant part of the world, even a significant part of our very city and area.
Thought about how blessed, and maybe privileged, we are.
I know people who grew up in that kind of environment; it hits very close to home. We didn't have a lot in the early 1950s in Amsterdam, but we rarely lacked for what we needed. A little girl growing up in rural North Louisiana didn't have a lot, either.
"You don't think about it," she'll tell you. "You do with what you have, and you adjust to it. You find a way, and you live the best you can."
What we did have in Amsterdam in the winter was plenty of snow and cold. For Mom, it likely brought back (bad) memories of a "Death March" she was forced to make in the middle of one of western Europe's most brutal winters a long time ago.
So when it snows here, in the Deep South's usually mild climate, I always think of my mother, and how she absolutely despised cold weather. When we moved from Amsterdam, she loved the change in weather. Until the rare occasions when it, yes, snowed.
Mom would have been miserable the past few days. We're not exactly delighted.
Looking at the weather forcast online, we have a few more days of sub-freezing temperatures, winter storm warnings, more snow possibly late today and likely Wednesday, a slight rise to above-freezing Thursday, a sunny day but still not above 36 degrees Friday, warming up and sunny Saturday and -- gloriously -- temperature highs ranging from 56 to 67 Sunday through next Tuesday.
The weekend can't get here fast enough, can it? The abnormally cold weather can't leave fast enough.
Got lots that needs to be done: exercise classes, laundry, haircut, grocery shopping. More Louisiana track and field books to pick up and mail, more to print and have bound.
Need electrical power for some of that, need clear and safe roads.
The weather is out of our control. What is in our control, the power we do have is mental. It's challenging, but we can deal with it as long as we count our blessings.
Sunday, February 7, 2021
Hannie Urbanus: Holland's baseball superstar
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| Spring training, New York Giants, 1952: Dutch superstar pitcher Hannie Urbanus and Giants manager Leo Durocher. |
He was my first baseball hero.
In fact, he was the only baseball player I knew of until we came to the United States in early 1956.
Of course, that name will be foreign to you ... unless you are -- or were -- Dutch, and only then if you were a sports fan, or more specifically a honkbal fan. That's the Dutch word for baseball.
Hannie Urbanus was the superstar of the sport in our home country, a right-handed pitcher for the OVVO team in Amsterdam. They were the Dutch Yankees, the perennial 1950s champions.
He was good enough to warrant a month-long spring-training stay with the 1952 New York Giants, the reigning National League champions. It was more of an exhibition appearance rather than a tryout. When he returned to Holland, he resumed leading his team to championships and as the No. 1 pitcher for the national team.
Baseball was far from a major sport in The Netherlands in the late 1940s and early 1950s when we lived there. Soccer (voetbal) was the sport most people cared about, although other sports that were popular included cycling, swimming, speed skating, basketball, track and field, field hockey, and an odd mixed-gender sport called korfbal -- a derivative of basketball, without dribbling -- in which Holland was the world's best.
Here is how I learned about Hannie Urbanus and baseball:
Here was history, highlights, photos, rules of all these sports. It was great for a kid who was absorbed in it all and loved to read. Soccer was the main emphasis, of course, and there were only two relatively small sections on honkbal/baseball.
Still didn't understand the game much because we'd never seen it played, even though home base for Hannie Urbanus and his OVVO team was in Amsterdam.
To collect the books, and the paste-in photos, I suppose, we had to buy lots and lots of Blue Band margarine. And we did.
Those books, bound together in a neat folder, came with us to the U.S., and they're right here -- barely holding together; they're fragile -- on a shelf to my left as I type this.
Seeing notice of his death today sent me on a Google search for Hannie Urbanus. Here, from www.knbsb.nl, is the headline on the best story -- really his life's story -- that I found:
honkbal icoon, heuvel legende, en hall of famer han urbanus overleden
Translated: Baseball icon, hill legend and Hall of Famer Han Urbanus passed away
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Here is the first portion of that story:
Han Urbanus , who played in the Dutch big league in four decades, pitched eleven no-hitters and played for the National Team for 17 years, passed away on Friday (February 5) at the age of 93. With the Netherlands National Baseball Team , Han Urbanus won seven consecutive European titles. Urbanus also participated in Major League spring training with New York Giants, was a member of the Dutch Hall of Fame, and was a living legend and Dutch baseball icon. |
-- Eleven no-hitter, from 1954 through 1961 (take that, Nolan Ryan). That included nine for OVVO and a couple in the rivalry national-team games with neighbor Belgium. Twice (1954, 1956) he pitched two no-hitters in one season.
-- He was selected the Dutch major league's "Best Pitcher" five times (1953-55, 1957-58), and set a league record for strikeouts (213) in 1955, a record that stood until 1980. He was the league MVP three times (1954-55, 1961).
-- He also played second base and shortstop at times for OVVO and the national team, and was a solid hitter with home-run power. In 1959, he was the league's Best Hitter with a .348 average.
-- He played in 64 international games, a record at the time of his retirement.
He played in the highest division for four decades (1947-70) and his 24 seasons was a long-standing record.
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| ... On the left a unique playing card with the portrait of Han Urbanus ... ... On the right a caricature made by the famous draftsman ... ... Dik Bruijnesteijn, which was used in newspapers ... | |
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In 1952, at age 24, he received a unique invitation -- the first European player to take part in one of America's major-league spring training camps. It was the Giants' camp in Phoenix that included BobbyThomson (whose famous pennant-winning home run was the previous October), Wes Westrum, Alvin Dark, Sal Maglie, Monte Irvin, Hoyt Wilhem, Jim Hearn, Larry Jansen ... and a young Willie Mays.
The manager was Leo "The Lip" Durocher. Frank Shellenback was the pitching coach.
From the story:
A year earlier, Urbanus had been interviewed by Albert Balink, the publisher and editor of 'The Knickerbocker,' a Dutch/American magazine for Dutch immigrants in America. It was Balink who arranged the trip to promote and stimulate baseball in Europe.
When Urbanus received the invitation in February, he worked as an assistant accountant at an Amsterdam office. His employer immediately gave him the opportunity to travel to America. ... In an interview in Het Parool at the time, Urbanus said: "I just wonder if I will be able to keep up with the level. And if they ask to remain as a professional, I refuse firmly.'' He was described as 'a calm and jovial man of 24 years old.' "
 ... New York Giants Pitching Coach ... ... Frank Shellenback ... |
When Urbanus returned a month later on March 15, he brought back an instructional video and in the weeks and months that followed he traveled across the country to lecture on pitching, what he had learned and what it's like to participate in a professional training camp. All these lectures were organized by clubs or the union in canteens or rented halls that were packed with many baseball enthusiasts. In an article in the Algemeen Dagblad, Urbanus said: “To my great surprise, I have experienced that in America people throw completely differently. Besides, I learned that the pitchers are completely focused on pitching and not hitting themselves. '' Urbanus also wrote many articles about pitching and the correct way to throw a ball in Baseball News.
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And then there was the Urbanus tie-in to Texas.
His grandson Nick Urbanus, who was a star in the Dutch leagues playing for the Amsterdam Pirates, signed with the Texas Rangers' organization in 2011 and was a middle infielder in the rookie leagues and Class A for four seasons. But he never hit much here, and returned to play in Holland.
Throughout his life, Hannie was a constant -- and revered -- presence at any baseball gathering of note in The Netherlands, and also in Europe. He remained visible almost to the end, always the ambassador for the game.
And always a Dutch hero, including one baseball fan in Fort Worth. Hannie preceded even Mickey Mantle.
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