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Retirement guys: Are you ready for the homestretch?

By
Mark Clair & Nolan Baker
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It is absolutely amazing how long an hour seems at the age of 10 years old.
It seemed like while out playing with your childhood friends, time stood still.

I (Mark) used to love to be out in theneighborhood playing a game of baseball or kick the can with all the kids from the neighborhood. If you were to be home by dark, it seemed like an eternity.

Why is it that as you get older time seems to go by more quickly? I recently saw a stand-up bit by comedian Louie Anderson who was talking about aging. He observed that as we get older we start to move a lot slower, but everything else seems to move a lot quicker.

Someone asked Louie at the end of the day, what he did that day.

“Is it over?” Louie replied. “Oh, nooooooooooooo! I had a bowl of soup! That’s about it.” Part of it is as children there is not a lot that is required of us.
At that age we are not very conscious of the clock like we are as adults.
As we get older we come to the realization of what point we may be at in life.In our 40s  maybe we are at the halfway point, 50s are well into the second half. In our 60s, we start
feeling really mortal.

Are the 70s and 80s, homestretch?
The sobering truthis, none of us are promised tomorrow.

Many will never make it to what we think is a normal life expectancy. The IRS expects a male to live approximately 87 years. Yet we know not everyone makes it that far.

Every day, we hear of tragic occurrences of people dying at young ages. I am amazed sometimes that when a person dies that is in their 80s or 90s and their loved ones act like God has personally attacked them.

I in no way am diminishing their grief, but I feel like if anyone makes it that far it is a blessing.

What does the idea of retirement mean to you? As The Retirement Guys we talk to our clients about what we call a “mind shift”: A shifting of how we approach things in our younger years to how we should now approach things as we enter this new phase.

Sometimes there is never this shift in thinking. The shift involves adjusting how you think about things like risk tolerance, rate of return, taxes, debt, income, etc.

We as advisors think there should be a definite difference between how you think about these things in your 30s, 40s, and 50s, compared to your 60s and 70s and 80s.

Here are a few pointers on what to be thinking about if you are approaching or are already in the retirement phase:

1. Identify potential sources of income. Look at savings, investments, pensions, social security, etc. Try to get a handle on what it will look like. Think about what level of income you will require.

2. Reassess your risk tolerance. Many times, levels of risk exposure are never reduced. The older you get the safer you should be with your money.

3. Pay down any remaining debt. It will be a load off your mind and free up more dollars from your income stream to be enjoyed.

4. Have a tax analysis done. Taxes may be a big issue during retirement especially if you have accumulated the bulk of your savings in retirement accounts such as IRAs and 401(k). This money has never been taxed and you will have to deal with it sooner or later.

5. Get out and enjoy life! Time is short so do not wait.

For more information on what to think about, you can go to retirementguysradio.com and request The Complete Retirement Toolkit.

Beyond Affairs group opens in Toledo

By
Caitlin McGlade
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You want to hide in your bedroom.

But you don’t because it reminds you of your spouse.

You want to be stronger. But you can’t stomach the idea of eating food, and haven’t for weeks. You want to scream. Cry. Go outand buy Victoria’s Secret lingerie or expensive cologne.

Months could have passed since you discovered your spouse had an affair. Or years. Or just days. It doesn’t matter. When your friends look at you with those sullen eyes or pat you on the shoulder and open their lips toutter, “It’s time to get on with your life,” you suppress a desire to smack them.

Started in the 1980s by a woman named Peggy Vaughan after she discovered her husband cheated, Beyond Affairs Network (BAN) comprises a chain of support groups linked by a common grief: infidelity.

The network has since expanded to 15 countries and territories, reachingnearly 100 cities across the United States, five of which are in Ohio, including the recently opened chapter
in Toledo.

Only betrayed spouses can start a group and only those betrayed may join. For each meeting, the group leader will open a discussion on topics approaching anything from forgiveness to the stages of healing to empowering literature.

The objective is to help the individual on his or her path to wellness. This may or may not lead to reuniting with his or her spouse. The organization is also deeply rooted in anonymity — you can even introduce yourself to group members with a false name.

The  Toledo BAN leader has asked Toledo Free Press to grant her anonymity to protect her children and her recovering family. We’ll call her Jane.

She said one of the most powerful tools of the group is its ability to help people realize that they are not alone. At a related seminar she met women who bonded over their
reactions to infidelity.

“We found out we had spent more money on lingerie trying to deal with it in the past three months than ever before,” Jane said. “And we thought wewere all going crazy — other people were repulsed by what we were doing but it was totally normal.”

Until death do us part?

