My Cousin: David Charles Baker

A week ago today at his home in Salt Lake City, David was arrested after a most spectacular finale to several months (probably longer) of deteriorating mental health.  I didn't learn about the arrest until Tuesday evening but my sisters and I had become concerned when his endless stream of  YouTube rants and other online postings suddenly ceased.  The paranoia and delusions were so pronounced that I sometimes wondered if he was faking the whole thing-- running for president, talking with god, making bombs, threatening people with a sword cane, buying gloves that functioned as brass knuckles, vowing to get back at all the people who misused him-- and certainly it seemed that everyone misused him-- people in the post office, the bank, the gun and ammo store, the camera store, etc.

Here is a sample of his recent writing-- an email to his mother.

Re: Please send a check for $40,000 to MIKE "God" PROCTOR at Enginuity Automotive Services, Inc. 5926 Stratler Street Murray, UT 84107 (801) 268-0125 before he gets back on Tuesday

Inbox

x

David Charles Baker	Sep 15

O*M*G - and this is how my life goes all the time:

I went in to tell Mike the good news you'd be sending $40k and his daughter said he was like a little kid with the steel-knuckle gloves I sent him when he liked mine and had "just left minutes ago for his 40th wedding anniversary" in Elko. I was going to run out and tell him he was getting $1,000/year from y'all as a little wedding gift for being such a stand up guy he's been with the same woman for 40 years.

He really needs the money because he made the mistake of having a worthless son (Brad; sassed me so Mike canned him from his shop) who had a kid and doesn't want to care for it so poor Mike and his wife, at nearly Susan and Don's age, have to take in a teenager. 

My mother said she can "barely stand Janet and Andy's kids for even five minutes and was so glad" I never had kids. Imagine having to raise one of mine.

Thank you again for sending Mike the money. And isn't that a funny coincidence? It's almost like GOD INTENDED IT TO HAPPEN THAT WAY.

BTW, I said yesterday that Michael Proctor is God. So you know, since he's getting the money, it literally is like God intended. DO IT!

Oh, and I didn't go out to Elko as Kristy said she would kill me if I bothered God on his 40th anniversary and when the daughter of God tells you to do something, sometimes I do it ('cause she's super cute and in a bad marriage so I have a pretty good shot if Kelli approves; God has already given his blessing by saying how much he hates his son-in-law).

HOW DO YOU LIKE ME NOW, HATERS?

There are lots of details about his arrest on the internet and they are easy to find with a search.  His videos have received thousands of views, the picture of his arrest wearing a black sequined mini dress with cowl neckline and orange fun fur trim is everywhere as is his mug shot:

How did we get to this point?  I thought David was irrational a couple of years ago when he refused to provide DNA for genealogical purposes.  The reason given was that the government might discover that he had a rare, fatal and highly contagious disease and would therefore kill him to protect the human race.   I told him that the testing people did not need his name or even initials and that the genealogical test was very limited, but it  made no difference to him.  Then last summer (2011) two of his beloved dogs died and he seemed to go off the deep end.  My sisters and I talked and talked about the situation but always came to the conclusion that there was absolutely nothing we could do.  We all felt helpless, distressed and very sad.    

I am reminded of two lines of poetry (Edna St. Vincent Millay).

Having shook disaster till the fruit fell down

I feel tonight more happy and at east.

David spent his last day of freedom busily shaking disaster and the fruit did fall down.  It seems very clear that his escalating craziness was designed to provoke a response.  Does he feel more happy and at ease?  Did he need the legal system to help him stop a descent into madness that he couldn't escape on his own/  Did he hope or expect to be killed in the process?   A similar situation later in the week, also in Salt Lake City, ended with the death of a mentally disturbed man.  

As I wrote today to his mother, I may be naive in hoping that the several charges filed against him will be dropped in favor or inpatient psychiatric treatment.  In the meantime I think of him alone in custody-- no drugs, no computer, no dogs, no freedom.  Please let it be that some wise and kind person is trying to help him through this.

David in happier times.  He brought four black dogs to visit us in Maine and because he needed to sleep with all four (and his wife Kelli!) we gave him our bed.  

