Goodbye to the Daughters of Charity

I used to read "The Tennessean",Nashville's only daily newspaper. I read it on-line until they barricaded it behind a paywall. Now if I want to know how many shootings this city has had overnight I go to the TV station websites. But the story about the Daughters of Charity, who once ran Nashville's only Catholic Hospital, was one I missed.

I called a friend, who had worked at that hospital a few years longer than I had(I was there for 27 years)to ask her if she had heard that the Daughters were pulling out of Nashville. She had not heard, and when I wondered why we had never heard any mention of this, she pulled out Occam's Razor.

"I don't think anyone cares", she said.

When I started working at the nuns' hospital I was 31, and it was 1981. I worked in their ICU, and on Sunday mornings we had to set up a towel and a cup on the over bed table of any Catholic patient who was alert enough to want Communion. The nuns were ever present. One was head nurse on one of the floors. The head administrator was a Sister. They lived in a little house outside the hospital. It had a privacy fence with climbing roses.

But soon that house was gone, turned into that most sacred of structures, the Parking Garage.

And one by one the nuns disappeared. The Head sister was replaced by a series of corporate secular gunslinger CEOs, hired to do ruthless things. There was still a nun Mission Director, kept I suppose for cosmetic reasons. There will not be one now, nor will there be Daughters of Charity in eight other US cities, including Austin, Texas and Waterbury, Connecticut.

The order says it is pulling out to redistribute the Sisters to more needy areas. I, who grew up not far from Waterbury, do not believe this for a moment. When hospitals talk about Charity now their smile is fake, their face turns red, and disgusted spittle flies everywhere.

Not that the Sister were averse to making money- There always seemed to be plenty, and their for profit competitors hated them for it, since the nuns' profits were tax free. It was an eighties Nashville joke to refer to the Daughters of Charity as the "Daughters of the Dollar."

None the less, this is a sad story, and I am sorry to hear of their leaving.


And where did I hear this news?

On the Internet, of course, while doing some research. The story was dated last October.

What To Do After Church On Wednesday Night-

Last October I wrote about the opening of the "Pleasures Romance Boutique" adult toy store on White Bridge Road, which is catty corner across the street from St Mary Villa and its Child Development Center. I believe I reported that the boutique's neighbors had qualms, and that the city councilmen had promised to keep an eye on the shop to make sure vulgarity and tastelessness did not get out of hand.

I can report that the shop is still there and open, and that it has a new marketing ploy.
I drove by it a week ago as I went out to work the overnight in the clinic at the Little Big House.

Now to those of you who live outside the South, I can assure you that Nashville is not Amsterdam. We take sin seriously here, and in the Protestant South Wednesday night is church night.

Well, it appears that the owners of the Pleasures Romance Boutique now feel confident that not only can they compete with Church, they can also lure in Church goers, who might be looking for something to do after the service Wednesday evening.

There it was, announced in big letters on their white road sign that has the flaming Tiki torches on either side.

"Free Condoms Every Wednesday Night".


Perhaps this is because people who work for Hobby Lobby are thinking that Justices Roberts and Scalia are going to end their insurance coverage for birth control, and the Boutique knows opportunity when it sees it.

Or maybe there is something about Wednesday night services at the Church of Christ that puts people in the mood-

Laugh of the Day

I am going to embarrass myself by admitting that prior to yesterday I had never read anything by David Foster Wallace. I had heard of him in passing, and had read of his sad end.

I read an essay by him last evening that I found in the forgettable and pointless book "MFA vs NYC". His essay was a garnet glowing on a slag heap.

Today I found his Harper's piece about his week spent on a luxury cruise ship. It is "Shipping Out" and can be easily found on a number of Internet sites. It is not short, and may prove to be too much for those who find Twitter too long winded and taxing, but I thought it the funniest thing I have read since Mark Twain wrote about Emmeline Grangerford.

Here is an excerpt in which Wallace describes his fellow passengers-


" I have heard upscale adult US citizens ask the ship's Guest Relations Desk whether snorkeling involves getting wet, whether the trap shooting will be held outside, whether the crew sleeps on board, and what time the Midnight Buffet is."

The rest of the essay is just as funny.

I hope to read his novel "Infinite Jest " sometime soon. If his fiction is as good as his essays it will be good indeed.


*There are some fascinating videos of Wallace's talks and interviews on Youtube. I am working my way through them now.

Poor Man's Fertilizer

In New Hampshire, where I grew up, country people called late season snows "Poor Man's Fertilizer".

Late March in Nashville should bring blooming redbuds and all manner of flowering trees. Instead we have this, for all morning snow has been falling on and off-








But there are other things happening in this city besides lousy weather, and some might be of interest to tourists and people thinking of visiting Music City.

Firstly-to all out of towners- a word of advice. Never cross a Nashville street. If there is something on the other side you want, forget it. Every week now and sometimes twice drivers who are never charged are mowing down pedestrians with impunity. Today someone knocked down a lady jogger in Green Hills. She lived, but not everyone else recently run over was as lucky.


The other unhappy trend is the number of shootings, sometimes two or three a day. You would think this was Memphis. Or Chicago. If you think I am exaggerating check out the WSMV.com website, and you can keep a tally.

And this morning, not a quarter mile from where I am typing, a man robbed the Bellevue Shell station on Highway 70 at 2:30 am.

In stodgy, somnolent Bellevue, where till now one was more likely to be mugged by a skunk.


Nashville is turning into Dodge City-

Barn Swallow Watch

Barn Swallows, those beloved birds, have come back to Tennessee. Surfbirds is reporting that they have been seen in Robertson County, just north of Nashville, and two days ago they were in the Chattanooga area.

I remember that last year they arrived in mid-March. All day the sky was empty, but at four o'clock I walked out onto my porch and heard them chittering.

They nest in our parking sheds here, and they use the same nests, but this year they must build new ones. When the work crews painted the sheds last October they knocked the old nests down and pressure washed the shed.

What a joyful day it is when they return!

Unbelievable

I bought seeds from two well known seed houses today. Four packages of seeds from Burpee cost $26.75 with $6.95 of that shipping and handling. I bought eight packages of seed from Park. $26.60 with $6.95 of that shipping and handling.

Have you ever picked up a seed packet? It is featherweight. And if I had bought just one packet of seeds would it still have cost $6.95?

I have heard the big nursery/seed companies are in trouble financially.

Now I see why-

A Freeloader at the Feeder

When I opened the blinds this morning this is who I saw chowing down on the sunflower seeds on my platform feeder. I bought this feeder two weeks ago when I relocated my other feeder off the porch to cut down on the mess the house finches made tossing seeds to and fro. I expected a squirrel or two,but I think the porch cats have deterred them.

Nothing deters opossums. They ignore cats. And they will eat almost anything.

Well- almost anything. I brought some mixed carrots and peas home from my night dinner tray at the prison clinic, and nothing would touch them.