Minnesota is a beautiful place to be during the summer. There are rolling hills of corn. Every farm you see is well-kept: the fences appear freshly painted, old machinery does not litter the landscape, homes and sheds are in order. It basically looks like people, who take pride in what they do, live there. And even the summer storms are beautiful. When it rains, it is torrential, and as bizarre as it seems to appear, I love to hear the echo of thunder that shakes windows in homes, although I hate the fact that tornadoes are a thing to worry about there too, which is something that we have here only rarely. But even then, every time it rains, I look for things I am accustomed to here in the high plains desert, like the smell of ozone after a storm when everything smells so fresh and clean.
In summer, you can hear the sounds of crickets and frogs. To watch grandchildren pick them up and play with them is not only fun, but it also reminds me of my doing the same thing.
The picture above is of Tommy and Anna at Soldier Park. Minnesota recognizes that parks are important. There are incredible examples of playground equipment that any child loves, designed to give them the exercise they need by getting out of the house and away from computer games and television.
Jack loved the park there when he was with us in September of '08, but there were already changes in the air while we were there. It began to be cool at night, requiring a light coat and closed windows at night. In the heat of summer, the windows stay open, if not to create a little cool fresh air, then definitely a chance to hear those frogs and crickets. The night sounds were still there in September. You could, however, still notice the anticipation of winter.
Driving became a NASCAR adventure with people who cut you off frequently or suddenly recognized that cars have horns to be used if someone waits a fraction of a second too long at a light or stop sign. The smiles were no longer there, and no one seemed to be experiencing karma. They seemed to know that winter was coming. I don't blame them. In fact, the reason I probably interpret the sadness is because it is how I feel in winter.
I can't imagine what they must feel. Seeing the "white stuff" is depressing enough, so I have no way of understanding what they must feel when they find weeks where daytime temperatures rarely climb to plus degrees. In fact, the only thing that helps we survive Idaho winter at this point in my life is knowing that somewhere in Minnesota, it is most likely forty or fifty below zero any given night in January and early February.
We will visit again this summer. I will drive across Montana and Wyoming and the Dakotas, hoping to make it well in advance of the invasion by fans of Harley Davidson who feel that it is their constitutional right to bare themselves at any given moment. There should be a law that forbids anyone over the age of 45 from acting stupid like that.
But being in Minnesota means visiting Tommy and Anna with Jack, a rare time when we have all three grandchildren together in one place at one time. It means driving to the Dutch restaurant to see the workers bring a plate with a European pancake smothered in berries while saying very loud, "Pfannekuchen." Oh, they don't say it in German. They use the Dutch word, although I am sure they mispronounce it badly, but it's still fun to be there and watch the fun and eat the great food.
2 comments:
Hey Herr Ward. Did you know that Minnesota is where my mom and dad ended up after dad retired as supt. of Madison School District? They live in a little town called Elk River about 45 minutes northwest of Minneapolis. They LOVE it there. After dad retires from his job (again) in about a year, they're going to move a little closer to all of us. But they are heartbroken that they have to leave MN. I have to agree, it's a great place.
The harsh winter is more than I could ever enjoy, regardless of anything else, although I find the people in Minnesota exceptionally nice. I do, however, see them change when the weather becomes cold, and we were there only when things were beginning to become a bit gray. The leaves turned to fall colors while we were there in September, and in a short period of time, it was interesting to see how different things became on the highways. They remained polite in stores, but you didn't see too many smiles at all.
My daughter says that too. Garrison Keillor makes reference to it frequently in his stories about the fictional place Lake Wobegon.
I became an instant fan of A Prairie Home Companion and visit the store in the Mall of America every time we visit my daughter. I have four or five of his books on Cd that I converted to one of our Ipods.
We look forward to the drive to Minnesota this summer, but we will be waiting for blue skies. For me, the drive is as almost as much fun as being there. Once you get through the traffic north of West Yellowstone, the Interstate takes you through beautiful country--Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota and the beautiful Black Hills area.
And we always stop by Mt. Rushmore too.
When we returned in late September, there was a harvest moon that made things beautiful just as darkness began. We took a couple of pictures, but nothing like that is ever like it naturally appears.
If the weather were better, I would not hesitate wanting to live there. Their easy-going nature reminds me a bit of what I found in North Carolina when my wife and I visited our son and our daughter-in-law when they were attending UNC Chapel Hill. There are parts of that particular area that remind me of Germany, particulary the Kiefer I remember in Berlin. I don't know what kind of pines I saw in Carolina, but they reminded me of the ones in the Gruene Wald in the southern part of Berlin.
They live in Virginia now, and I look forward to visiting them there this summer when Ann and I and hopefully our grandson Jack fly out to see them. Charlottesville is beautiful too, although winter is a bit colder there than where they were in North Carolina.
As you can tell, my body just can't take the cold any more. I guess it's the downside of my passion for football when I was in high school. There are not many things I didn't injure at that time, and winter reminds me of it every year.
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