50+ Lifestyles

PUBLISHER’S CORNER

By Eloise Graham

Looking Forward into the Future While Reminiscing of the Past.

The month of January is named for the Roman god Janus. It is said he could see forward into the future while looking at the past. So we, too, must keep moving forward embracing the future while nostalgically remembering our times before.

Let me introduce you to Gary Heath, someone who boldly made a new beginning by moving into a retirement community during a pandemic.

Gary moved to the QCA, more specifically to Ridgecrest Retirement Village, from Clinton, Iowa, where he had been for 32 years. He was a professor of sociology and criminal justice at Mount St. Clare. In 2005, that institution became Ashford University. He continued teaching at Ashford until his retirement in 2016. While living in Clinton, he served one year as chair on the Clinton Human Rights Commission.

Gary attended the University of California at Berkeley earning his BA, MA, and PhD degrees. He moved to the Midwest in August 1969 to start a teaching career. He taught at Illinois State University at Normal, IL for 19 years. Leaving Illinois, he came to Clinton, Iowa in 1988 to teach Mount St. Clare College.

Gary lets his creative side shine through his love of words, forming them into poetic thoughts. His style is free-form with more of a rhythm rather than always a rhyme. He paints pictures with the words he uses.

Here is a poem he has entitled My Dad’s Pick-Up.

My Dad’s Pickup by Gary Heath

The ancient pickup that Dad

Used to haul wood sits out

Back, enduring the elements

Under the sprawling oak,

Spots of rust showing. We

Have it up for sale but it

Doesn’t sell. Who wants a

’52 Ford anyway and what

Could we get for it anyhow?

Each time I look out the

Kitchen window at the back

Acreage, I see us working the

Garden or splitting logs for

The fireplace, taking turns

With the maul, enjoying

Ourselves to the full, breaking

For iced tea Mom brings. The

Memory bites, bites hard.

What can I say? The pickup

Stays, monument to my Dad

As powerful as any ever built,

A monument I love to drive,

To replenish our fireplace, to

Burn memory bright.

It was on a recent December Sunday that he thought of his dad and the old truck, their time together. The memories became a poem. Another of his poems titled The Fish That Swam Away can be found on page 5.

Gary has also authored several academic books including Vandals in the Bomb Factory and a textbook The New Teacher published by Harper and Row.

Gary will be the Poet in Residence for 50+ Lifestyles. We hope you enjoy his way with words and his insights to living. So let us wax poetic as we embrace the moments of the past, giving us the excitement to move ahead into the New Year. Happy 2021.