Hope Yancey

October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month. The official 2011 theme for NDEAM, announced earlier this year by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy, is “Profit by Investing in Workers with Disabilities.”

The voice on the other end of the telephone starts out with something like, “It’s me, Grandma. Don’t you recognize my voice?” And there begins another scam designed to take advantage of a senior citizen. These crimes are not uncommon, unfortunately. We all read or watch news stories about older adults preyed upon by scammers, some of them losing their hard-earned savings, or personal property with financial and sentimental value. The circumstances of the crime may even place them in jeopardy of physical harm, if the scammer initiates any in-person contact as part of the con – perhaps the perpetrator accosts the victim in a parking lot, offering to accompany them to their home or bank. Or maybe they want to come in person to collect on whatever they’ve talked the victim into giving them over the phone.

Tomato plants have a particular smell. If you’ve planted them, you know. And there’s joy in tasting that first juicy tomato you’ve grown and placed on the kitchen counter to ripen. Better still? Letting it turn bright red on the vine and bringing it inside to rinse off and eat while it’s still warm from the sun. I’ve had a pretty decent crop of tomatoes, though they never got very large, just from the single Abe Lincoln heirloom seedling I grew in a big pot on the deck this year. I set it out thinking I’d be happy to get one tomato.

I observed my first Father’s Day without a father last month. In the past, I would have celebrated the day by sending him a funny card, buying a book or necktie, or inviting him for dinner or dessert – perhaps coconut pie, a favorite. Holidays stir memories and are often bittersweet times for people for a host of reasons, of which death is just one. It’s not something the culture is great at acknowledging yet. Still, you can seldom go wrong by saying to someone simply, “I’m thinking of you.”

If my calendar were a box of sharp crayons, I would toss out the wild watermelon, sea green and peach of the hot weather months and color my days with the granny smith apple, burnt sienna, copper and chestnut hues of fall. I start early keeping watch for signs of fall, an impatient countdown ritual that begins in June each year. Once the summer solstice has passed, I reassure myself the days will slowly be getting shorter.