Did I Poison Myself?

The Upper Basin Chronicles

Chapter 24

Did I Poison Myself?

Owen Murphy walked slowly from the back door of the farmhouse. He labored down the steps, and rested against the old hand pump over the kitchen well. He felt tired. He wondered if he would have fallen had he not leaned against the pump. His vision clouded. His head buzzed. He felt faint. Teresa told him daily, "Son, don't get excited, just rest a minute." This pained Owen a great deal. He missed being out with the men in the fields, haying and hauling oats, loading and unloading, feeling the turn of the tractor steering knob in his hand, smelling fresh earth, new hay, dusty grain. He missed wiping the real sweat of hard work from his forehead with a worn blue or red bandanna. He missed drinking deeply of the cool water from this very well...

Even though the family did not drink this water any more, the well still pumped clear and the water smelled good. The creak and clank of the pump as someone began to work the long curved handle reminded him of his younger days. Fetching water in the mornings, winter and summer, was his sole responsibility as a six and seven year-old, at least until his younger sister Lucille took over. Lucille was gone now. She died ten years ago of lung cancer in Minneapolis. She smoked, worked in an office, and never married, Owen recalled.

Alexander had the well tested when his wife, Marie, was pregnant with baby Lucy. The test came back with levels of nitrates too high to drink, and traces of atrazine enough to make his son say, "No way we're drinking this water any more, Dad." That was a sad day. Owen felt like he'd lost an old friend, had been betrayed. They still used the water for washing up, and for the flowers. The old pump rarely creaked now, except when Teresa watered the outside flower pots with her watering can. The other well, the deep well, drilled in the dry year of 1956, supplied the family with water for cooking and drinking, bathing, for the vegetable garden, and septic system. It also watered any livestock they fed. For awhile, during Marie's last pregnancy, Alexander considered having the creamery truck haul water from town. Instead, he put a dual filtration system in the house, and changed the filters vigilantly.

"Good thing, but maybe too late for me," Owen said. The afternoon, though cloudy, did not seem to promise rain. Owen was thirsty. He felt nauseous. Funny thing was that he was actually feeling better! The chemotherapy treatments in Iowa City really clobbered him. Just a couple of more to go and that would do it for this round. He wondered if he would survive the next pound of cure. When Dr. Fishman diagnosed Owen's cancer last winter as non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Alexander practically lived in the library for three days researching the disease.

"Dad," Alexander said, "non-Hodgkin's, or NHL, is a farmer's disease. A study in Nebraska first linked it to nitrates in water. Other studies show a link to pesticides and herbicides, like atrazine, but the federal environmental guys at EPA aren't totally convinced on that one, yet. The librarian showed me internet maps from the National Cancer Institute. NHL has doubled in white males since the corn boom began. I'm sorry it got you. But we gotta fight this, ok? We'll get you through it."

That was months ago, and they fought on yet. He'd lost weight. His hair was gone, but it might come back, if he lasted, anyway. He hadn't the strength to play the fiddle anymore. In fact, he spent most of his time in his chair, or lying on the couch. It was a godawful, boring existence. Except for Teresa nursing him through the vomit, Owen figured he would have given up. But then little Lucy would come toddling over, bringing him a book to read to her, and he would rally. He wanted to watch young Michael play another soccer game, too.

As he pushed away from the old pump, still unable to reach down to work the handle, Owen suddenly thought about the nearly 75 years he'd drunk from that well. About the weeks he'd spent spreading dry nitrogen fertilizer, working for the co-op many springs. About not wearing gloves or other protection when he mixed sprays over by the deep well. About all the times he turned downwind of his spray rig. Did I poison myself over time, he wondered. It seemed so.

"Owen, where are you?" Teresa called from the kitchen. "There's lemonade and cookies. Come sit down."

Owen Murphy turned and shuffled toward the back steps. A glass of lemonade and an oatmeal cookie, now there's something worth living for.

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Next week... "Sailing 'Round a Wetland Sea'," Chapter 25.

The Upper Basin Chronicles, Chapter 24 was written and edited by John Gabbert.

Resources:

Link to the National Cancer Institute's interactive map server per cancer type:
http://bc3.mapinfo.com/scripts/hsrun.exe/distributed/nci/mapxtreme.htx;start=hs_nci

Cancer Facts, National Cancer Institute, Nitrate in Drinking Water Associated with Increased Risk for Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma

Comments? Email feedback to The Upper Basin Chronicles, Chapter 24.

The characters presented here are purely fictional, and neither bear resemblance to persons living or dead, nor represent the views or opinions of Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota.