Enjoy it while you can, ….

Enjoy it while you can, It won’t last. I’m talking about the weather and since I can’t do anything with the lack of rain, I sure can enjoy the bright, sunny days. I’ve found a nice shady spot right out in front of the Rehab Center.

I was telling this to Jackie this morning and she agreed by saying how terrible it was last December, but we lived through it. And that might be true now as we have already hit the halfway mark in June.

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Last week’s TRG had a story about the new Loyal ambulance. Quite a contrast from the time Loyal was buying their first. Seems like I got right in the middle of it. It seemed like everyone was buying one, but a couple of the city council members felt that having one in Neillsville was good enough.

Every Friday I would make ad calls in Spencer, which took me into Nall’s Electronics. To say Lorrin Nall was the top authority would be putting it mildly. Not only was he the head of the ambulance; he was fire chief as well.

Then I would attend the Spencer Village Board on Monday nights with Loyal City Council on Tuesdays. Naturally these things got talked about. Somehow I never could remember I was just a reporter and got involved in the discussion.

Our state assemblyman at the time was Gene Oberle from the Stanley area, but a Clark County resident. I think it was at some veteran meeting or affair when naturally we got to talking about it. He offered some help.

A few months later, it came up at the city council and someone turned to me and kind of pointed a finger, saying it was my fault nothing was being done.

So I called Gene and he arranged a meeting with the new state safety coordinator, a man by the name of John Ratzcliff. Dennis Cook and city clerk Lawrence Davel went along. We got to Ratzcliff’s office and found a guy with his feet up on his desk.

We told him why we were there and he sat right up and said sure, he could help. As it turned out, our ambulance would be the 100th purchased under the new program. Naturally, that called for a celebration. We had lunch at the Star Lodge Motel. Ratzcliff came and all the new ambulance crew members were there. Somewhere there is still a picture of the whole crew.

It was something new and would be completely different from the fire department. The ambulance crew had to identify the crew and the shift they would service. Nothing like that has ever been demanded of the fire department, and I think at the beginning they didn’t get paid. I’m checking that out. I found out they did get paid, but only when going on a run.

I even took a ride in it one night. It was the Fourth of July coming up and I wanted to get the lawn mowed at the office. The combination of cheap tennis shoes and dew on the grass didn’t work on the hill behind the TRG office. Thankfully, I never sharpened the blade, so only got a broken foot with some cuts on it and not the whole foot cut off.

The whole idea behind the program is to help buy ambulances. You could live in a community with the best ambulance crew in the world. But once you leave, or had left, you were at the mercy of the leaders in that community. Did they care about serving their fellow man, or was it everyone for themselves?

There were and are some great, caring, talented people. Then there are people like me that can faint at the simple mention of the word “blood.” I recall one day we were having lunch at the old Amber Inn. Somehow we got on the subject and the next thing I remember I was toppling off my chair.

Someone yelled, “Bob Berglund is having a heart attack!” and someone else screamed, “Oh no, the ambulance is out of town right now.” I did recover rather quickly, but the lesson was learned. Don’t mention blood if I’m around.

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I still subscribe to the Medford Star News newspaper, although Mark has long since moved on from being a reporter or even living in the community. But I have taken to following their political battles and efforts to do more for less in county government.

Along with that I always read a column, “Wouldn’t It Be Nice …,” written by the editor, Brian Wilson. Especially after he tried to explain how he lost a wheel and tire one cold, snowy, windy winter day while driving down one of Taylor County’s highways. Or how a young man from a large family from New Jersey went to college and found himself working in the Northwoods, so to speak, in communities like Medford and Rib Lake.

One of his latest was one he called, “Expensive Lunch.” Seems they were looking for a good, cheap, reliable and oh yes, cheap used car. His son Alex will need it this summer when summer jobs roll around.

They were in luck as their daughter Beth knew someone who lived in Reedsburg and had more cars than his wife thought he needed. So off they went, Brian driving the new used car while Beth and Alex followed behind in their car.

On the way home they stopped at a fast food place, ordered, ate their food and were on the way again. Suddenly Beth started having a breathing problem that finally ended up with a stop at the emergency ward in a Wausau hospital. After several hours of IVs and other medical treatment they were on their way again, with a bill for $3,500 and some advice about not eating seafood again.

And my family thinks I’m dumb for not eating shrimp. I can point to my long life in part because I never touch it, and oh yes, broccoli.

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While I don’t know how much rain it was, we got some Saturday afternoon. Everything greened up a bit and I think it might have eased the thought of a full-scale drought.

Rain is something like snow. Wouldn’t it be nice if it only rained where and when needed? Not when a farmer has cut a whole bunch of hay or someone has an outdoor picnic planned.

Then in the winter it could snow on the snowmobile trails and the ski hills, but not on the highways where you have to drive. They always say people talk about the weather, but never do anything about it.