October is Coming, Prepare to Be Bold

photo by Stu Johnson

October is a month that encourages courage. The languors of summer are finally dispersed and the chill of reality in the air tells you to get to business.

She told me out of the blue that she adores me. I was there, in a chair, listening; she was standing by the grandfather clock. She didn’t sing it but she said it clearly. This should answer any remaining questions. But Mister Malaise and Madam Miasma are ever on our trail, skulking in woodlands and meadows, waylaying the vulnerable, requiring us to drink discouragement and despair, and they got me a few days ago, two weeks after mitral valve replacement, walking tall in Transitional Care, transitioning back to normal life when I was hit (in the time it takes to tell it) by abject weakness, dizziness, nausea, and had to be locked up in hospital and tubes put in my arms for blood and antibiotics, and then released in a weakened semi-invalid state. It’s a lousy feeling. I look out at Minneapolis and imagine it’s Odessa, which it is not. I worry the Swiss banks will fail. Water mains will burst. Bacon will be banned, leaving us with vegan substitute.

The body wants to heal and it has felicitous intuitions how to go about doing it but meanwhile I ache and shuffle around like an old grampa and hike the hallways and work at maintaining a cheerful outlook (false). My wife is a worrier and when we promised to love and honor each other 27 years ago, diarrhea and vomiting weren’t mentioned in detail, so I walk carefully.

Life throws a beanball at your head and you dig in at the plate and swing at the slider. Look at Columbus, whom we honor in October, the month he landed in the New World. Some dishonor him because he came uninvited but there was plenty of uninvited migrating and mooching around in the 15th century. You took your chances. And it was a bold venture to sail out on the ocean blue with no idea of where you’re going. No wonder he was paranoid. He stood at the helm — it hurt to sit because he had horrible hemorrhoids — and guessed he was near India whereas he was closer to Indiana. Still, some of us admire his courage.

October is a month that encourages courage. The languors of summer are finally dispersed and the chill of reality in the air tells you to get to business.

No wonder Brother Martin Luther on that October day in 1517 roused himself to nail his 95 theses to the church door at Wittenberg. Pounding nails into a door of any kind goes against a good German’s nature, but he did it, announcing that salvation is a gift of God’s grace, not available for purchase, for which he was outlawed but went on to lend his name to a major bunch of Prots. Whereas Pope Leo X is known for his diet of worms.

It was in October 1781, that Washington and Lafayette whipped Cornwallis’s ass at Yorktown and brought the American Revolution to a successful end. It had gone on long enough, Washington decided. Time to dispose of the foe and get down to the real problem, which was figuring out what sort of government would take the place of the Crown. So Washington pretended to be laying siege to British-occupied New York City but in fact was rushing his troops south where he caught the redcoats by surprise and made short work of them.

And Cornwallis surrendered. He didn’t claim the battle was fraudulent and that he was the true winner, nor did he slip out of Yorktown a day early to avoid having to hand over his sword. He handed it over.

Washington did this despite his terrible dental problems. False teeth made of wood and ivory that chewed his gums as he chewed his beans and mutton. We do not know for a fact that the Father of Our Country did not assign one of his slaves to chew his food for him. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. But his bold move on Cornwallis did more to secure our independence than the Declaration of 1776 did. Anybody with a pen can declare independence; somebody has to get the job done.

And so it comes down to you and me, friend, as to what needs doing in October. Leaves must be raked, storm windows hung, and we must listen to candidates and distinguish hogwash from common sense. And I must climb up from my clobbering and be ready when the bell rings for the next round.

Garrison Keillor © 09.20.22