This Letter to Louie examines one of the most important questions of all time… what generation will be the generation that will bring peace to the world? A moving and insightful look at the seemingly perpetual cycle of war and its casualties… on the battle field and off.

Before there was Amazon and Home Depot, there were hardware stores on Main Street… and so much more.

Nothing to say? Not true, not true.

Let’s hear it from Louie himself…

At the encouragement of my daughters, I thought it might be entertaining to recall a number of events which occurred during my practice of medicine which were initially strange and scary, but which with time and telling are now benign and entertaining. Entertaining, especially when told to grandchildren, on a dark summer evening while sitting around a campfire, talking listening to the night sounds, huddled under a blanket with a three year old on your lap.

When does one realize a mistake? Is a mistake ever singular, does it always involve a situation without retreat, redress, withdrawal, reorganization, humbling... a condition of expensive ‘egg on the face?

The announcement of the tragic action and near homicide was by an article of accusation in the MJS Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. At coffee, the discussion was of the old man who hit his wife with a hammer" and only after a few questions were doubt cast as to "what truly happened".

85 years ago, my mother gave birth, with the aid of extraction forceps. The delivery was successful, but I bear a scar on the right parietal aspect of my head from the extraction. Technology wasn‘t much, but kids had been born for centuries. She had minimal pre-delivery sedation, one nurse attendant, and a physician trained in the 1920s. But it worked out well.

This cheese-making is like life. The enzymes of nurturing, along with the bacteria of living produce the cheese and whey. Swiss cheese with its individual holes, never two pieces alike are likened to people; never two alike, never two equal, never one without some blemish, and most giving off gases, not always innocuous carbon dioxide.

It sort of reminds me of many lives, many relationships which initially have begun with sunshine and happiness, only to drift into squalor and depression as loving associations are destroyed by slow deterioration. Then after years of subsisting in emotionally crowded confines of personality conflicts, some devastating earth-shaking event causes cataclysmic devastation.

It is surprising how much one can learn of another during brief encounters. I learned of his bowling prowess, of his encounters with the law during prohibition, of his family, and of his wife who poorly controlled her type one diabetes. I learned a great deal from him, but the greatest lesson was to begin to recognize the insidious onset of chronic depression, which I later called bartender’s disease.

In the beginning, there was Thursday, and for the next forty years, there were Thursdays. Always Thursdays were important and many times different; quiet and hectic; worry-free and troublesome, but always promising and so close to the weekend.

Saab no longer will be an item of consideration but an asterisk of history. It will no longer be remembered as “being born from Jets” but will be recalled as the three-cylinder failure of the ’70s. Changes occur, many are left with a depreciated new auto and many are truly left on the scrap heap of society. Where would one rather be? I choose to drive the Saab and try to assist the discards in society.

The house at 39 South Rural St. was old when we lived there in 1940. We, the Algiers lived there from 1940 to 1951. We lived and died there, rebuilt the house, and found its treasures and its weaknesses. We laughed, cried, sweated and grew in this small house, small by today’s standards, small by the one bathroom, one tub, four bedrooms in a home of 1568 square feet. It was cramped, but it was home.

Centuries ago many, from children to English nobles, marched in the holy fight to the promised land, to bring back the Holy Grail. Now we are engaged in another march, on to Texas to bring back the grail of the most important event in Wisconsin since the "milk wars" of the thirties.

As one ages, age becomes an associate. All or most of our actions are controlled by, modified, or inhibited by advancing age and associated problems. Initially, we laugh about aches and pains, clumsiness of actions, or memory loss. Later we rue the day of aging and wonder where youth or at least middle age has gone. We laugh at forgetfulness and silently curse the missed appointment, we recall days of full calendars but are happy with a day without ringing phones.

personalities never change as the population of the Senior Center ages. One observation; stack a couple of hundred seniors in a confined space such as this, and periodically the Reaper stalks the halls with his long steady all-encompassing scythe, takes a swing or so and the catalog of personalities changes; one down, one up within a few days. Always change continues.

The mechanism of sudden death is ventricular fibrillation, and no cranial flow for over three minutes, so the treatment is recognition, 911 call, and rapid constant chest compressions. I thought of all those features while clearing the intake furnace tubes, coughed a few times-- this should increase coronary flow during exertion, and because you are getting this message, I guess it worked.

The memory of my friend and his flashing spikes so far ahead of me on the track of the Little Ten conference reminded me during the years that track ribbons and medals, even Olympic Medals are cold to the touch when compared with the memories of friendship. I do hope the athletes take home more than medals from the Olympiad, that they take home some of the admiration for the fleeting spikes of the winning athlete, as seen by the other runners.

This aging is not a quiet process; it is fraught with one significant problem, forgetfulness. To age is to forget; small things, large events, names and faces, events and promised events. To forget to “write it down” and if it is written, just where in the hell was it written, and where is the “book?” There are many steps in memory, and all are forgotten one at a time.