Here at Camp Deer we are cut off from the world. We get our
news slowly and don’t hear about the awful stuff until it is at least 24 hours
old. That is good enough. The headlines said that the nation was “stunned”.
That does not describe my feelings. “Stunned” implies surprise. I’m definitely
not that. I’m more discouraged because it seems that is just how it is. We get the Minneapolis Tribune
every day and that is good because of the puzzles, but it comes with the news.
I have no Google up here to help me with my puzzles so I have to rely on what I
know so puzzles last longer. That is good.
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| Camp Deer Sunset |
So far I’ve read The Kite-Runner by Khaled Hosseini
and have started on American Scripture: Making the Declaration of
Independence by Pauline Maier. No slouch there. When I get out of the
woods, I’ll go back to reading the normal mysteries and suspense novels that I
prefer. This was the best that I could pick from Ludwig’s library before I
left. It all came recommended by my brothers who are well read men.
We are taking a week off from our retirement. We would be
out catching fish but the boat we brought with us does not idle and we’ve been
trying to fix that but have failed so far. Yesterday we drove it around
Pickeral Lake at full throttle to see it that would help. (Not to worry, it is
a 9 horse so it doesn’t go very fast.) It may have a helped a little so now we
have our poles rigged up and when it stops raining we’ll head out and see if we
can catch some fish. Our neighbors up here are an extended family who have
several boats and routinely go out and catch Northerns and Blue Gill. This
morning they took pity on us and brought over some fried Blue Gill they caught
before I got up. It was delicious.
Lest you think that our vacation is a dud based on what I’ve
written, that is not true. We both agree that just being here with Deer Lake 20
feet in front of our cabin, the sunset, the wind blowing, warm sunshine and
nothing on the schedule except eating and sleeping is absolutely fine.
The summer has been busy. My brother Ludwig continues to
allow us to stay at his house and we seem to be getting along pretty good. He
is even allowing us to use his garage as a woodworking shop where we have 4
projects in the works. One project is finished.. a piece of trim for Greg’s
house. Another is just about finished. It is at least out of the garage. That
is a mesquite table that we made. Don brought 2 large pieces of mesquite back
from Texas that we had put together with a middle section of Illinois walnut
and a couple of accent pieces of maple. Another woodworking project is some wooden
boxes for my brother Mark for transporting his vinyl records when he dj’s at a
radio station KAXE up in Grand Rapids. In the works but not started yet is a toddler
climbing toy called a Pikler Triangle that we will build and then deliver to
Philadelphia sometime before October.
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| The unfinished table |
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| The table being finished |
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| The finished table |
Every Tuesday since school got out we have picked Edie up from her summer day camp at a Minneapolis park to her gymnastic class at another Minneapolis Park. We have tried to do some fun things with her while we have her without wearing her out before gymnastics.
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| Gymnastics finale |
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| Seamstress |
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| Getting ready to model the dress |
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| Edie modeling Elsa |
At the end of June, one of Don’s former customers in
Effingham, Illinois had a big anniversary celebration and they invited him to
come down for a day of golf, good food and seeing old friends. So I went along
and stayed a couple of days in Springfield where I spent some really good time
with some of my favorite people in the world.
Our plan was to spend the summer making a decision about
where we want to live and what kind of home we want to have in Minnesota near
the twin cities. We went to open houses, had a couple of agents working for us and toured some places... condos, houses, town houses, coops, etc. Then one Sunday in July we went to an open house and there was
the perfect town home for us in Coon Rapids. It had low HOAs to cover the cost
of outside maintenance and snow removal. It had a first floor with everything
we need to live for as long as we live including a walk-in shower and main
floor laundry. Probably just as important is a large open room in the lower
level with a walk out basement so as long as we can walk down stairs, we can
entertain. There are already cabinets, a refrigerator and sink there. All we
need is to add a range and have a second kitchen. Even more impressive is a
large storage room that would hold some wood behind which is a room tucked
under the garage that will make a perfect wood shop. Upstairs is a balcony with
a good-sized bedroom and bathroom for guests. Coon Rapids is a northern suburb
on the way to Brainerd where my brothers and sisters live and a little more
than a half hour from Greg’s house if the traffic is good. We are five minutes
from the places we like to shop. There is a commuter train that runs to Target field. And the price was right so we made an offer on
the house. We finished settling the contract before we came up north. We’ll
close on the house September 30 and have a month or so to move our stuff out of
storage and get a little settled before we go back to Texas. It makes me happy
to know that I have a home in Minnesota.
We will have plenty to do when we go back to the city. But
for now I have another book to read and maybe even some fish to catch. It would
be nice to actually need our out-of-state fishing licenses though they may be a
donation to the Minnesota Department of Conservation.
It is now Sunday evening and we are back at Ludwig’s. He is
up at the Blue Grass Festival at El Rancho Manana. We would normally be there,
too but because of poor scheduling on my part, we were at Camp Deer instead. We
did catch a few Blue Gill and a Crappie so we fried that up and ate it last
night. We dropped the boat off to get it fixed on our way back to the Twin Cities. Now, it's back to retirement.
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