Hi friends-
Minwaanimad Joseph and Memegwesiikwe Victoria Gokee will be leading a traditional lacrosse stick making workshop in Red Cliff this coming Monday-Thursday. See above flyer. If you can join or stop by, I'd love to see you (and your kids) and for you to learn more about this powerful game of this place. When I moved back to Bayfield in 2008 I was the assistant coach on the Bayfield High School Girl's soccer team (before the numbers dwindled requiring a merger with Washburn). During those years I got to know (or re-know) Memegwesiikwe, Marita, Nissia, Sophie, Esme, the LaPointe sisters, and others in their adolescence. I can't imagine my life now without these beautiful people in it. It was a full circle moment for me to be able to coach the soccer team that was born while I was in my adolescence. Five years ago I had the opportunity to join in a community game of baaga'adowewin (traditional lacrosse) led by John Hunter of Twin Cities Native Lacrosse. Since then I've had the chance to play the game with youth and adults, native and non-native, all ages and all genders, in Mashkiiziibii (Bad River), Ashland, Bayfield, and Miskwaabikong (Red Cliff). A favorite moment was during the 2018 Red Cliff Powwow. I had been asked to facilitate a game as a morning activity during the powwow weekend. I was looking forward to playing, but was a little nervous too and hoping there would be someone with more experience to lead the game. Friends had instructed me to bring asemaa along so I would be prepared to ask for help. While baaga'adowewin has been a popular game of this place historically, as Damon Gizhiibide Aanakwad Panek wrote in a FB comment once: “Baaga’adowewin along with makizinataagewin, bagesii, and other Anishinaabe izhitwaawinan were frowned upon by the early Indian Agents and missionaries. The practice of our culture was systematically portrayed as bad, savage, and without merit. This narrative dominated our social identity and people shed their connection to fit in and not be ‘one of those dirty Indians’. So we lost a lot. Luckily we still have some things but the oppressive narrative is still there, lurking.” Baaga'adowewin has been growing in popularity again in the Chequamengon Bay region thanks to passionate youth and leaders in Mashkiiziibii especially. Leaders of the game in Miskwaabikong are still emerging, so I wasn't sure who would lead the powwow game that day. Then I saw Memegwesiikwe walk up with her personalized baaga'adowaan. I am so grateful for that moment, when big smiles were exchanged, asemaa offered, and our roles could reverse and balance. I also relish in another moment that came a little while later, when I set a pick that knocked the dude on his butt, and Memegwesiikwe ran off of my shoulder to score.
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I’m super proud of the soup I made last night. A rift off of Linda Gordon’s Wild Rice Soup recipe but adapting it to use up a pile of little school lunch and breakfast servings that have been accumulating in our freezer. Here’s what I did:
-Sauteed and seasoned some chopped onion, celery, butter, and mushrooms in the bottom of my soup pot. (These things we had on hand… not from the school.) -Filled pot half-way up with water and brought to a simmer. -Added carrots—a mix of fresh chopped and frozen. And some bouillon. -Chopped and stirred in two school lunch “chicken” breasts and a little tub of turkey and brown gravy. Let this all cook until the carrots were tender. -Turned down/off the heat and stirred in several little tubs of rice (mostly Wild Rice, one of brown, one of white), four tubs of breakfast sausage and gravy, and a tub of Creamed Chicken (I hesitated the most on this one, but it turned out fine.. lol). It hit the spot! And now we have a lot more room in our freezer. I’m thinking I might be able to use the pile of baked beans and taco meat still in our freezer in a Chili one of these days. I’ll keep you posted on how it turns out. Linda shared her soup recipe with me when I was working on a Local Foods cookbook project during my Farm to School days, so I don’t think she’ll mind if I share it again here (for all of you who aren’t getting the steady supply of little lunches each week). Linda Gordon’s Wild Rice Soup Recipe --Ingredients-- 1 cup uncooked wild rice 2 lbs pork sausage (1 lb hot and 1 lb regular or 2 lbs hot if you like it spicy) 1 small onion, diced 2-3 stalks celery, diced 11 cups water (or so) even better...substitute some water with canned chicken or beef broth 1/4 cup soy sauce 2 tbsp (or so) good beef base (use the paste kind not those cheap bouillon cubes or granules) 16 oz. fresh mushrooms, chopped (or 2 small cans mushrooms) 2-3 carrots, coarsely diced 1 can evaporated milk 1/2 cup water (or canned chicken broth) and about 5 tablespoons cornstarch --Directions-- 1) Wash the wild rice thoroughly by running it under cold water in a strainer. Add rice to 3 cups of boiling water in a heavy saucepan or pot. Bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer until rice is tender. This will take 35-45 minutes (don’t overcook), drain and set aside. 2) Crumble and brown sausage until about half-way done. Add onions and celery and brown some more. Add water (broth), soy sauce, beef base, mushrooms, and carrots. Cook until celery and carrots are done. 3) Add cooked rice. Let mixture cool slightly before adding milk. (It can be hot but not boiling hot—sometimes if it’s too hot it’ll curdle the milk). 4) Bring to boiling again and thicken with cornstarch/water mixture (add only 1/4 at a time to see how it thickens and stop when it gets as thick as you like it.) BONUS COVID DINNER IDEAS- -Dinner on our school lunch delivery day this week was a fruit and veggie tray (eat 'em up while their fresh!) with popcorn and shrimp cocktail. Covers all the food groups and no real cooking involved! -Another easy go-to has been egg rolls in the toaster oven and a bag salad dressed up with extra lettuce and mandarin oranges. Hi Laura- I'm feeling inspired to check-in via a long email... (lol) Oscar + school work was a battle last week. Jen and I both made attempts with the sight words, but he resisted every step of the way. We didn't have a lot of time or energy to tackle more of the lesson plan. I think he did some A-Z kids and some ABC mouse. Maybe Jen did a math lesson. On the weekend I made a list again. It seemed like it had worked so well the previous weekend, but this time he fought that too. I included fun things like play legos, practice soccer, write Lyla back. I let him choose three things. (He chose the three I mentioned and nothing from the lesson plan.) I insisted that he at least practice and write his sight words at least once. "I'm going to go jump on my trampoline," he said. He went outside and Jen and I made breakfast, watching him through the window and remarking on how nice it is when he just goes outside and plays by himself (which can also be a battle). When he came in a little later, he exclaimed that he was out there a long time and he definitely earned some screen time, so we said sure. A couple episodes later, I got him to turn the TV off and encouraged him to go out and help Jen feed the dogs. It seemed like he might move in that direction and then instead of getting pants out of his drawer, he pulled a pile of books off his shelf. "Can we read all of these?" he asked. He knows I can't resist and honestly it made my heart swell because we hadn't been reading as much as we usually do. We snuggled up together. I started the first book and noticed it used some of his sight words. We still hadn't crossed site words off our To Do list, so I went and grabbed them and tried to make a game of it and then we were