Clarence M. Baker: 1896 - 1950

Today, afflicted (or blessed) with a sudden fit of industry I began sorting the heaps on my desk.  The first thing I lighted upon was a picture of my grandfather, Clarence Baker and his high school graduating class.  I decided to write a letter and send it off to the Brandon Vermont Historical Society.  In the process I realized that by coincidence today is the 62nd anniversary of his death on September 25th 1950.  He died two months short of his 54th birthday.  The Vermont death certificate reads "Right sided heart failure duration 2 hours"  Contributing causes were noted as severe asthma and hypertensive heart disease.  Twenty five years less one day later, 24 September 1975, his widow, Madge Clark Baker, died.  The death certificate says "self-inflicted medication overdosage" caused by a "severe depression reaction".

I was not yet three years old when my grandfather died and I cannot remember him.  He was a mild man, henpecked according to my mother who was very fond of him.  He had a beautiful voice and was a soloist at church and in other venues.  He was a pillar of the community, an active member of the church, an optometrist with a practice in Brandon and a Freemason.  I have researched his ancestry back to Thomas Baker, the original immigrant to New England.  Thomas Baker (1638 - 1710) came to Massachusetts but soon left for Rhode Island.  A tailor by trade he later ordained as a Baptist minister and was pastor of the Kingston Rhode Island church from 1664 to 1710.

Clarence was in the Naval Reserve during World War I.  In this picture he looks very like his grandson and my brother, Brian Smith.

Clarence played the cornet and it was said that he played in John Philip Sousa's band but I have never confirmed this.  The instrument was passed down in our family and was briefly played by Brian but I believe it has since gone out of the family.

This is the picture taken at the end of his life-- a slight variant of the one used in his obituary.

Porch: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Porch-- the word brings nothing but pleasant associations.  Dining al fresco, rocking chairs, iced tea, leisure, neighborliness, summer.  True enough but there is more-- green slimy stuff on the parts near the ground and black mildewy stuff on the rails and posts up above, spiders and insects in every nook and cranny and a much interference with light into the actual house.  So yesterday, a beautiful fall afternoon, John and I attacked it with the hose, buckets, spray bottles, brushes and earth friendly cleaners (quickly abandoned in favor of good old chlorox).  Looks great doesn't it?  We have done as far as the stairs and will continue on this afternoon.  We listened to Joni Mitchell's disk "Miles of Aisles" with long remembered live versions of all her best songs.  Our working together was congenial and satisfying.

This is a very small quilt that I made in May after our tiny quilts class.  The strips are 3/4 inch before sewing. I spent all summer postponing taking it further and couldn't really see how to quilt it.  Finally I got the idea just to make a red french knot in the center of each light rectangle.  Made a big difference in how it looked and soon I will have the binding on.

Am listening to David Copperfield (again) as it is one of the two Dicken's books selected for our Senior College class-- the other is Bleak House-- a book I have also read (listened to).  I was looking forward to the class but our first one was mildly annoying.  The teacher finds it valuable to read aloud for whole pages and I don't.  We will see how it goes this week-- I am giving up the quilt guild meetings in order to take the class.  

My Prayer

Keep bright before me the moments of my highest resolve.

Peak Bagger's Delight

The "trail" leading down from Sargent Mountain in Acadia National Park.    Peak Bagger's Delight winds its way up, down and over four summits-- Bald, Parkman, Gilmore and Sargent.  It is only a four mile hike but strenuous and for me difficult.  It took us nearly five hours to complete-- a time probably lengthened by rain and wet rocks.  It is particularly "delightful" because the four peaks are in close proximity to each other and can all be seen one from the other.  There is a great deal of hiking above treeline and lots of granite-- my favorite things.  As I lagged behind John and our friend Rick Fitzsimmons I spent some time channeling Otzi, the "Ice Man" found in the Italian Alps-- plodding along feeling weary and anxious for a bit of rest-- finding a slightly sheltered niche between the rocks and falling asleep, never to wake.  I, on the other hand, plodded along and reached a rocky summit where I could rest and carry on with renewed energy.

Here you see John and Rick at the summit of Sargent-- we had fog at times but the wind often swept it quickly away giving us the typically superb views of mountain and ocean that one gets in Acadia.  After Sargent there is a beautiful walk along the open ridge before dropping down into the woods and a very difficult trail back to the parking lot.