The divorce rate among baby boomers has doubled within the past two decades, while the rate among younger generations has flattened, according to Susan Brown, a Bowling Green State University professor who co-wrote the paper “Gray
Divorce Revolution.”

She and BGSU faculty member I-Fen Lin examined data from the 1990U.S. Vital Statistic Report and the 2009 American Community Survey. Their results recorded that one in four people who get divorced are 50 or older.

A lot of this has to do with the nature of the baby boomer generation. Flip back through history and you’ll quickly make the connection — this was the first demographic that made divorce popular.

Consider, then, that many of these people got remarried. Sociologists contend that you’re more likely to get divorced if you’ve been divorced before, so it follows that many people 50 or older are now exemplifying the statistic.

“We basically have a different view on marriages and it’s about what the marriage can do for me,” she said. “We’ve ratcheted up what we expect from marriage. In the 40s and 50s, we had much more modest expectations. Whether I’m in love with this person or if I’m happy or depressed, that was a nonstarter.”

Extramarital affairs raise the odds of divorce by about two-thirds, said Alfred DeMaris, also a BGSUprofessor and a statistician for the Center for Family and Demographic Research.

DeMaris reviewed data on 1,270 spouses — 492 men and 778 women — who responded to a study beginning in 1980, and followed up by phone or mail in years that followed. Th e group he analyzed in 1980 reported no extramarital sex during their marriage.

He has found that marriage tended to reduce the likelihood for extramarital sex and that the quality of marriage, including how much time couples spent together,was an indicator of how at-risk the couple was for affairs. He cites a theory that two people feel passion for each other when they rapidly grow intimate with each other.Over time, there is less to learn about each other so passion ebbs.

“The stuff that fuels romance is desire and longing and uncertainty and if you look at all the great romances in history through literature they all have these qualities,” DeMaris
said. “And marriage is about obligation and predictability. The two are fundamentally incompatible. But in return for that you get s o m e t h i n g that is really more valuable, which is a life partner.”

DeMaris has also documented the effect infidelity has onmarriage. Being religious, for example, seemed to exacerbate the effect of the affair. He had hypothesized that the quality of marriage before the affair might have some bearing on consequences, but found out otherwise.

The only circumstance that lowered the likelihood of divorce after infidelity seemed to be if the wife was unemployed prior to the affair and then got a job afterward, he said.

“Very few things seemed to buffer the aff air,” he said.

Growing despite despair

Anne Bercht knows that there isno buffer. The organizer of Beyond Affairs Network, who took over for Vaughan in the mid-2000s, travels the country to give seminars on how to take your life back after an affair or how to prevent affairs in the first place.

“Our culture has created perceptions about aff airs and why they happen and most of thoseare false. I go sit on an airplane and people ask ‘What do you do?’ and I tell them and they get this almost offensive response and they’ll tell me how great their marriage is,” Bercht said. “All of the people in our group are people who would have said that before it happened to them.”

She said that we tend to conjure an image of the “cheating type” and assume that as long as we meet spousal needs then affairs couldn’t possibly strike our marriages.

She can say this because it happened to her.

Bercht recalled a day when she was driving in her car, belting out the lyrics to “Unbreak my Heart” by Toni Braxton. She thought about how depressing the lyrics were and then felt lucky that she and her husband shared a good marriage.

That night her husband confessed to her that he’d been having an affair.

Years later, the two are back together and have met with hundreds of troubled spouses. She went back to school. She wrote a book called “My Husband’s Affair Became the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me.”

This is how she does it.

Attempted sympathy

First, never underestimate the shame and terror that comes along with talking about betrayal.

Bercht could offer numerous accounts of individuals who want to come to BAN meetings.

They drive to the site of the meeting. They try to get out of the car. But instead, they sit in their cars. And wait until the meeting lets out. And leave.

This reaction is wrapped up in the stigma that marks people who have suffered from spousal betrayal.

“There is hope that you can have a monogamous marriage by being uninformed [about others’ affairs] so when it happens to someone else we tend to make some judgments,” she said. “If I only had a penny for every time I heard ‘I wonder what you did tocause your  husband to have an affair’ or ‘I know how men are with sex!’”

Those who have not experienced this tend to shrink away when they hear about affairs. They tend to avoid the word altogether. It’s almost asthough they are afraid it will happen
to them if they hang around for too long, Bercht said.

Another misperception commonly faced by members of BAN involves the rate at which their friends expect them to ditch their grief. It could take a minimum of two years to recover. Bercht recommends a victim of infidelity not make any decisions in the three months following the news.

But all too often, Bercht said, friends will try to talk logically about “being a smart person” or “everything becoming OK soon.”

She said the victim’s life is falling apart. He or she doesn’t need this. Reacting to an affair is like reacting to a death. This is, in fact, the death of a relationship as both parties know it.

Friends who have never experienced affairs don’t understand that the victim has to go through the stages of grieving and may often suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome, Bercht said.

“If only people would treat it the way that they treat the loss of a spouse
o death or a loss of a child,” she said. “If you lost a child, no one would ever come to you three months later and say ‘Why are you so sad? Your kid is gone — it’s time to get on with your life.’”

Do you really complete me?

Bercht recalls a marriage counseling exercise that required she and her husband to mash together a hunk of yellow and a hunk of blue Play-Doh to make green. The combination of  the two colors symbolized the unity of marriage.

But this didn’t seem right.

“Don’t tell me at this point that I’m nothing but a half-green and Anne ceases to exist,” she said. “Each person has to avoid losing their identity in their marriage. People get too enmeshed in their identity as who they are as a husband, father, wife, mother and the very things that were special and unique about them — the thing that their spouse was attracted to in the first place — they tend to lose sight of.”

The “you complete me” mentality of relationships is what Bercht tries to move away from.

She teaches affair prevention seminars across the country and this is one of her major points. The program encourages couples to embrace their differences. This is about having a voice in the relationship and how to lighten pre-existing baggage.

A lot of Bercht’s job is to deconstruct the misconceptions surrounding relationships.

Another loaded falsehood, she said, is expecting that one spousecan change the other.
She leads a “take back your life retreat” for the betrayed and said most people respond with similar desires when she asks what they want.

“Th ey say ‘I want my spouse to change this, that and the other thing’,”she said. “I spend a lot of time saying, ‘You don’t have control of that; what do you want without your spouse?”

By the end of the weekend retreat,the individuals see that they need to make themselves whole and make improvements on themselves. And thenext thing she knows, the betrayed and his or her spouse are signing up for couples’ seminars.

She said that betrayed spouses havethe tendency to obsess over saving the marriage at first — but this comes across as needy. When they finally reach the“aha” moment and realize they cannot control their spouses’ behavior, more often than not there is a positive change in the other person, she said.

Her book is called “My Husband’s Aff air Became the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me” because her husband’s affair forced her to realize that she had to build herself up independently of her spouse. Once she began to do that, her marriage improved.

Jane, the leader of Toledo’s chapter, said Bercht’s story helped her and now she wants to help others.

“I want people to know that this happens far too regularly in our society and there is a process to go through,” she said. “Th \ere are people out there that care in a nonjudgmental way.”

Contact Toledo’s BAN at [email protected]. Jane is open to questions and/or inquiries as to how and where to join the group.

‘For the Birds’ exhibit is Toledo Museum of Art’s homage to birdwatching

By
Caitlin McGlade
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John James Audubon's depiction of a Whistling Swan. Courtesy Toledo Museum of Art.

The sound of about 100 birds chirping, cooing, squawking and singing will call visitors into Gallery 18 of the Toledo Museum of Art  now through Sept. 2, 2012.

The exhibit “For the Birds” is an ode to songbirds and other species as they migrate north from Central America and the Caribbean, stopping along the south shore of Lake Erie to restore energy along the way. Bird lovers come out in droves to witness their landing in Northwest Ohio.

Shortly after Museum Director Brian Kennedy moved to Toledo he discovered the bird action along the lake. Fascinated by the wide array of people who turned out to witness the bird migration, Kennedy said he saw the experience as something “extraordinary to our area.”
To capture that local flair, most of the artwork in the gallery depicts birds that are native to the region or have been spotted here during the migration. A recording that loops bird noises captures the sounds from birds that inhabit the area or have been seen here.

Curator Paula Reich collected the work of 12 different artists for the show. She found most of the pieces within the museum’s own collection, but also brought in prints from local private owners.

When you enter from Monroe Street, the fi rst wall to the right exhibits the “The Garden of Eden,” by Isaak van Oosten. The 17th century oil painting sets a forest scene filled with wild animals, detailed with at least 45 species of birds perching on tree limbs, floating in a pond or standing on land.

“It was a time period when people were becoming really fascinated with the natural world because of the exploration of the New World,” Reich said.

Just next to van Oosten’s piece are the hand-colored lithographs of John Gould, a British ornithologist known for helping Charles Darwin identify birds he found inthe Galapagos  Islands.

The five Gould prints belong to Toledoans Nancy and David Kelly. The pair have been avid bird watchers for decades. Years ago when Nancy was bargain hunting through secondhand stores, she found a copy of a Gould print. She read up on the artist and learned about his importance throughout history. She was hooked. She was determined to find originals. She and David have collected at least 15 works by Gould.