back to fighting again. We got through it--did some sight words, read a couple books (but not the whole stack as he had been excited for), and then he said he wanted to go help Mom. I sat in his bed, looking out the window, feeling like I had spoiled our reading time. Before he went outside I gave him a hug and said, "How about we take a break from sight words next week and go back to working on letters instead?" Late afternoon as I was starting on dinner, a LCOOC student messaged me asking if I'd be able to meet up for a walk. I was glad to hear from her and left Jen to finish dinner. I got home just a little before sunset. Oscar and Jen were watching a cartoon. She had got him to take a bath and he was still in his robe. When the episode ended, he turned to me and said, "I would play soccer with you Mama." It was late and I was tired, but soccer was on the list and it was the first time all day he had asked to do something on the list. I thought, What kind of an example am I setting if I am now the one to resist? I looked out the window. The fading sunset had filled the sky with bright red clouds. "Okay," I said. "Get yourself dressed." I flopped down on the bed by Jen. "You are a good mama," she said with a smile. A couple minutes later he jumped into the room in his polar bear fleece PJs, asking "Is this a good outfit?" We ran and passed the ball down the driveway and along our dirt road. We found the flow we had been struggling to find all week. We were fast and tricky and having so much fun. We listened to the peepers. We remarked on the moon. It was my favorite part of the whole weekend. This week I still haven't opened the lesson plan in Google Classroom, but I know we are making better progress. He has been practicing his uppercase letters using a puzzle we have and then choosing one letter that stumps him to practice writing using the Alphabet Learning Mats that were sent home. I was trying to find a fun way for him to practice his lower case letters. I Googled “lowercase letter puzzle” and “best ways to teach lowercase letters” without finding much to inspire me. I had a vision for a game I could make. I wanted first to find out which ones he needed the most help with and started to write them out. “I have an idea," he said. "You draw a line to match.” “Like this?” I write the lowercase letters a-k, in jumbled order, at the top of a page, then the letter A-K, in jumbled order, at the bottom. We do the first one together and then he grabs the pen and pad from me and spends the next 5 minutes quietly working on his puzzle. He hands it back to me when he’s stumped. We finish it together circling the letters that gave him a hard time so I can incorporate them into the next puzzle. We get through it quickly and without argument and I reward him by saying yes to his request for me to play Mario Wii with him. Yesterday after breakfast he was supposed to go outside and help Jen feed the dogs, but he lingered in the house instead. "I just want to snuggle with you," he said. I put my work aside. "Okay, but we are reading Birchbark House then." We started reading the series by Louise Erdrich a year ago. He had a hard time getting into it at first, but this fall when he started kindergarten and we had to get stricter about bedtime, he knew he could always get me to read longer if he requested Birchbark House. It became a chant, and a giggle, and a "I knew you wouldn't say no to Birchbark House." And then we would settle in together and nothing felt more special than sharing the history and story of this place written by a writer who I so admire. We have made it to the fourth book in the series, Chickadee, but have been moving through it more slowly. When I suggest it, he usually asks for picture books instead, so I am grateful when he concedes. We are snuggled together in his bed. The boy in the story is riding on an oxcart with his uncle. They drive through a swarm of mosquitoes. They are suffering. We remember battling mosquitos on our hikes last summer, but admit it was nothing like what is described in the story. This fall as we approached the end of the first book, Oscar fell asleep one night as I was reading. In the story a sick man had come into their village and I knew what was coming. I read on as my little boy slept next to me and then sat with this sad part of the story for several days, wondering if he was ready to hear it. "I feel like I've heard someone say you should wait to expose kids to the dark parts of history until they are in 4th grade or something," I said as I talked about it with my best friend. "I don't know that we are living in a time where that is possible," she said. This was before COVID. When we were feeling the weight of climate change and Trump and families being separated (the weight we still feel now in addition to COVID). As I recently navigated talking to my son about his body and what kind of touching is appropriate and what to do if someone makes him feel uncomfortable, I thought a lot about when and how my mom had those conversations with me. I drew on her ability to be honest and calm and compassionate. I was in elementary school when she told me my friend’s dad had gone to jail for molesting my friend and what that meant. She wanted me to hear it from her first and talked to me about how I could support my friend if she or others brought it up. When Inga was murdered when I was in high school, she took me along to the sentencing. She showed me how to show up for our neighbors when horrible things happen. She also wanted me to be aware. I’ll never forget the images shared in the courtroom that day. Every story of abuse and violence--from friends, from books, from podcasts--stays with me. They haunt me, but they also grow my empathy. My mom didn’t allow me to live in a bubble, and for that I am grateful. Eventually, I decided to read the hard parts of the story to Oscar, but I prepped him first. I told him the story was going to get scary and sad, but that things were different then. And really they were-- this is hard, but that was harder. Because we had read and talked about the way sickness can spread, we have something to reference when we talk about COVID now. We talk about how much we need to worry and how and why we need to be careful. I still worry that he is too little to carry this knowledge, but he seems to take it all in stride. He is safe. We are here. The chapter we read in the morning about the oxcart and the mosquitos was enough to suck him back into the story. At bedtime, we ask him which mom he wants to read to him and which books. "Mom reads SpaceCows cause she hasn't read it yet and it's funny, and Mama reads Birchbark House," he says. I brush my teeth and take out my contacts. I am able to read a couple pages of my own book before being summoned: "Mama, your turn!" Jen and I kiss goodnight in passing. I readjust the pillows and get under the covers. "Are you surprised that I said Birchbark House?" he asks, eyes glinting. “It makes me so happy,” I tell him, but he already knows that. We stay up late and finish the book. Of course it has a beautiful ending, of family reunited, of singing a song that we can’t know completely but we will do our best to imagine and feel. I spent my lunch hour across the blueberry row from my dad, pruning out snow-damaged branches to make room for new growth. Such nice conversation, especially listening to him share stories about a community member who died recently, who was so kind to him, as an employer, as a friend, as someone whose roots to this area are deep, welcoming in my transplant hippie-looking dad, inviting him to rebuild an old tractor in his bus garage, offering knowledge and tools that my dad had yet to obtain himself.
