I swear I wasn't intentionally eavesdropping. In fact, I've wanted to tell this story for a long time. I'd been saving it for a chapter in my book, but feel now I've got to share at least part of it as it relates to "Dad Earl" and my mother, Hope.

The year is 1992. We'd just recently moved to Northern California, where my husband had been assigned as an ammo inspector with the Department of Defense. My 11-year-old daughter, Jennifer (who, being very shy, made friends no easier than I had at her age), had unexpectedly brought two friends home from school. After introducing them to me, she ushered them toward her bedroom door, where on the other side I assumed they'd talk privately about the most important matters of the day -- boys, teachers, moving to a new school and what-on-earth-ever-brought-you-Here?

But before they reached my daughter's bedroom door, I couldn't help but pick up on her words, and I had to stop and listen.

"Yeah, we're from Iowa," she said, "but you probably know my Grandma and Grandpa Thelander. They're famous, you know."

She said it so matter-of-factly. The tone languished somewhere between a child's innocent bragging and one already versed in that which makes other people proud.

"Really?" I heard one of the girls respond.

"Oh yeah!" Jennifer said. "My Grandpa Earl and Grandma Hope ... you know, the ones who rent out all those apartments?

knows them and I thought for sure you'd have heard of them..."

And then her bedroom door closed and I heard only muffled voices.

I remember smiling, and thinking:

Even my own daughter, at such a young age, clearly understood the role my mother and stepfather played in our community.

How could I have known that 15 years later, my stepfather would in fact make

for having been killed trying to make life better for others?

The article in

may have a couple minor details wrong (Earl was preparing the house for a new renter, not to sell), but the underlying truth rings loud and clear:

isn't a problem limited just to Iowa, nor even to the United States. It's become an international problem, and is costing hundreds of thousands of dollars along with innocent lives.

Though Iowa legislators currently are working on

in efforts to control illegal copper theft sales, thieves continue to find willing salvage buyers at recycling businesses throughout and state and the U.S. In Las Vegas, Nev., where salvage yards have gone from 60 visitors a day to over 250 visitors a day with salvage wire,

recently purchased nearly $200 worth of copper pipe at a local home improvement store. Then, along with a hidden camera, they took the copper out to sell for salvage. The station randomly picked three recycling businesses from the phone book to see if they'd be asked for photo identification, required for salvage sales in Las Vegas.

All three salvage yards -- the Silver Dollar yard on Lossee, Nevada Recycling, and a yard at Lakewood -- purchased the copper without any identification. The seller's ID as logged by Nevada Recycling?

With copper content at

, the stories of copper theft are growing almost as fast as the illegal sales. In Buttonwillow, Calif.,

and died after thieves stripped copper wires out of irrigation systems throughout California. Almost $38,000 in materials was stolen in June 2006 in 10 copper thefts in

, and in Tacoma, the frequency of copper theft in the Nalley Valley industrial area now has investigators helping businesses install camera surveillance.

has seen at least

associated with the theft or removal of electric copper wire. And just last month,

experienced delayed response times due to a repeat copper theft.

It's also happening in

.,

and 

.,

., the

,

,

,

,

,

.,

,

,

and

.,

.,

,

,

, and yes, even in

.

I dare anyone to find a single state where copper theft is not a major problem. Still, to date there has been but one single innocent man who lost his life amidst the $48,000 worth of stolen copper here and the $250,000 worth stolen there. He became famous, all right, but I suspect

, would have preferred to remain anonymous and live out the rest of his life doing what he loved most: spending time with my mother, fixing up and providing homes for those less fortunate who couldn't afford housing elsewhere, enjoying his family and grandchildren, and tending to

.

. That was before copper thieves came in the night and cut propane lines and let it fill with gas to later explode with a man inside. That man was my stepfather,

.

My grandparents used to live here. After my grandfather died, my folks purchased the rural country home from my grandmother (who'd come to live with them after Grandpa died) and fixed it up as a rental property. This is how my folks earned their living; they worked hard fixing up homes and apartments for those who needed housing in this small Western Iowa community where everyone knows everybody else. They'd recently installed new insulation and put permanent siding on the house. They cared for their tenants' homes the same way they cared for their own, making sure everything always worked properly and that families who lived in their rentals were comfortable and happy.

