Cancel the Tour Guide

I called the Baxter 800 number this week to place my monthly order for dialysis solution and supplies. One of the many new hats one wears as a kidney dialysis patient is shipping and receiving clerk.

Baxter provides you with a handy-dandy order pad, and every month you're supposed to do an inventory count of the cases of "Low Calcium Peritoneal Dialysis Solution With 1.5% Dextrose" and related equipment (like tubes, bags, masks, catheter caps) you have on hand, estimate how many more you'll need over the next 30 days, then phone in your order to Baxter.

I have determined that I am horrible at this. It's really hard to look at 30 cases of anything stacked up against a wall in your home, then call somebody and exclaim, "What the heck – send me 30 more!" But because it takes about two weeks for Baxter to process the order and get that mile-long delivery truck of theirs to your door, you have to think in abstract terms of what won't be there in two weeks, not what you see with your lyin' eyes.

Fortunately, the Baxter operators who take your order have gone through this process a few times before – in the previous 15 minutes, most likely – and are unfailingly helpful, cheerful and experienced. (I know that sounds like a commercial for Baxter, but it's true; believe me, if I ever have to deal with some stereotypical order-processing doodyhead, I will tell you about it.)

At any rate, as I'm going over the supplies in house to confirm this month's order, I glance at the words printed in the corner of one of the boxes: "Baxter Healthcare Corporation, Deerfield, IL."

Deerfield! I'm living currently in Decatur, Ill. Geobytes.com says the two cities are only 170 miles apart! (Out here on the prairie, people drive 100-plus miles between towns like they were going to the corner store for a cherry slush.) Maybe I can wangle a tour of Baxter headquarters! Suddenly I have visions of giant vats of "Low Calcium Peritoneal Dialysis Solution" being squeezed into the plastic bags I use when it's time for my kidneys' daily rinse cycle, and sterile tubes carefully being connected to the bags by happy, mask-wearing employees. Look! They're whistling while they work!

The next sound you hear is my thought balloon being popped. "Oh, we don't produce any of the materials here," the cheerful operator informs me. "We just take our customers' orders in this location."

Drat. They probably don't even wear masks while they do it. I'd still like to take a Baxter tour someday, but rows of operators chatting on headsets is not quite the impressive vision I had imagined. As long as I don't find out someday that the solution that rumbles around in my body isn't being manufactured in China or Uzbekistan, I'll still be pretty geeked for a day trip to Deerfield. Did you know the Irish settlers originally wanted to name the village "Erin," but lost out to the "Deerfield" faction by four votes?

No, I didn't think you did.

The End of the Road

I'm writing this entry from the sunroom of a lovely little house at the end of a short road on the outskirts of Decatur, Ill., (home of Archer Daniels Midland, "Supermarket to the World"). There are deep woods next door and behind the house, and cornfields are not far away. Around these parts, they are never far away. This isn't exactly the end of the world, but you can see it from here.

This is my in-laws' home, and it soon will be ours as well: After considerable prayer, discussion and rumination, Karen and I have decided to leave our place in Champaign, Ill., and move 50 miles west to Decatur to help my in-laws, Larry and Linda, co-parent the 9-year-old twin girls they have raised practically since birth, Emma and Madison. A drive-in garage has been converted into a new bedroom and walk-in closet, and Karen and I will set up the downstairs as our separate home. (She's writing a blog of her own about the experience, called Love Nest on the Prairie; you can read it at http://lovenestontheprairie.blogspot.com/ )

Emma and Maddie are typical 9-year-old girls; rambunctious, curious, chatterboxy. My in-laws are...well, nine years older than when they began parenting their second generation of children. Karen and I are committed to serving as the buffer, the DMZ for the well-being of both sides.

For someone who spent three decades amid the bustle and big-city energy of Detroit (which, despite what you continue to hear and read, is a wonderful city), this is the definition of culture shock. I remember the first time I went to visit Karen in Champaign and asked her about the large flat field next to her gated community. "Are they planning an expansion?" I wondered. "No, silly," she replied. "That's where the corn will grow." Stranger in a strange land, come in.

I feel far removed from the life I grew to know and appreciate, but the more I think about it, that may be why I'm here. I'm a firm believer in the will of God and that everything happens for a reason. Here, in this quiet and tranquil place, my body may be relieved of the everyday stress that urban living inflicts, and thus aid in my kidney preservation and overall health. When the loudest noise you're likely to hear is the spontaneous giggling of children, the end of the road feels like a very good place to be.

The precious reasons I'm moving: Emma, and Madison with me on Gull Lake.