“It is not only the subject of the birds we’re interested in; they are artistically done,” she said. “They are a good balance of botanical as well as ornithological presentation and he had an eye for giving a sense of bird habitat.”

The back wall of the gallery includes another artist who labored to perfect habitat: John James Audubon. His depictions of finches, cranes, herons and others are etched with a keen attention to scientific detail.

The other artists’ renditions of birds are less science-oriented.

Ohara Koson, a Japanese artist who lived from 1877–1945, was a master of woodblock printing. His bird artwork pairs the animals with various plants or berries, soaked in contrasting colors that pop from the frame.

Along the adjacent wall, American artist George Benson’s etches are displayed. His pieces  are in dark, black-and-white shades. One simply depicts a small bird standing alone.

Two glass cases sit in the center of the room, one of which features etchings of goldfinches by Pablo Picasso. The etchings are part of a special edition volume of a natural history book, originally published by Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon.

Brochures encourage museum-goers to look for birds within art throughout the museum.

“There’s a constant intrigue at their fleeting nature; they’re there one minute, they’re gone the next,” Kennedy said. “But also they can do something I think humans would love
to do be able to do — just take off and view the landscape from on high — it’s wonderfully, pun intended, uplifting. It’s inspiring.”

Garden Party for the Birds to unveil 200-foot mural

By
Dock David Treece
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Manos Community Garden will host a Garden Party for the Birds on May 4, 2012. Starting at 11 a.m., the party will dedicate the garden and unveil a 200-foot-long mural completed by seven artists.

The garden is at Jackson and 14th streets behind Manhattan’s.
The dedication to Manos Paschalis, who owns the garden, will commence first. Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur will be present.

The agencies and organizations involved in the garden, including Toledo GROWs, The Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the Lucas County Board of Developmental Disabilities will thank her for helping to bring funding to the garden.

At noon, those who attend can meet the artists who completed the mural. Toledo School for the Arts’ Steel Drum Band will perform from 12:30–1:30 p.m.
Th e organizers will give out free “Celebrate Urban Birds” kits and posters and off er a drawing for free bird feeders.

The day also signals the kickoff of the community garden growing season with Toledo GROWs.

Miller: Born to Run

By
Michael Miller
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Bruce Springsteen is 62 years old but during his April 17, 2012, concert at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, he displayed the energy and athleticism of a man in his 20s.

The three-hour show often resembled a church service in its intensity and the 20,000-member audience’s call-and-response fervor. There was no intermission and Springsteen only left the stage to wander into the crowd to interact with fans, dance and carry one girl to the stage.

At one point, he fell back into the standing-room-only floor area so fans could help him body surf back to the stage.

At this point in his life and career, Springsteen could be forgiven for slowing down, for focusing on studio work and easing away from the punishing rigors of touring. But he is living up to the title of the current “Wrecking Ball” tour, leading more than a dozen musicians through two-dozen songs, including such rockers as “E Street Shuffle,” “Light of Day,” an Apollo/soul music medley and an encore that pounded through five songs, including “Born to Run,” “Dancing in the Dark” and “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out.”

For decades, Springsteen has set the standard for the onstage rock ‘n’ roll work ethic, and if the April 17 concert is any indication, it’s a title he won’t soon relinquish.

That famous Springsteen work ethic could serve as a lesson for at least two local people, who chose to abandon their posts and a co-worker at Westfield Franklin Park Mall on April 7.

Our family traditions for Easter include taking our 3- and 5-year-old sons to the Easter Bunny Train in Blissfield. It’s a slow, fun experience, an hour or so riding the passenger train as the Easter Bunny visits the children for pictures. But this year, dad wasn’t on top of the calendar and we missed the opportunity.

My wife and I planned to take the kids to our Lenawee County mall, but weekends melted away and we found ourselves on April 7, the day before Easter, without the annual photo opportunity. It became complicated when we learned our local mall did not host an Easter Bunny this year. It seems to me that a family shopping mall that doesn’t host the Easter Bunny has all but given up, but it’s more proof that the economy is hurting everyone.

As if anyone needs more proof.

We had business in Toledo on April 7, so we planned to swing by Westfield at the end of the day to take the boys to see the Easter Bunny. My guess is this trip means more to my wife and me than it does to the boys, who were excited but not pressing the issue.

The bunny was scheduled to be at the Macy’s court until 9 p.m. We arrived at around 6 p.m. to see two very long lines stretching through that wing of the mall. One was for two Notre Dame football players who were signing items at a sports memorabilia store. The other contained about 30 families (not 30 people, 30 families) winding around the court where the Easter Bunny sat while one person took photos and one person processed orders.