Driving home (back to work) on Star, I see Tommy Jo stop his car on the road. What's he stopping for? I think and then we wave at each other as I pass and he turns up Andi's driveway and I realize he just stopped so he could wave at me. So we could have that moment of connection before continuing on with our days. I often share my gratitude for living where we do. For the trees and water and dirt roads. Today I need to share my gratitude for those who create the community of this place. For every Harold Maki and Tommy Jo. Listening to a saved Facebook Happy Hour concert by Liz Woodworth and the family band (bottom right) while I finally start to get caught up on TRiO reporting. I've had both on my weekly to do for weeks, and they compliment each other perfectly. Also this view of plants growing in and out and a messy but manageable life. Grateful for where we live. Grateful that Jen and Oscar went waterfall chasing today so I could have the space to dig myself out of this pit. Life has been such a shaken snowglobe of hard, powerful, beautiful, crazy, weather, emotions, moments. I feel the glitter settling around me (Jill Karofsky!) and am feeling hopeful today.
From www.rollingstone.com: On October 12th, 2012, the musical drama premiered on ABC. Since that time, the series, which also streams on Hulu, was canceled and then revived by CMT to air for two seasons. In October 2012, we moved the tiny house to Pratt Rd and moved in. I ordered a used copy of The New Essential Guide to Lesbian Conception, Pregnancy, and Birth and we traded it back and forth with Michael, making our plan, building our trust, sharing lots of good meals and laughs. These past seven years have been so fun, and hard, and easy, and sad and lonely, and full of awesome people. I have so many memories bubbling up of friends visiting to dogsled and ski and visit the beach and eat from our garden. And then they leave and the house is quiet again and I’m still finding my place back in this place that is so beautiful, but also so isolated. I never for a second regret my decision to come home, to make my home here with Jen and Oscar, but I do appreciate that in some of the quiet tired moments, I am able to bring up hulu and let my feelings be guided by the music and acting and writing of a completely different place and ensemble of characters. As the [final] episode opens... [skim or skip the rest of the italics if you don’t want spoilers, and you'll still get the gist] ...Gideon is missing after Deacon discovers he’s been drinking again. Deacon also finds out that his manager, Bucky, has organized a tour for him because “old guys are coming back in style.” Deacon also calls Will’s ex, Zach, who is now running for Senate — another nod to the show’s beginnings, when political intrigue was part of the plot. Jen and I kept up with the show for the first few years. We’d look forward to a new episode each week and watch together in the evening after dishing up dinner. Then when Oscar was a baby and I was home with him a lot, I went back and rewatched from the beginning. It was okay if I was distracted from the show while caring for him, because I already knew the story and could still enjoy the music. For the last couple years, our internet was too slow to stream hulu, and I’ve had less time to watch, but this summer Jen got us hooked up to something decent, and every so often I’ve been able to sneak in another episode. Brad, meanwhile, shows up at Alannah’s to tell her that he has scored her a gig in Memphis. After the show, she’s in her hotel room and Brad invites her to a party in another room. There is, of course, no party — just Brad, who finally gets a smack from Alannah right across his smug, slimy kisser. When they return to Nashville, Brad is shocked as Alannah, Deacon and Zach barge into his office. Zach offers him $15 million for the record label. Well, he doesn’t so much offer it as insist on it as Alannah reveals she has memorialized Brad’s slithery moves on her phone. He’s then ambushed by a parade of pissed-off women, including his ex, Jessie, who demands full custody of their son. I guessed early on that the show was written by women. When I went to the internet to confirm, I found out that the creator, Callie Khouri, also wrote the screenplay for Thelma & Louise. These last seven years of women speaking up has been something: Me Too, the Women’s March, the Kavanaugh hearing, this, this, this, traveling to Iowa with my mom a year after my grandma died. Reconciling. Avery shows up at Juliette’s house only to find out she’s leaving to live on a farm outside town. He knows she’s keeping something from him but she doesn’t spill. He talks with Hallie about Juliette moving out to the country and Hallie reveals he’s going to be a daddy again. Juliette’s character arc hasn’t so much come full circle as it has done a 180-degree turn, as she tells Avery she didn’t want to trap him into staying with her. That’s a long way from the tormented country-pop star that could — and would — step on anyone and everyone who got in her way early on in the series. As her boxes are moved from the house and she prepares for a new life out of the spotlight, she sings a beautiful song about being free. I don’t need the show in the same way I used to. I feel much less lonely these days. Slowly but surely friendships here have grown and flourished. Working in Red Cliff and with Oscar in kindergarten, I feel so much more connected to community. I enjoy my time with my parents and brothers more now that I am less involved with the farm. Jen and Oscar left yesterday to spend the weekend hunting and cookie-baking with the Tealeys in Bloomer and I’ve been so looking forward to having a few days to myself. This morning I video-chatted with Kate from bed. We laughed and cried and caught up in a way that was long overdue. I ate my lunch in front of the TV. I had three more episodes of Nashville including the finale. I texted with Jen during the commercials. (She got a doe. It was a hard shot. She put down tobacco. We will be eating venison this year. I am so grateful.) Steve Earle makes a guest appearance on the show and makes a reference to fly fishing. I am reminded of a favorite memory from this summer. Greg Brown was playing (supposedly his last show ever) at Big Top Chautauqua. Jen and I went without Oscar. We sat with our friends. When Michael Perry introduced him he talked about how Greg Brown meant so much because he was a deep thinker with rural values and there is a special connection in that. Then Greg Brown and Bo Ramsey played. Mid-way through, Theresa turned around and said, “I can’t understand a word that he’s saying, but I love him.” There was a huge rainstorm. He sang his encore with Iris Dement. It was beautiful. And we understood every word. Deacon takes the Ryman stage, giving a speech of heartfelt gratitude that sounds like it’s directed not only at the fictional characters, but at the real cast, crew and everyone involved in Nashville for the past six seasons. He invites his dad onstage and asks him if he knows the song he wants him to play on. “Son, I know all your songs,” Gideon says. With that, fiction and reality are blended together in a truly beautiful scene as the stage fills with Deacon’s family and friends, and then the dozens of real people who made Nashville possible, including production crew and cast members we haven’t seen in a while, not least of all the angelic Connie Britton, back where she belongs. And the tears stream down my cheeks. I sob in a way that feels so cathartic. So grateful. So easy. I know I need to write about this and that I have the time to write. So I am, with the Highwomen playing in the background. And I’m still crying. And grateful. So grateful. I could dismiss it all as a silly soap opera, but I won’t. These are real feelings. This is real healing. And I'm so fortunate to have "a life that is good." Oscar had a couple extra days off of school for spring break this week. Jen (with the weather’s influence) closed her dog sled trip season on Wednesday. I had been talking and emailing with my brother and my nephews for a week contemplating a little spring break getaway. I wanted to stay in the Porkies and squeak out another ski trip, but others were less enthused. They ended up heading west to bowl and overnight in Duluth. We embraced a lazy day at home and then headed east. On the way to Michigan, we stopped for lunch at El Dorado in Ashland and listened to a surprisingly good podcast about the Baby Shark song Oscar has been spontaneously breaking out lately. In Ironwood, we got movie tickets and a motel room. We discussed the general pros and cons of hotels vs. motels with Oscar--cost, access, pet policy, look, noise, smell, pool options--and he decided he likes motels best. It helped that this motel had a cute little one-eyed dog and sweet hot tub area just two doors down from our room. After checking in, we drove to Black River Harbor, hiked across the bridge over the river and a mile trail of packed snow and ice to the Rainbow Falls overlook. Oscar got tired on the hike back to the car, but lures of hot tub time before the movie kept him going. We had just enough time to get in a little soak, call the Poppas, rinse off, and eat some leftovers. Then we walked to the theatre. Jen went to Captain Marvel, which she has been eager to see in the theatre, and Oscar and I went to Dumbo. So good! I can’t recommend it enough. A great story about fighting to keep families together. Tim Burton direction. Set in the era of my grandma’s childhoods. My kiddo on the edge of his seat. My kiddo who loves animals and dreams of flight. I am so grateful to have shared this moment with him. I will also be grateful a few years from now when he and Jen go to the next new superhero movie together and I can have the indy tear-jerker flick I’ve been waiting for all to myself.
