Yearly Archives: 2014

Colorado, The Move

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Fall                                                                                 Falling Leaves Moon

Another house, another surge of energy and questions. Like:

1. Does household use only for a well mean no watering of a garden?

2. How do they anchor fences in rock? Does that make building a fence much more expensive in the mountains?

3. What does 6.5 gallons per minute recovery on the well mean?

1. how do we get info about the septic system?

2. how do we get more info about the well: depth, water quality, water quantity?

Has the cedar siding on black mtn been treated with fire retardant chemicals?

Easy to sit back home and let the questions come, then 1 e-mail, then a second, then a third. I don’t want to be too cautious, but I also don’t want to buy something with flaws obvious to someone who knows the local scene. Water quality, availability and flow rate are all important in water poor Colorado. Fire is a big issue with mountain homes in Colorado’s fire red zone, a zone which happens to include all the areas we’ve investigated so far.

These questions are in addition to square footage, usability of the space, attractiveness of the house and lot, privacy, kitchen, all the ordinary factors. We can assess those using our own subjective yard sticks and make firm, confident decisions, but in matters we know less well, like water and fire, hesitancy seems prudent.

All of these questions swirl around because we have the means to make this move and the will. So they’re happy problems, or questions, but they are questions.

 

Art and Culture, Friends

Quirky

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Fall                                                                                  Falling Leaves Moon

After lunch yesterday, Bill Schmidt went on further north, going up highway 95 from Marine toward the use to be town of Franconia, now home to a quirky, but sensational sculpture park. He took a few photographs.

Thanks Bill for sharing lunch and the photographs. BTW: Franconia sculpture park is on 95 just south of Highway 8.

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Colorado, Friends, The Move, Woolly Mammoths

End Times

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Fall                                                                               Falling Leaves Moon

Maybe I’ll look back a year from now, from somewhere high in the Rockies when the sky hits mountain blue and the cirrus mimic the tails of nearby horses, maybe I’ll look back and remember this day. 62, sunny, blue skies with high wispy cirrus clouds and leaves just starting to turn. And a drive east toward Stillwater, toward the St. Croix, with the intention of lunch with Bill Schmidt at the Gasthaus Bavarian Hunter, but finding it full, going to Sal’s Angus Grill, a biker bar in Whitworth. Whitworth? An intersection, near as I can tell, with a huge ballroom and Sal’s, the whole town.

The drive from here took me east through the northern reaches of the Twin Cities exurbs, across Anoka County with its sod farms and nurseries, lakes and marshes and forest, then across Washington County with its expensive country estates, more marsh and lakes and plenty of cute decorations for Halloween. It was an hour so of ambling through the very southern end of the Boreal Forest, seeing the blue-black lakes reflecting back the sky, choppy with light winds. A lot of other folks out, too, just driving, seeing an October wonder day.

Bill invited me to lunch and I picked the spot since he was driving on from there to see the color along the St. Croix, something he and his late wife, Regina, would often do, meandering as the day took them. That’s how we ended up at Sal’s, wandering north from the Gasthaus. We ate, talked about the move to Colorado, his family, but mostly we affirmed our now long friendship, passing an October lunch with each other.

And so the end times have begun. I expect no rapture, no bugles, no seals breaking, no anti-Christ rising but I do anticipate moving from this place, my home for over 40 years. With that move so much will become past. The Gasthaus. An easy lunch with a friend of many years. Access on a whim to houses and neighborhoods where I’ve lived or where Kate lived. The cultural riches here: the Guthrie, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and the MIA especially. Those early years in medical practice for Kate. All of my ministry. Raising kids time. All that will become more past than now since their physical context will be far away.

The end times, at least the Christian version, is followed by that great wakin’ up morning when the dead rise from their graves. So too it will be with us following the end times here, a whole new life will rise from the ashes of this one. I look forward to it.