Now, it's nothing but a pile of rubble . . . a haphazard scattering of bricks, nails, metal pipes, a tumbled-down chimney and ashes laid out in layers like a melted accordion. (

)

Earl had gone to install a new water pump when he discovered the break-in and gas leak. Local law enforcement officials arrived and aired out the home, and several hours later Earl returned to get back to work. He plugged in a fan, and the home exploded. He died trying to make life better for others. Despite a

for information on those responsible for his death, there have been no arrests in the case.

The Iowa Legislature, however, now has

assigned to a Judiciary Subcommittee. I pray this bill will become law. For Earl. And for the thousands of other lives affected financially and in countless ways by what has become a national epidemic.

Copper Thieves Steal Lives. Please join me in supporting Iowa House Study Bill 660.

*

crime takes place in Iowa. Or, perhaps he

Iowans care about the crime taking place within our state. Then again, perhaps he

crime affects Iowans' lives.

He's wrong. It does. We do. And, yes,

Thank God, our U.S. Senator

(D-IA) realizes all the above.

Once again,

is fighting for Iowans and leading the effort to restore critical funds to this year's budget in response to Bush's latest proposal to

from state and local law enforcement programs. This, while Iowans are still recovering from

to the Byrne funded drug task forces across the state.

"Iowa is already reeling from funding cuts to law enforcement programs, which I am currently fighting to restore in the current year’s budget," Harkin said in response to Bush's latest proposed cuts. "I will continue my work to ensure Iowans do not have to face these devastating cuts.”

Federal assistance allows local law enforcement to better coordinate drug fighting efforts, hire officers and purchase equipment, stop domestic violence and effectively deal with drug dealers. Unless funding is added to the budget, these important programs will be cut.

The Bush Budget Impact on Iowa

· The Bush budget would slash or eliminate many programs aimed at bolstering local law enforcement, including the

, which helps local police departments put more officers out on Iowa’s streets. In Iowa, law enforcement agencies would have to absorb a loss of $6.5 million dollars if this was enacted.

· The President’s budget will eliminate

that fund many drug fighting programs across the state. Due to the President’s veto threats, last year’s appropriations bill underfunded the Byrne Grant program. Senator Harkin is already working to restore this money this fiscal year which would restore $3.5 million to Iowa so law enforcement will not need to cut staff and program resources. He will vigorously oppose any attempts to eliminate this program in next year's budget.

· The President’s budget also proposes to eliminate all

including legal assistance, grants for safe havens for children and victims of domestic violence with disabilities. Due to this loss of funding, most, if not all of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Programs around the state would have to close.

Fellow Iowans, is this acceptable to

Bush never got the privilege of meeting

. Perhaps

meant nothing to Bush, nor the deaths of many more like Dad Earl whose fates were sealed by Iowa law enforcement entities doing the best they could in the face of numerous budget cuts under an administration whose mantra is and has been

But,

are quick studies.

are quick studies. And, we're watching you, Mr. Bush, just like you've been watching us.

Thank you, Sen. Harkin, for keeping watch on issues that matter not just to Iowans, but to all Americans.

PetSmart may be smart about making money, but it's clueless when it comes to taking proper care of the animals it buys and sells by the millions.

The company's trade in live animals supports a mass-breeding industry just as cruel as—and less regulated than—the puppy mill industry. This results in abysmal treatment of tiny, vulnerable beings and ultimately leads to their overpopulation, homelessness, neglect, and suffering.

Take a closer look at PetSmart and please do not buy anything from PetSmart until it stops selling all animals.

In the film

, there's a scene where young Jem goes back to the Radley's collard patch late at night to retrieve the britches he'd abandoned earlier after snagging them in a fence. Some days later, when his sister Scout catches him admiring the trinkets he found in a tree near the Radley home, Jem confesses to her the truth about the night he went back after his pants.

, he says.

For the past two months, every time I pulled into my mother's driveway and saw Earl's tomato plants spread out further and thicker than they were the day before, I could hear echoes of those words ...

...

Like a loyal dog sitting faithfully by the door -- an ear tilted sideways, awaiting familiar footsteps and sounds of the master's return -- the tomato vines kept listening, leaning, yawning, spreading out their arms to sleep and curling themselves around the empty lawn chair's legs where he once sat and then waking to another day to nudge against the bright yellow Tonka truck toy he'd parked in their bed ... almost as if

to come back home and play and pluck an annoying weed from their loom like an unsightly burr from a retriever's golden coat.

He had waited for them first, using his index finger and one good eye to sight the one he'd chosen as his favorite.