Back at the motel, we shared the synapsis and favorite moments of each our movies, then fell asleep listening to a couple chapters of Ramona Quimby. The next day was less enchanted (as it always has to be I guess) but we made the most of it-- refueled from the motel offerings and a sit down breakfast at Mike’s, a shorter hike to Interstate Falls (fairly accessible and impressive), bought farm eggs and potting soil from Stoffel’s, listened to a few more chapters of Ramona, and stopped for a few groceries in Ashland, but weren’t really organized enough to buy for the week. At home Oscar and I put some soil in pots, and some seeds in soil. I don’t have a big plan for my starts like I have in the past. Partly, because the professionals just do it so much better. This year I let Oscar lead the charge completely. He asked to buy a couple seed packets from the grocery store. I pulled out the box of seeds from seasons past. He puzzled a mix of large and small containers into the tray. We filled them with soil. We poked in some seeds. We poured water on top and put them in the sun. I am optimistic that something will grow, and that is enough. We finish our day with TV, a little Mario, pasta diner, tidying the house, a round of Pictionary, books, Oscar to bed by 8 (a feat in our house), and five episodes of Transparent. And this is also so good--to have my kid asleep in his own room, and watch TV (on a television) with my wife. A good show that plays without ads or interrupted buffering none-the-less. We bought a Roku on our last trip to Duluth. Enjoyed SMILF with a free Showtime trial, and now with a AmazonPrime free trial have settled into Transparent (with a dash of Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and purchased RuPaul’s Drag Race mixed in). This morning I wake up with my alarm, crunch ice puddles with Oscar on our way to the bus, make tea, and sit down to write. Two weeks of this easier routine, of transitioning into the next season. Then two weeks of vacation. Driving west in our jeep to friends and sun and mountains and desert. (Any family-friendly audio book recommendations? Jen and I decided this morning we need to bail on Ramona.) Then Monday, April 29, Oscar starts his last month of 4K/Headstart and Jen and I both start new full-time jobs. She’ll be helping our friends with their landscaping business on the island, and I’ll be stepping in to the role of Support Assistant at the LCO Ojibwa Community College Outreach Site in Red Cliff. We are both ready for the change, for regular work and routine, for weekends together, but right now my head is mulling on the goodbye. The bitter and so sweet moments of hanging with first-graders after school, of helping a friend in his office while he helps us build our house, of farming with my family, of living by the seasons, of mothering a preschooler. I am sad to say goodbye to the work I have pieced together, but I am eager for career. I hope I can find and overlap with people who would like to pick up the work I am leaving. Please reach out if this might be you. The Bayfield After-School program may need another instructor, especially if you have knowledge of or interest in baaga’adowewin. I know of a very sweet, very part-time, not very organized gig for someone who can manipulate a spreadsheet. And most of all, I need someone full-time (or 2-3 people part-time) from late July through Labor Day to help fill my role at the farm--primarily covering our sales shop and winery tasting room and, if interested, could also include assisting pick-your-own customers in the blueberry fields, harvesting and packing of blueberries, and/or pruning in the spring and fall. We hire a crew of 15 or so to help with harvest, so this could be a good job for a parent/teacher person who has a kid also looking for work. You drive out to the farm together. You chat and take money and pour wine and your kid picks berries. You both finish the summer with a little extra cash in your pockets. Yeah? Let me know. I have a meeting with my family on Thursday to start planning for a harvest season that I am less a part of, so if you reach out before then, even better. Jen puts Oscar on the bus. Chris brings Milo with him to our place in the morning. I eat and pack and load our gear in the car. Chris and Jen lead their first dogsled trip over our bridge. Milo and I head to Blackjack. On the way we talk, about what we are reading among other things, then put on a podcast that beautifully overlaps with our conversation. (It was one of the best This American Life episodes I've listened to in a long time--tears streaming down my cheeks by the end of it for my deep deep love for libraries and welcoming librarians.) At Blackjack the lifts are running, but the chalet and mountain is quiet. Just how I like it. Up and down together, chatting and not. Lunch in the bar, my pickiest-eater-ever nephew, commenting on the perfect breading of the chicken tenders and flavor of the bbq sauce. More mountain. A break to jump on the bungee jump trampoline. We are ready to head back out, when we notice they are shutting down the lifts. They have moved night-skiing to Indianhead we are informed, so we head there. A few runs. My thoughts on the lift have turned to my TAP kids and if there is a way I