An uneventful trip home, a pleasant glass of wine with Liz and Rick on Kaler Road, a very satisfying alfredo with onion pizza from Belfast Variety (the Greek Salad not so great-- iceberg lettuce, too much feta), an hour with the three nannies from "Berkeley Square" and so to bed.

Catching Up by Photo- yet again

When I named this my "everyday" blog, I meant not that I would post everyday but that it would be about ordinary, daily life-- just saying!  What I find, however, is that we did a couple of extra-ordinary things in late August and September and that left a big blogless space.

Departing from routine, John and I drove on the 27th of August up to Caribou, Maine and embarked the next morning on a loop bicycle ride from Caribou to St. Agatha, to Van Buren and back to Caribou.  We were accompanied on this jaunt by Liz and Rick Fitzsimmons.  It was the first time I had ridden a bicycle with panniers and I had some trepidation about it but in the end didn't notice much difference.  We carried very little-- just one set of bike clothes, one set of apres bicyclette and one set for sleeping.  I didn't even take a book-- something that I regretted.  The weather wasn't fabulous but we escaped a heavy downpour while touring one of the catchall museums seemingly typical of the area and it was great that we were never hot.  If anyone tells you that "the County" is flat, they are wrong-- my idea that we would be passing through great swaths of potato fields was a fantasy-- even where the area was heavily agricultural, the hills were not gentle.  But as John reminded me, it takes hills and valleys to make scenic beauty and much of what we saw on the trip was quite lovely.  Our first night, at the Long Lake Motor Inn in "Sain Agatte", was especially nice.  There was a welcoming bar to reward us for riding forty miles against the wind and the hotel staff arranged to drive us up to an excellent restaurant and had the restaurant staff return us to the hotel!

Liz and Dereka:  Photo by Rick

The highlight of the next day came when noon approached with no sign of any possible place to eat--  then, like a mirage out of the potato fields, appeared the "Misty Meadows Organic Farm" in Grand Isle.  Much more than a farm, the family owned enterprise includes a superb organic restaurant where they were very gracious about providing a gluten free meal for Liz and where I had possibly the best fried fish ever.  John had the daily special, beef stew with all the ployes he could eat and there were even cats to pat.  Although we knew it to be the case before we went, we all found it surprising that people who have lived their whole lives in Maine speak French in preference to English (although totally bilingual) but I was further surprised to learn that Gloria (?) at the Long Lake Inn speaks French first but cannot neither read nor write it.  She told us that reading and writing in French was forbidden in the Maine public schools.

We rushed back in time to liberate Darby from the Canine "Country Club" and to prepare for the next day arrival of Margaret, Andrew, Andrew's dad, Ron Richter, Eliza and baby William.  It was a jolly crowd at dinner, made strangely hilarious by the news that four days after FINALLY getting a job, Margaret discovered that she was enceinte.  That makes two daughters expecting at the same time-- something that gives them both a lot to talk about and me another grandchild to adore.  Here are the three of us, back at our old favorite game of Acquire.  Eliza won as always.  Ron and Andrew went off to hike and camp while the rest of us had a nice lazy weekend.

On Tuesday the 4th of September, John and I tooted off to an AMC facility in the North Maine Woods called Little Lyford Pond Camp.  It was an annual "over 50" outing and once again we were accompanied by Liz and Rick.  The camp was lovely (but surpassed by the nearby Gorham Chairback facility that is six miles away and that we visited after our second day hike).  An old "sporting" camp, it was purchased and rehabilitated by the AMC.  It poured the first night and into the morning and I was secretly hoping for an entire day of knitting and reading but it cleared enough for us to take a four miles walk around the two ponds.

In the later afternoon John and I took the l.5 mile nature trail-- walking very leisurely and paying close attention to the interpretative signs-- a lovely interlude for the two of us.

Each of the cabins had a private outhouse!

On the second day we hiked up the Third Mountain Trail to the Appalachian Trail and Monument Cliffs-- a totally gorgeous hike of the kind I love most-- pine trees, rocky, steep and difficult climbing but much preferable to a steep dirt trail through hardwoods--

Our days have been saddened only by the loss of Robin Richenaker.  While I knew Robin myself it was mostly because she was an especially close friend to Joan Herrick.  Their camps on Pitcher Pond are adjacent and for eleven years Robin and Joan walked their dogs together.  Robin has battled depression for many years and on the 31st of August choose to end the battle by suicide.  R.I.P Robin.