Rene’ biking the Munger Trail.
Another summer shot to hell. Another season of lament.
Sounds like the opening line to a depressing folk song. What put me in such a black mood? Well, it’s the fact that I’ve failed to keep my summertime agenda. So far, I haven’t plopped a canoe into the black water of the Cloquet River. Not a once. I’ve fished the local lakes by boat and motor one time. One time. I’ve taken a boat out sightseeing twice. Once on Island Lake, once on Fish.Three trips on the water over the entire summer. Pathetic.
Where the hell did the time go?
It’s Sunday morning. I’m sitting playing hooky from church on a windy end-of-summer-day (the weather forecast calls for a 65% chance of a thunderstorm by tonight and a wet morning to put a damper on Labor Day). I’m thinking about what I could have accomplished this summer.
A canoe trip to the BWCA.
A better, more vibrant vegetable garden (should have dumped in manure like Rene’ suggested).
A long road trip to Yosemite (never been) or Yellowstone (haven’t been since I was 6 years old) or some other such place.
Construction projects that need doing around the house.
Trail clearing and cutting.
More bike rides, more walks in the woods, more quality time with Jack and Rene’.
The list goes on and on and on as Dylan’s Planet Waves plays softly over the computer behind these words.
That’s another thing undone, uncompleted. I was going to transfer more of my vinyl, including the new Trampled By Turtles (bought vinyl as an ambitious bow to the past), into digital. Got three or four albums done and then the effort petered out.
The great writer Tony Hillerman (he passed away in 2008) penned a memoir entitled Seldom Disappointed. I’ve often thought that, when and if I write a memoir, the working title should be Always Disappointed. But that title is such utter bullshit, my wife, kids, friends, and other family would slap me upside the head if I ever deigned to pen such a piece of selfish crap. I know I’m a blessed man. I’ve lived a wonderful, wonderful life. I know this when I see my grandson, A.J., and he lights up as he shrieks “Grandpa.” I know this whenever my four sons are together and I can appreciate what fine young men they’ve become. I know this even before my beautiful and pragmatic wife says, “lighten up.” So enough with the dirge already. Seasons come and seasons go. I’ll never be able, no matter how I try, to manipulate every thought in my head into action. Things will be left undone. Trips will be left untaken. Stories will be left untold. But the life I’m living is damned blessed. This I know.
Sandhills on the field getting ready for their migration.
If you look really, really close at the photo to the left, you’ll see two cranes strutting across our pasture. The sandhills know that change is coming. They can feel it in the early morning dew and the late evening air. They can hear it in the chatter of drying leaves. They can sense it in the shifting wind. I wonder: Have these graceful birds left any tasks for tomorrow? Have they missed out on any amusement they were looking forward to? I doubt it.
Blueberry breakfast.
I should be more optimistic. For the first time since we’ve had blueberry bushes in our garden, I actually picked more than a handful to eat. It’s true birds found the ripe berries before I did. Still, there were enough berries left behind for me to have a week’s worth of cereal and fresh blueberries. That treat alone should have been enough to declare summer a success. But remember the title of my faux memoir. I am not a man easily satisfied. Give me a quart of fresh berries, I’ll ask, “Why can’t I have a gallon?” Wrong, you say? No question. A controllable personality quirk? I’m working on it.
Other pluses for the garden have been the Russian berries, the red raspberries, the green beans, the onions, the carrots, the potatoes, and the tomatoes. The photo to the left shows the first of the tomatoes Rene’ will conjure into her famous spaghetti sauce and salsa. There will be more. Not as many as last year. But enough. And that’s a definite plus. A positive.
Yesterday’s tomatoes.
Thinking my pre-autumnal malaise through, I believe there’s an age component to my steely resistance to appreciating what’s right in front of my eyes. Very soon, I’ll be entering my seventh decade of life. I don’t want to cross over that threshold with trepidation or alarm or regret. I want my next decade of life to be exciting and educational and full of family and friends and new adventures and experiences. To get there, I need to figure out a better way to curb my inclination to expect perfection from others, from the world, from the seasons of the year, but mostly from myself. Maybe the spur-of-the-moment trip Rene’ and I took yesterday is the beginning of my attempt to break free of an unsustainable pattern.
On a whim, we jumped in the car and motored off to St. Paul to take in the Minnesota State Fair. Usually, I plan such excursions months in advance. Yesterday, we simply woke up, took our showers, got dressed, and headed out. Sort of a prelude, a practice session to being empty-nesters. That’s a transition that’s some years away, what with Jack still in high school. But it’s coming. And maybe, just maybe, what we did yesterday, what I did yesterday, is a sample of how things might be if only I let go a bit.
Rene’ at the fair.
Parking was a bitch because we arrived in St. Paul after 1:00pm on the busiest day at the fair. There were a few tense moments, a few untoward comments between us, until I found a place on a side street and parked my wife’s Rogue.
“I’ll walk back after we’re done and get the car. You can wait by the entrance. I’ll pick you up.”
My wife (who suffered a horrific ankle fracture a few years’ back) isn’t up for walking long distances on pavement. Just ambling around the fair for a few hours would tax the metal-and screw-reinforced joint. I didn’t think of it at the time but my not insisting on Rene’s limping back to the car was a bow, a recognition, that things don’t always have to be done according to the Gospel of Mark. Adaptability: That’s what I need to somehow acquire in my toolbox of attributes. Maybe I took a step towards that goal yesterday.
Chair lift at the fair.
With our late arrival to the fair, we missed seeing our sons (Matt, Chris, and Jack), our daughter-in-law Lisa, Lisa’s mother Judy, Chris’s significant other, Rachel, and our beloved grandson, AJ. We also missed completing my annual checklist of booths and exhibits that are “Mark must sees”: the DNR display, the livestock barns, and Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion live broadcast from the grandstand. We did manage visits to some of our usual suspects: the tractor vendors, the screenhouse builders, the pole building contractors, the travel trailer lots, and the boat and motor outlets. But these were minor distractions. The locations we failed to visit are at the very essence of why I love the fair. And yet, substituting the quilting exhibit, the art exhibit, and the 4H building for the main attractions was more than satisfying. I could have stayed in the art building, studying the talents of Minnesotans working in pen, pencil, clay, metal, paint, and wood for days.
It was pitch dark when we pulled into the Adolph General Store in Hermantown. I listened to Springsteen’s The Rising while Rene’ went into the store to buy fresh pork chops, burger, and a roast. It’s true that the album has moments of regret and angst. But in the end, The Boss included lyrics of hope and redemption in the composition. Sitting in the car, in the dark, the title song drifting over me, I had this thought:
Maybe there’s hope for an old man to learn a new way of appreciating the world and the folks who grace it.
Peace.
Mark