can get them on snowboards this winter. A warm-up break with pretzel bites, live music, and fun people watching. Milo chooses to slow his pace for our last two trips down the mountain, weaving in out and out of each others tracks. Two winters ago, we came here for the first time. Riding the lift that day, bubbly eight-year-old Milo exclaimed, "this is the best day of my life!" Now ten, his reactions are much more subdued, but there is no doubt it has been a great day together. We drive to the Black River Lodge, where I have a two-bedroom room booked for the next two nights. We check in to our room and head down to the pool and hot tub. Before long we are joined by Chris and Silas, then Dustin, Wylder, and Olin, who all drove over after work and school. The boys swim. Chris and Dustin pull chairs up to the hot tub to chat (they both forgot to pack swimsuits). While the three of us have shared space at parties, it has never been just us three. In a bigger group, I drift to my mom or girlfriends, Chris to the grill, Dustin to playing with the kids. But the conversation now is so fun and easy, that I know there will be more. The conversation turns to the engineering of fish tank sealants and I head up to the room to shower. A little later, I hear them all come in to the room, the dads directing the boys into pajamas, and I condition my hair and relish this evening of family without parenting responsibility. Dana drives up from a Wisconsin Midwives meeting in Madison and joins Chris, Dustin, and I gabbing on the king-bed like kids at a slumber-party. Her arrival is the last bit of the evening that we have all looked forward to when she sent the text this afternoon that she was on her way. It's just a few miles to get from the lodge to Powderhorn the next morning. We eat breakfast there, pull gear from the car, get lift tickets (one free with each Ashwabay season pass), and say goodbye to Chris and Silas, who are on a mission to bring a bag of platy babies to the fish store and scope out xc-ski trails. Milo and I get in a couple runs, come back to help the Churness-Moriarty family finish getting their gear on, then the six of us explore the mountain together, mixing and matching on the chairlift, and fanning out down the hill. Liam and Theresa join us and we are a party of eight, bringing back memories of joining them on their spring break trip to visit Kate in Colorado, watching our different personalities influence the way we each make our way down the hill. By the time we getting in our last runs, Jen and Oscar have arrived, bringing their energy to the party. We drink a beer in the chalet and negotiate take-out options while the kids motivate us to get them to the pool. Tonight I get to share the hot tub with Jen and Dana and Theresa. I always look forward to hang-out time any of these women, so to be with all three at once is a special treat. Showered and dressed, we move to a couch in the lounge near a pool table the four older boys have taken over. Dana gets called to a birth, Theresa and Jen go downstairs to the bar for a scotch, and I sit quietly watching the game. Tired and content. The next morning, Oscar is the first in our room to wake. He won't be coaxed back to sleep, so we go to the lobby to make hot tea and then up to the board game area outside of Theresa and Liam's room. Of course they are awake too and it feels good to share this quiet morning time with them. They decide to spend the day at Indianhead and head out. The rest of us will be undecided until we can eat a good breakfast. We try out Mike's in Ironwood and are not disappointed. (I'm eating my leftover breakfast wrap and hashbrowns as I type this.) Re-fueled, but still not especially ambitious, we decide to check-out Mt. Zion. It's perfect. Quiet and chill. Only one chair-lift, but lots to choose from with a tubing hill, beginner area, terrain park, and fun glade options off of the main trails. Dustin offers to hang with Oscar for a bit so Jen and I can ride the lift together. We pack a beer and beef sticks and sit together at the top of the mountain. There were a couple years before Oscar when I was learning to snowboard and Jen was learning to telemark, where we took little mini-vacations (usually day-trips) to check out the ski resorts in the area. Those were some of my favorite days together. They don't fit in to our life now like they did then, but I am grateful for this moment. A little bit of time for just us, in the midst of this busy beautiful sometimes-chaotic life we are living. Jen takes Oscar home and gets a chicken carcass simmering for soup. Dustin and I close down the lift with the boys. On the last run, they go ahead and we can't keep up as we wipe-out on little jumps and tree runs, laughing all the way. Big hugs as we say goodbye. Later he texts, "Thank you for being that friend who makes fun happen. It is good for all of us!" Milo and I pull in to Stoffel's Country Store to check out their fish and pick up eggs. Silas's platy babies have settled in nicely. I decide to get his panda cory's siblings and a swordtail for Oscar's tank. The sun has set and the horizon is purple as we drive west. We listen to another moving podcast on the way. I am so grateful for this time and also ready to be home. To get back to work.