"Right there. It's already turning red. See it?" he'd said, hunching over and pointing into the sparse vines. And I'd followed his gaze to where the small but plump orb blushed amidst its less developed sister fruit. "That's the one I'm waiting for," he'd said proudly. "That one's mine."

On his knees, he'd planted these seeds and gently blanketed them with soil and cared for and tended to them with the same kind of commitment he bestowed upon all things he molded and created with his own two hands. But some time in the night's dark hours, the Boo Radley of Jem and Scout's deepest fears came to rob this man of his life and loves and the pleasures he derived from taking simple moments like these and turning them into something spectacular.

... six days after his funeral ... my mother passed by them on her way to the hospital for the breast lumpectomy and returned with her breast cancer diagnosis.

and spread out toward the east while ... one week later ... Mom's doctor told her she needed to make a decision.

and spread toward the west and wrapped around the heart-shaped sign reading "Grandpa and Grandma - Kids Spoiled Here While You Wait," while ... two and one-half weeks later ... another car took her away for the mastectomy and returned with all these other vehicles and so many lively children.

while ... amidst all the muffled voices and words like metastasized and chemo and numerous close calls with small running feet and shrill laughter and surprising phrases like

and questions like

... new buds spurted forth and heavier vines swept down and around them like mother hens pulling rowdy chicks back and away from the busy traffic in Earl's driveway.

and snaked around the legs of his white chair and climbed up higher for breathing room and a view of dozens more green offspring below while ... careening near the chair's arm where he used to lay his elbow ... they sucked in the late October sun as new words like

and

drifted over the rail near the door and filtered down between the effervescent green foliage.

And so, as the month drew to a close and I returned my mother to her home after the morning's hospital visit where they made her blood radioactive to prepare for chemo treatments and she said we need to get the tomatoes out by nightfall lest they freeze, I looked down at the tangling vines and thought about how their roots of hope had somehow spawned hundreds of tomatoes, and, against all odds, continued to multiply and produce as if their very life -- or, perhaps, ours -- depended upon it.

"But some of them are still so...small," I said. "They haven't even had a chance to ripen." Yet, I knew.

Still, I could not bring myself to pick them. Perhaps I wasn't yet ready to say goodbye to summer. Perhaps I wasn't yet ready to say goodbye to the interlocking green stems that still drew energy from the sun and soil. Perhaps I wasn't yet ready to say goodbye to Dad Earl. Cutting down his tomato plants -- even in the face of a freeze that surely threatened to kill them all -- was too much like severing all hope he'd return once again to gather his offspring in his arms...if only for one final moment.

Flannery O'Connor wrote

, and, like Harper Lee, recognized that which separates good and evil and redemption from sin.

In Earl, we found a good man. In Earl, we found our own Atticus Finch. His spirit will be there with us when we go to sleep at night and it will be there when we wake up in the morning.

Yeah. It’s us. And then some.

We weren't supposed to say the word out loud, let alone put it in print. The surreptitious nature of the secrecy confused me at first, but others were quick to provide reasons why: anyone seeing

would be less inclined to come forward with new information. And, even the guilty party's so-called friends or associates might also be reluctant to

and come forward, lest they, too, somehow be held accountable for the information they'd possessed but had chosen to suppress.

So, when I stood in my mother's kitchen the same day she found out her breast cancer had metastasized and I saw the spiral-bound book lying right there on the table with the H-word written as big as the hole it left in all our hearts, I felt relieved there was someone -- albeit the

-- willing to call what happened by its real name:

"A Guide to Survival: Information for the Family and Friends of Homicide Victims," it was called.

Yes. Exactly.

Did it mean we now could utter the "m" word, too?

Published Tuesday | October 16, 2007

Reward offered in dog poisonings

Eight dogs have been fatally poisoned in the past 18 months in Neola (IA), and Pottawattamie County authorities are offering a $750 reward to find the person or people involved.

The latest poisoning killed a 13-month-old chocolate Labrador retriever that was in its kennel at its owner's residence, said Stacey Robertson, Pottawattamie County animal control supervisor.

"Somebody's baiting the animals," Robertson said. In the latest death, "the poison was put on the meat and tossed into the kennel."

Robertson said the poisonings could harm children.

"We've been working on this for a long time, and our investigation has reached a dead end," Robertson said. "I really hope somebody will point a finger."

The Pottawattamie County Sheriff's Office is investigating the incidents.

Anyone with information can contact Robertson at 712-366-1143 or the Sheriff's Office at 712-890-2200.

- Abe Winter