We took our place in line, which moved slowly but steadily enough to offer the illusion of forward motion. We were about nine families from our turn when the bunny
stood up and walked to one of the people working. They quickly conferred and then hurried toward an employee exit by the sports memorabilia store.

By this time it was close to 7 p.m. and there were close to 50 families in line. There were some murmurs as the bunny left , but the grown-ups in my area theorized about potty breaks and how hot and uncomfortable it must be for the Easter Bunny as he took photos with kids.

But after about 15 minutes with no bunny in sight, the murmuring grew to a rumble. I approached the young woman who was taking photos and quietly asked if the bunny was OK.

“They quit and walked out,” she said.

The woman told me that the long lines had freaked out her helpers and that both of them had just quit and left . She was professional and relatively calm as she told me the mall was securing a new bunny and her sister was coming in to help.

Before too much longer, the bunny reappeared, took his seat and the photo-taking process resumed.

I was angry at the defectors. Not because of any great personal aff ront or major inconvenience, but with the idea that two people could flee from their commitments and leave 50- plus families with young children standing in the mall on the night before the holiday.

What exactly were they stressed about? The Easter Bunny is not Santa Claus, who has to talk and listen and interact with children. The Easter Bunny sits there with his big lifeless eyes, nods his furry head, sits still for a photo, hands out a piece of chocolate and repeats the process. How selfish and irresponsible does one have to be to quit a job that has fewer  than two hours left , while hundreds of people stand waiting?

There’s no claim that their job is a laugh a minute or supercushy, but as someone who has earned money washing dishes, shoveling dirt, stacking boxes and through just about every other minimum wage gig, it’s infuriating that two people could abandon their duties with no thought to of the consequences.

You make a commitment, you fulfill the commitment. That’s work ethic.

If the bunny bounders at Westfield have no more sense of self-respect and responsibility than they displayed April 7, they’re not fit to carry a guitar case for Springsteen, much less be trusted with the lessons of his hard-working legacy. ✯

Michael S. Miller is editor in chief of Toledo Free Press and Toledo Free Press Star.

Bluesman Ellis to ‘Speak No Evil’ at Evolution

By
Toledo Free Press
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Tinsley Ellis -- Photo by Flournoy Holmes

After watching The Beatles on “The Ed Sullivan Show,” 8-year-old Tinsley Ellis begged his parents for a guitar. But it was the King of the Blues who made him want to really learn to play.

“I was really into the music of the British invasion, like The Animals and The Yardbirds, Rolling Stones — they always talked about B.B. King,” Ellis said. “And an older guy said, ‘Well, if you like that bluesy kind of music and that twangy guitar, you need to check out B.B. King.’ And I said, ‘What is a B.B. King?’

“And around the time I was asking that question, [King] came and played at a hotel in North Miami Beach where I grew up in south Florida and did a teen show,” he recalled. “Mr. King did an hourlong set for kids. And I actually got a chance to meet him, and it just knocked me out. It floored me the way he would sing and then he would imitate with the guitar playing — the guitar playing was sort of a musical interpretation of the words.”

As if meeting a legend wasn’t inspiring enough, the 14-year-old took home a piece of the show.

Tinsley Ellis

“[King] was playing Lucille and bearing down on [his guitar], and his E string popped. We were in the front row, so we reached up and got that string and divided it amongst us, as kids do, and I’m the only one who kept the string,” Ellis said during a call from his Atlanta home.

Since his 1988 Alligator Records debut, “Georgia Blue,” the electrifying guitar slinger and his searing style have earned quite the reputation. Rolling Stone compared him to Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck. And he even toured with King.

The singer-songwriter will play an 8 p.m. concert May 6, 2012, at Evolution, 519 N. Reynolds Road. Tickets are $18 and $15 for Black Swamp Blues Society members.

“We count on these blues societies like the Black Swamp Blues Society to keep us on the road and to keep their members — new members and prospective members — aware that we are even coming to town. This will be a good night,” he said.

Ellis will play songs from his 2009 disc, “Speak No Evil.”

“The themes of blues songs are timeless,” the 54-year-old said. “People are always going to be losing jobs; there’s always going to be taxes; people are always going to be breaking up with their loved ones; people die — those are the themes of the blues.”

That said, Ellis aspires to take people away from their worries.

“I hope they leave the show with the feeling that they’ve had some relief. We need relief; we need the kind of relief that doesn’t leave you with a hangover, unless it’s a blues hangover.”

D. Michael Collins: Rainy days and Mondays

By
D. Michael Collins
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The tornado siren goes off and if you are like many Toledo-area residents, you’ll head to the basement or an interior room while awaiting more details on the storm. If you are one of the thousands of area residents who live in a manufactured home park, the tornado warning advises you to leave your home and take immediate shelter.