I never planned to be an aquarist. I just fell in to it when Jen and Oscar spontaneously came home with a fishbowl one day, and things "grew" from there, but not at all as I expected they would. I think I have stuck with it because I like researching and learning and because I really like planning and creating community. It's been an exhausting year with a new job found and lost, a good blueberry harvest, building our house, and Jen taking over Wolfsong. Things are calmer now, but I'm still tired and each day I have time where I'm unsure of what I need to do next. So I watch the fish. I wonder if there is anything I can do to improve their lives, if we have room to take in any more.... I can spend a whole day exploring answers to these questions. I have two people in my life who I love dearly who are also aquarists. They were the ones who called me home. Because I loved them as little ones and knew if I wasn't here I would miss out on being with them as they grew into adults. A decade has past since I moved home and now they are on the cusp of middle school. The greatest gift of this hobby has been to share it with them. Hi Wylder and Silas. Oscar is gone at his poppas' house, so I've taken over complete care of his tanks for a few days. After our trip to World of Fish the other week, we moved our molly in to a fish bowl quarantine (at Wylder's suggestion) and she seems much happier there. I did so because our dwarf gourami was picking on her and she looked sick/stressed. Her eye maybe had some ich on it, but that has cleared up now. I'm worried that this tank is too small for her to be in for the long term, but I also really don't want to move her back to the large tank because the loach picks on the gourami and I think they*(see footnoot) would completely terrorize the molly. The fish bowl isn't heated, but is pressed up against the heated 10-gallon tank. I've been keeping track of the temp and it seems to stay around 69-73F, which so far seems okay for her. I did order a filter set-up for the fish bowl. Maybe a solution would be to find something that could hold more water, like a five gallon pickle jar, do they make such a thing? That's a lot of pickles. Of course the ideal solution (but not sure it's one I can afford right now) would be to buy a bigger tank to move loach into and get them some feisty friends that can stand up to their nips. Then move molly back in with gourami. Eventually she should grow bigger than gourami so maybe they'll get along better then. Loach seems to be doing okay. They ate up all the snails (I'm keeping a couple in the fishbowl with molly, so that they can continue to reproduce and provide food for loach, cause I think they need it in their diet). Loach likes to hang out in the shipwreck. I really think of it as their house now. At first we rarely saw them come out of the house, but lately they've been coming out more. They are fast and fun to watch. They nip at gourami some, but gourami is fast and will nip back, so I think he can hold his own. It reminds me of how we might not treat our siblings as good as we treat our friends, but we can still get along okay. Jen did notice yesterday that one of gourami's flowing tentacle things under his chin (what are they called? [Silas has informed me they are called "ventral fins"]) was much shorter than it used to be, which must have been the loach's doing. Gourami is still swimming around just fine though. I want to understand my loach and his behavior better. I really liked what this guy had to say about his loaches in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqfivHPXSZE. The comments below the video were interesting too and made me think of what Wylder said about his tropical tank--how the books say his fish shouldn't get along, but from his observations they do just fine. Are either of you interested in making videos like this one? I really liked being able to watch his fish as he talked about them and their behaviors. If I did have a 30-gallon tank, I would set it up like this: Sandy substrate. Move my pleco and loach over. Maybe get another loach, so mine doesn't get lonely. Maybe another skunk botia, or a zebra/candystripe loach. Get a school of barbs. I'm not sure if they all need to be the same species to school, or if you could get say 3 tiger barbs and 3 ruby barbs to make a school. (https://www.thesprucepets.com/barb-species-1380768) Maybe get a school of zebra danios. (https://www.thesprucepets.com/zebra-danio-1378473). If you got a(nother) 30-gallon tank, how would you set it up? I found a website that is even better than the app on my ipod for calculating your tanks capacity and compatibility: http://www.aqadvisor.com/ I tried it out on a possible set-up for Oscar's 10 gallon if I ever get a 30-gallon. I hope you are both having a good break. How are your rum-bottle shrimp doing, Wylder? Silas, do you have your new tank set up? Do you guys have any ideas on when we should get together again and what we should do? Love, Magdalen *a note on the gender of our fish: I'm pretty sure our molly is female (and refer to her as such) because she seemed to be pregnant when we got her and there were babies in the tank a few days later (maybe hers, maybe the platys, maybe both). I think our gourami is male because of what I have read about the difference in their coloring. I have no idea if our loach is male or female, so I've decided to use gender-neutral pronouns when referring to them. It's a little confusing because a lot of people only use they/them/their when they are referring to multiple people, but that is changing and use of a singular they is more and more common (and I believe socially just). That said, I wasn't raised to use a singular they, so if I'm typing or talking quickly, I may mess up and use 'he' instead of 'they' when referring to my loach, but I'm gonna try my best to use the singular they, because I want to be more practiced at it. Also, I could be wrong about molly and gourami-- baby-making and outward presentation don't necessarily indicate gender, but unfortunately I can't ask them what pronouns they prefer, so with the fish I just make my best guess. As far as people go though, one of our employees on the farm this summer told me, "It's never impolite to ask someone what pronouns they prefer" and I really appreciated the advice and pass it on to you two as well. I know you both as he, but if you ever prefer a different pronoun, I hope you will let me know. Here is a little more about the singular they: http://iheartsingularthey.com/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/09/the-new-they/568993/ And a story I really loved about someone who uses they/them pronouns and wants to have a baby: https://longestshortesttime.com/episode-170-becoming-a-single-dad-while-trans And for those of you who are still with me through all the fish details (I know, it's a lot)...
