The Martha Kostuch Story
June 26, 2002
If I start with the end in mind, as good planning practice dictates, I should start with the book review.
I imagine Martha's Story to be reminiscent of Brian Fawcett’s late work: openly didactic, intended to educate. The writer could even separate the pages so that the meaning and the subtext of the stories could be explicitly stated, like a running colour commentary on the narrative above.
In 2002, Martha separated her shoulder. I had the opportunity to visit her one weekend and help out as managed her veteranary practise.
We visited Bill, a dairy farmer. He'd never seen me before and assumed I was Martha's new assistant. My job that day was holding the cows's tails.
“Have you been around cows much?”, Bill asked me.
“This is my entire adult experience. I think I visited some petting zoos as a child.”
“And you want to be a veterinarian?” Bill said in the background.
Notes on A Day With Martha Kostuch
- b. 1949, near Duluth, Minnesota
- Married 19 years, divorced 1990
- Cows can spray manure 50 feet when they cough
- Can play the card game ‘Sevens’ while particpating in a conference call.
- 20% large animal/agricultural practice, but never intended to do small animal practice
- Private prosecutions are possible under every statute in Alberta, Linda Duncan wrote the book, value is precedent which shapes procedure (ie. Laying charges results in corrective action by companies, government officers may be politically prevented from laying charges, charges can end a common practice such as gravel mining riverbeds)
- Private prosecutions under Federal Fisheries Act allow share of any award
- Every Canadian has “standing” under Federal statutes. There is no “directly affected”.
- If basal aquifer water affects riparian organisms, it would be a ‘deleterious substance’ under the Fisheries Act requiring a Section 36 permit which automatically triggers CEAA.
- After anaesthetizing, peel cat testicles like furry, pink grapes, slit each one with a scalpel blade, and pop out the organs like pimples. Tie off the vas deferens with a slipknot.
- Dogs have small veins in their legs making inserting an intravenous catheter a challenge. Shave the leg first. A lactating drip will nourish a puppy back to rambunctious health.
- Tom M. Kostuch was an industrial arts/music enthusiast who followed his wife into veterinary medicine. He chose small animals as his practice.
- Cows that have calved in the past year should be regularly inspected for pregnancy and organ movement by inserting the veterinarian’s arm up the cows anus all the way to the shoulder. Recruit an urban person hold the tail if you’ve recently separated your shoulder.
- A cow grazes to collect material to feed the bacteria in its first of four stomachs. The by-products of its resident bacteria population nourish the cow.
- A theme of her life is personal empowerment. It represents what anyone can accomplish.
- Martha keeps three small notepads: a memo style day timer, a scribbler style account record, and a notebook style journal which itemizes everything she does.
- There are 17 types of orchids in the Rocky Mountain House region. We saw the yellow lady slipper, and the round leafed bog orchid.
- People dealing with their own issues seek her counsel, and she acts as an agent between people (The Johnsons) and industry and government.
- Both she and Tom were raised in families with eight children, leading them to adopt Danny and John, even after they had their own two biological children.