Where do you seek shelter?

The United States has the highest occurrence of tornadoes in the world, with more than 800 tornadoes reported each year. In Ohio, more than 200 tornadoes have been reported during the past decade.

In 2010, I was first approached by residents of a manufactured home park and asked that question. It is one I have asked members of the Mayor Mike Bell administration in 2010, in 2011 and again in 2012. Receiving no response as to what is the suggested safety plan for the residents of nearly 30 manufactured home parks in Toledo, as chair of Public Safety, Law & Criminal Justice, I held a hearing on Monday, April 23.

Residents of manufactured homes are at an increased risk during severe weather. In 2005, Harold Brooks, a National Weather Service research meteorologist, said mobile home residents are between 15 and 20 percent more likely to die in a tornado than people living in wood-frame houses.

The purpose of the hearing was to discover if the City of Toledo had a plan for residents of manufactured home parks that included suggested shelters; Lucas County Emergency Management Services and the Lucas County Sheriff’s Office were also invited to the hearing.

None of the Toledo safety forces administrators invited to the hearing chose to attend. Major John Tharp of the Lucas County Sheriff’s Office and Joe Walter of Lucas County Emergency Management Service did attend.

D. Michael Collins

Shirley Green, safety director for the City of Toledo, stated in an April 20 email that neither she, Fire and Rescue Chief Luis Santiago nor Police Chief Derrick Diggs would attend the April 23 hearing, “As a matter of protocol concerning tornado events, we (TPD and TFRD) continue to implement and follow the process established by the Lucas County Emergency Operations Plan.”

On April 21, I requested a copy of that process be provided prior to the hearing. It was not provided.

Manufactured home parks are regulated by the state, which means it would be difficult for Toledo to regulate what type of safe shelters must be provided. While  states like Minnesota require manufactured home parks to have storm shelters, Ohio does not.

Discussions could take place about what funding options exist. At least two manufactured home parks in other parts of Ohio received FEMA funding for storm shelters.

Spending taxpayer dollars on shelters was not a suggestion, nor is it something I advocate. I do support Councilman Rob Ludeman’s suggestion of exploring what type of tax incentives or insurance incentives exist for owners of manufactured home parks who provide shelters.

I wanted to stress the public information aspect and encourage residents to know weather terminology. According to Impact Forecasting:

A tornado watch is issued when meteorologists believe conditions are favorable for the formation of severe weather and tornadoes. At this time you should be going over your tornado safety rules and keeping abreast of the weather conditions via television, radio or NOAA radio.

A tornado warning is issued when a tornado has been spotted or weather radar indicates a developing tornado. When a tornado warning is issued, head to a tornado-safe place, such as a basement or interior room.

Possible safe shelter locations exist in our community for residents of manufactured homes and for others in our community who are not at home or who live in a home they feel is not safe during a tornado. However, if the Public Safety administration in Toledo does not work with Lucas County and the community to explore how we come up with those safe shelter locations and to publicize what options our residents have when severe weather threatens — the question asked two years ago will keep being asked.

“There’s a tornado coming — where do I seek safe shelter?”

 

D. Michael Collins was the Toledo City Councilman for District 2 and the chair of Council’s Public Safety, Law & Criminal Justice committee. He defeated Mike Bell in the 2014 mayor’s race and died in office in 2015.

Kuron (1812): O Canada, you stood on guard for thee

By
Frank Kuron
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We Americans often tease our northern neighbors for their relative passivity, but how many of you knew that they fought alongside the British and Native Americans in the War of 1812, eh? One such distinguished Canadian was John Richardson, a “gentleman volunteer.” His adventures throughout our Northwest Territory are both amusing and insightful.

Although he became Canada’s earliest esteemed man of literature, Richardson despised structured schooling in his hometown of Amherstburg. He often dreamt of running away to escape its rigors, and, but for the fear of a stern father’s retribution, he would have followed through on his fantasy. He noted, “It was therefore, a day of rejoicing to me when the commencement of hostilities on the part of the United States proved the signal of the ‘break up’ of the school.” Thus his transition from student to soldier began at age 15.

One of his first and fondest thrills occurred in August 1812, when he was selected to raise the British colors over Fort Detroit after helping to defeat U.S. Gen. Hull’s forces. This privilege, at such a young age, ignited his patriotism. Richardson’s military career would span the next 25 years and through it he would weave his extensive writing profession as well.