The (not so) brief story of how I got here: We started with a fish bowl and an Applefest goldfish. After a week he wasn't looking too good, so I did some research and decided we needed to get a 10 gallon tank. Who knew? Why is it even called a "goldfish bowl"? I also didn't know (yet) it would actually be healthy to move some of his dirty water and gravel along with him in to the new tank. Conveniently, the morning he died, we were already headed to Duluth on errands. We went to PetCo for a replacement, but the fish expert there told us a 10 gallon was still too small for a goldfish, so instead we bought a bushynose pleco, a molly, and a platy. As well as a heater, replacement filters, two plants, algae wafers, and tropical fish food. (The fish are cheap, but the stuff they need is not!) Things seemed good. A saw a teeny tiny little fish swimming around one day and learned that the molly and/or the platy probably came home pregnant, and that they would probably eat that teeny tiny fish the first chance they get. A week later, I saw little tiny snails on the glass and learned that snail eggs often come in on live plants. 'Seemed kind of cool at first, but then they multiplied and multiplied. So I started researching what I could get to eat them. Also the platy had died of ich (or really of living in an un-cycled tank, which I also had no idea about), so we had room to bring in something else. I tried a dwarf gourami because it was the only thing I could get in Ashland that might eat snails, but it wasn't doing the job, and the snails were getting out of control. On a previous trip to a pet store I had bought water test strips, so I could figure out when the tank had cycled and the test strip packaging recommended this aquarium app for help managing your tanks. Once I had it on my iPod, I thought it would be fun to get Silas and Wylder to put their aquarium info on there too, so I could keep track of what they have in their tanks in case I could learn from their experiences. That soon grew into an "aquarium club" and road trip to Duluth to get a skunk loach/botia, which Wylder has in his tank to manage the snail population and hasn't seen be too aggressive or lonely like online discussions say they can be. Now you are all caught up. If you have an aquarium or know someone who does, please let me know, because I think it would be fun a field trip for us to check out some other people's set ups. I’ve had a wishy-washy past few days. Missed connections. Second guessing. Gray days. Rain, sleet, snow. On Wednesday I met the poppas in the U.P. for a xmas kiddo exchange. Oscar and I had a great morning together and I was kind of sad to pass him off, but I’ve also really been looking forward to this week of freedom from responsibility to work and family. I just wasn’t sure how to start. I have so many ideas of things I want to do. Write. Cross-country ski. Snowboard. Meet a bestie at the bar and talk and talk and talk. Be with my wife. I had thought I would bring my nephew along to Michigan and continue on to our annual downhill ski date, but I didn’t follow through on convincing him (or myself)--too close to xmas, too little snow--and yet I still mentioned it half-heartedly on Christmas, and as I drive there and back wistfully passing the ski resort turn-offs, I regret not making it happen. And at the same time if feels good to just drive. Listen to music. Deliver the goods. I try to recall the perpetual shopping list in my head as I enter Ashland. I hate shopping and there’s always something I’m putting off getting, but here I am solo in the “city” with time. I pull in to Walgreen’s. Did I see something on Facebook recently that I’m not supposed to shop here? But if not here, where? Wander through the shampoo aisle. I’ve mostly just used the cheapest, the Suave I grew up on, but then I watched Jonathan Van Ness tell one of the guys he was helping on Queer Eye to look for the shampoos that don’t have sulfates, so now I’m on the search for something different. And oh man, it takes TIME to read all those labels and compare prices and weight and DECIDE on something. Someone just tell me what I should be buying. And where! Please! Has anyone tried that bottle-free shampoo bar thing I saw in a FB video? And do they make a conditioner version that will actually get the tangles out of my long hair? Anyway, I finally made it out of there with a bottle of Maui Moisture shampoo and Mane n’ Tail Conditioner. I’m yet to be convinced they are the right thing. But pistachios were on sale and Oscar’s been trying to put them in my cart every time we are in the grocery store together, so that was a win. “As long as I’m shopping, I might as well see if they have any pants at 2nd Look,” I think to myself when I’m back in my car. And they do! Which is the best win of the whole day. I hate clothes shopping and for pants in particular. But my go-to pair has a new hole in the crotch and I need a replacement. I flip through the rack and fill my arm with anything that might do. In the dressing room the first pair fits awesome! and the second! and the third! and then I over hear the cashier telling a customer that all green tags are 75% off!! Thank you, thank you! I buy five pairs for under $20 (one had a yellow tag). I won’t have to shop for a decade maybe. Merry Christmas to me!! I’m hungry. I wish I could just know exactly in this moment if any of my friends are in my proximity and open to a late lunch date. I curse not having a cell phone (which I really only need for this rare moment and the other thankfully-rare moment of being in the ditch) but I also know that my friends mostly don’t check their phones constantly (which I love about them) and if I send them a text now they are just gonna write later that they are sorry they missed me and when can we hang, which is also appreciated and forces the planning for a future meet-up, but doesn’t solve the now of where I can get some food. More decisions! I’m not in the mood to sit down by myself. What’s quick and easy and filling and affordable and environmentally-responsible and somewhat healthy? The coop usually misses on filling and affordable. McDonald’s