In January 1813, he found himself along the Raisin River in Monroe, Mich. The night before that battle, someone took advantage of young Richardson by switching the working firelock on his musket with a faulty one. He relates that in the midst of combat, “It flashed in the pan, I tried it again, and again it flashed. I never was so vexed – to think that I was exposed to the torrent of fire from the enemy without having the power to return a single shot, quite disconcerted the economy of my pericranium.” I told you he was an academic.

Soon Richardson was among those storming U.S. Col. Dudley’s men across from Perrysburg’s Fort Meigs. Twenty-seven years later he revisited the site for William Harrison’s presidential rally. Among 40,000 revelers, Richardson was the lone Canadian representative and was flattered to be received by Harrison “in that spirit of true and generous courtesy which is ever characteristic of the soldier.”

Back in the War of 1812, Richardson’s next stop was Fort Stephenson in Fremont, Ohio. As that moonlit attack wound down, he found himself isolated after lying for hours in a muddy ravine near the fort. Surmising that the rest of his troops had withdrawn, he did likewise. “I stumbled over the dead body of a soldier … the noise occasioned by my fall put the enemy once more on alert … not an individual, save myself, was exposed to their aim … although the balls whistled round my ears in every direction, and hissed through the long grass … I did not sustain the slightest injury … I found that my retreat had been well-timed, for the troops were already in motion toward the boats.” As Richardson collapsed into his departing vessel, he discovered a bottle of port wine that gave him “the most delicious moments of repose I recollect ever having experienced.”

Richardson returned to Canada fighting in the Battle of the Thames near Chatham, Ontario. Here, just moments into the conflict, the British and Canadians were taken prisoners. He explains, “A strong body of U.S. cavalry (was) coming toward us. At the head was a stout elderly man who galloped forward; and brandishing his sword over his head, cried out with stentorian lungs ‘Surrender, surrender, it’s no use resisting, all your people are taken, and you had better surrender.’” Richardson did; but not before he buried his musket into the deep mud as an act of sentimental defiance.

Richardson was marched to Frankfort, Ky., and imprisoned, returning to his Canadian homeland a year later. Despite his stellar military career and prolific writing, Richardson spent the rest of his life as a man of culture, living on the wages of a peasant. His fame arrived post-mortem. Sadly, just days before his death, he was overheard telling his lone friend, “Hector, we must part or starve,” and indeed his dog was sold in order to purchase his last meals.

Richardson’s books are still available and many provide a clear window into the history of this era.

Frank Kuron is author of the War of 1812 book, “Thus Fell Tecumseh.” Email him at [email protected].

Birding week to draw 64,000 to NW Ohio

By
John McCartney
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Prothonotary warbler -- photo courtesy Black Swamp Bird Observatory

An expected 64,000 visitors will flock to Northwest Ohio for “The Biggest Week in American Birding” festival, May 4-13, 2012, in Oregon and Port Clinton.

People from all over the world attend, according to Kim Kaufman, executive director of Black Swamp Bird Observatory in Port Clinton and festival director. Last year, Kaufman said, visitors came from as far away as Spain and Australia.

“The reach of this place is huge,” she said. “This wildlife area has become the most iconic area in birding in the Western Hemisphere.”

The birding festival’s headquarters will be at Maumee Bay Lodge and Conference Center, 1750 State Park Road No. 2, Oregon, on Lake Erie about 15 minutes from Downtown Toledo.

The festival, organized by Black Swamp Bird Observatory, is expected to generate close to $30 million for the Northwest Ohio economy, Kaufman said.

The entire area will enjoy the benefits of the birding festival, said Larry Fletcher, executive director of the Lake Erie Shores and Islands Welcome Center in Port Clinton.

“Indirectly, everyone benefits because of how tourism dollars trickle down into the economy,” Fletcher said. “People may come here for the festival in May and find out other things to do in the area, and then return later in the year. People who come here find so many other events and attractions, like the islands and the beaches, to see and return to. This area has a high concentration of family fun and recreation in a relatively small area.”

In 2011, bird watchers, commonly called “birders,” reported seeing 234 species of birds during the festival; expectations this year are for 225 species.

Kenn Kaufman, one of the world’s most renowned bird experts and keynote speaker for the birding festival, believes local residents should take an interest in birding.

“It won’t increase your income, but it makes the world more three-dimensional,” he said. “It makes life more interesting to know what’s going on. Birds live fascinating lives. Knowing about birds captures the imagination.”

Festival birders will be served by more than 200 volunteers, including 55 professional guides, who will give guided walks from dawn to dusk, Kim Kaufman said. She said what she “loves so much about this area is the amount of diversity in the people I see here. This has become a melting pot of all different kinds of people.”

Kenn Kaufman said he has known birders as young as 9 and as old as 90.