would be my go-to if I had my kiddo in tow. I mean, play-area! And I usually really like the people that take and deliver my order. I just spent a lot of time googling “Is McDonalds good/bad” and it seems they aren’t the worst. I think they are decent to their employees, provide accessible employment anyway. And they give some specific examples of how they try to use their “scale for good.” Obviously, I’d love it if they could buy their meat locally, but I get why that doesn’t happen, and do my best to include locally-sourced meat in the meals we cook at home. A few years ago, it felt so ironic going the drive-thru after doing my Farm to School work of meeting with farmers and cafeteria directors to strategize about getting more local foods in our communities cafeterias, but sometimes you just gotta eat something anything, when you skip lunch for the big picture and have a 45-minute commute to get back to your family and the beginning of dinner preparations. Speaking of dinner. Our friends generously gifted us their Blue Apron box last week because they were going to be out of town. It was kind of fun when Jen brought it home, because we hear this sort of thing advertised on our podcasts all the time and wonder is that something we’d want to do. No. It’s not. But I still appreciated a little help with the grocery shopping and meal planning this week. First off, there is so much plastic wrapped around every little bottle of hot sauce and two carrots, etc. Secondly, the cooking is way too involved to not have leftovers! I’m guessing both of these situations would be remedied a bit if you bought the “family box” version, but still, I think I’m gonna stick with buying the little cardboard box of Zatarain’s. I mean you need to go to the grocery store for eggs, coffee, whatever anyway. Then you can pick up a Zatarain’s box in the rice aisle, a box of pasta, some tortillas, go to the produce section and buy whichever fruits and vegetables look good and aren’t too expensive (buying seasonally). If I’m still stumped, the Zatarain’s box gives some ideas of how to “Veggify” and there might even be something local I can buy. Organic, local, whatever though, if you just do your best to buy yourself and your family some fresh fruits and veggies you're winning. Proteins I think are pretty individualized. I’m grateful to have people in my life that raise pigs and hunt. I look for the Amish-brand chicken and local eggs. We are so fortunate to get fish from the lake. I can also get down with some beans, cheese and/or greek yogurt (it’s delicious with everything AND good for you!). I’m not always eating the perfect proteins. But I try. Cooking lately has mostly felt like a chore, except making this soup using ground pork and squash (which we have always surplus of) and herbs that had recently died and dried in their pots in my window. My houseplants have to be pretty resilient to survive my distraction. I never know when they might give up (which makes me sad) or come back to life (which gives me so much joy). I added a bit of flour in the sauté and cream at the end. It fed us for three glorious undistracted days. This last year has been a roller coaster for me, with lots of highs and lows. I have a hard time writing about it mostly because it has just felt like a lot and I'm not good at sorting out what to speak of and what to leave out... I've felt very moved but also very uncomposed. In short: I found work that I love and then my position wasn't funded, so I'm not able to continue with it (at this time). We built a house and moved in to it and have had to jump through a bunch of hoops with the bank to get the money to pay for it. Jen took over the dogsledding trip business. Oscar is his own little roller-coaster as all kids are. Drives me nuts on the daily, but overall, a pretty great kid that concurrently centers me. Stressed with the house and work, Jen and I have had our share of shouting matches, and in the midst of them he is calmly in the middle saying "Moms. Moms. Just stop. Just stop moms." Through it all I think Jen and I have been good partners. Learned a lot about when and how we can lean on each other and when and how we need to stand on our own. I've picked up work with the Bayfield After-School program. I hang out with first graders a few times a week. They wear me out and fill me up. I am grateful for the chance to begin to know them and look forward to overlapping with them as they grow. I contemplate grad school (what I’ve mostly done for these last few wishy-washy days). I feel behind starting a new program/career now, but also if I don't start now, maybe I’m stuck as a farmer, and I never said I wanted to be a farmer. I just wanted to be home. But I do love pruning. And my kiddo and nephews growing up with the farm. This summer my nephews started working on the farm a lot more. Silas did all the grass-mowing. They both helped out some with harvest. During the harvest their dad my brother Chris is responsible for driving the trailer of picked fruit up from the field to go in the cooler. When the boys were little they liked to ride along on the trailer. And then I have this image from this summer-- I'm sitting in front of the shop waiting to help any customers who drive in and Chris drives the trailer up from the field and Silas and Milo are sprawled amongst the picking lugs. Long legs kicked up, their hair sweaty and sticking to their foreheads, their bodies tired from the work, their faces so calm and content. Not quite adults, or even teenagers, but definitely grown up.
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AuthorsMagdalen Dale and Kaite Sweval grew up a layer apart, overlapping and paralleling. Belonging to the shores of Lake Superior and yet not quite belonging. Laughing and dreaming on the bench outside the ferry booth as Mag passed the time and Kaite chose her time. Left to explore as soon as they could. And then as adults returned home, perhaps to their surprise. But glad to have each other... ‘cause we know there is strength in the differences between us and comfort where we overlap. Archives
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