“The best birders are people who are aware, have a natural curiosity about things, have active minds, want to know ‘What’s up with that?’” he said. “The best birders are friendly, open-minded, accepting, willing to use all of their senses and can watch and listen well.”

The festival will close with the celebration of International Migratory Bird Day, May 12, with a Silent Auction for Conservation scheduled at Black Swamp Bird Observatory. In 2011, the silent auction raised $20,000 for bird research, education and conservation in Northwest Ohio. Kim Kaufman said she expects to generate another $20,000 this year.

The festival takes place in Northwest Ohio because it is the best place to witness spring migration of songbirds in North America, Kenn Kaufman said. The southern edge of Lake Erie acts as a barrier that birds are reluctant to cross during migration.

The birds tend to “pile up” in the woodlots surrounded by marshland on the lake’s southern edge to rest and refuel before crossing the lake. The timing of their arrival is early enough in spring that the trees have few leaves, there are no bugs and the birds fly incredibly low.

Festival workshops will be held morning, afternoon and evening from May 4-11, and range in price from free to $40 per workshop.

Participants are encouraged to register online. A 44-page downloadable PDF document that outlines the schedule of events is available online. The website’s home page has 30 links where someone can explore all the festival’s events and opportunities and find answers to almost any question, Kim Kaufman said.

The website address is biggestweekinamericanbirding.com.

Local residents are encouraged to attend. They do not have to preregister for events like guided bird walks, family/beginner bird walks and shoreland and waterbird bird walks.

“Someone who lives here locally may be interested to know that people would travel so far just for these birds,” Kenn Kaufman said. “It implies that there’s something special here. Just come out. Birders are friendly, and you’re likely to get caught up in it.”

Ready U to address harvesting, storing garden produce

By
Erin Holden
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Spring planting season is just around the corner, but an upcoming Ready U session will help area gardeners think ahead to harvest time, including safe handling of produce and what to do with an overabundant crop.

Directed toward home and community gardeners, “Using Your Victory Garden” will focus on food safety tips for the garden and kitchen as well as food preservation options, said Lee Richter, program assistant in urban horticulture with the Ohio State University Extension office in Lucas County. Also presenting will be Patrice Powers-Barker, program assistant in family and consumer science with the OSU Extension office.

The free, hour-long session is set for 7 p.m. April 30, 2012, at The Andersons Activity Room, 1833 S. Holland-Sylvania Road in Maumee. The presentation will be the final Ready U event of the season.

Ready U, a yearlong series presented by the Red Cross of Greater Toledo and the Lucas County Emergency Management Agency, is designed to educate the public and prepare individuals and families for potential emergencies in Northwest Ohio.

“It certainly is that time of year when everyone is getting excited about vegetable gardening,” Powers-Barker said. “We’ll be looking a little at what’s going on immediately as well as what will be happening a few months out.”

Richter will share tips on food safety and preparation, while Powers-Barker will discuss preservation options, including canning, drying and freezing.

The session will cover the basics and discuss community resources where gardeners can find more in-depth information and instruction.

“We just want to give an overview so people can decide what will work best for their own gardens and kitchens,” Powers-Barker said.

One safety tip, for example, is to always wash your hands before handling plants or produce in a garden, Richter said.

“People don’t think before they go out to work in the garden they should wash their hands, but it’s really important,” Richter said. “Making sure of sanitation and cleanliness, even when working in a garden, is very important, especially when harvesting.”

Smokers, for example, can spread a virus called tobacco mosaic virus to plants by touching them after smoking, Richter said.

Community gardeners are encouraged to bring a bucket of water, soap and towel to wash their hands before and after working in their plot, Richter said.

The session won’t be a tutorial in preservation methods, but rather a discussion of options, Powers-Barker said.

“If it’s a great year for tomatoes, what are you going to do with all those? We will talk about where to share them if you want to donate, ways to prepare them fresh and also preservation,” Powers-Barker said. “We can’t cover everything, because there’s a different between canning green beans and canning tomatoes. It really depends on people’s interests and what they will be preserving, but we will offer an overview and show people where resources are for more information.”

The OSU Extension office promotes gardening as a healthy alternative to fast food and an inexpensive alternative to purchasing produce, Richter said. One of its main functions is connecting local gardeners with community resources.

“Our main purpose is to make people’s lives easier when trying to find answers to questions,” Richter said.

One resource is the Extension’s horticulture hotline, staffed 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday. At other times, callers can leave a message that will be returned. The number is (419) 578-6783.

Toledo Free Press is a media sponsor for the Ready U program.

Ready U kits containing emergency preparedness materials as well as smoke detectors will be given to the first 50 attendees, said Red Cross Communications Officer Jason Copsey.

For more information, visit ready-u.com.

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