Colorado, Humor, The Move

Later on

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Fall                                                                                         Falling Leaves Moon

Went for dinner tonight at Osaka. I love their sashimi special roll. It felt like cheating on Kate though, since I don’t recall ever having gone there without her. So, I called her. She reported that the romantic Russian composer street house had an uneven first level, a studio that would have required $50,000 to bring up to code, no space to hang art and too many steps. That’s why we sent her out there. No regrets.

She’s still looking, has her eye on a particular place. She plans to drive around by herself tomorrow, looking at houses, then she and Ann Beck will resume on Tuesday.

While I waited at the Wings Joint on Friday, I picked up a paper I only read when I’m there, Tidbits. It had some aphorisms called old farmer’s advice. Not sure they’re from old farmers, or farmers at all, but I found a few of them amusing:

Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight, and bull-strong.

Keep skunks and bankers at a distance.

Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.

And, my favorite: Don’t pick a fight with an old man. If he is too old fight, he’ll just kill you.

 

 

Colorado, Memories, Minnesota, The Move

Losses

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Fall                                                                                   Falling Leaves Moon

The Wing Joint. It’s a symbol of the loss.

Let me explain. In 1975 I began a year long internship at Bethlehem-Steward Presbyterian Church at the corner of 26th St. and Pleasant Ave. The focus of this work was neighborhood ministry, finding out what the needs of the area were and responding to them in some concrete fashion. This was work I could do and did not involve me in the more philosophically ambiguous (for me) worship, educational and pastoral life of a local congregation.

Over the course of those years, which included a good deal of time at South Central Ministry, based out of the old Stewart Presbyterian building which sits three blocks south of Lake Street on Stevens Avenue right next to the freeway sound barriers, my work at South Central was even more politically and neighborhood focused than at Bethlehem-Stewart.

That was when I found the Wings Joint. It was run by a Chinese guy and sat on Nicollet, maybe 8 blocks south of Lake Street. These were the best wings I’d ever had. Crispy, always moist on the inside and just a bit of zing, which could be amped up with the hot sauce. At the end of my day (often after 10 pm) at South Central, I’d stop by the wings joint, pick up some wings, then buy a six-pack of beer and get started on both on my way home. This was one of those urban equivalents of a special bay on a lake or a place with rare plant species in a forest, a unique haven, a place with qualities you could find no where else.

Then, I moved away from South Central and away from every week visits to the Wing Joint, though I would still, on occasion, go back to it.

When we moved to Andover, it seemed that all those unique finds, gathered over many years of wandering the streets and inner city neighborhoods of Minneapolis and St. Paul, would disappear.

Imagine my surprise when I read in a newspaper article that the Wings Joint had moved to Blaine. Blaine! I knew where that was now. So, I hunted down the the Wings Joints new spot. It’s in a strip mall with little presence, concrete block buildings with a Subway, an Asian grocery store and a Nail joint. But it was the same place. The same wings.

So on occasion, as I did Friday after dropping Kate at the airport, I take off Highway 610 at University and drive north, well into what used to be the heart of Blaine, stopped at the Wings Joint and enjoyed their atmosphere, unchanged from the Lake Street days. At least in my memory.

When we move to the mountains, to a state far away, all these special places: urban havens, Scientific and Natural Areas, places along Lake Superior will be lost. Not disappeared, of course not, but there will be no equivalent surprise of finding that unique Denver spot all of a sudden taken up residence in Idaho Springs. I don’t have the memories.

Making those equivalent memories in Colorado is something I look forward to, that slow accumulation of local knowledge, but the utility of all that Minnesota knowledge will fade away, useful only for the very occasional trip back.

 

Colorado, Memories, The Move

Fully Awake

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Fall                                                                                          Falling Leaves Moon

11 hours of sleep last night, a nap this afternoon, by tomorrow I’ll be back in the land of the fully awake, a state I try to encourage on as many levels as possible. Still feeling a bit numb from the sudden whirlwind of energy about the Tchaikovsky Road house. I didn’t mention that it had a great address, 329 romantic Russian composer street.

I remember, come to think of it, another stupid state, finals stupid. Just before, during and in the immediate aftermath of final exams my world would narrow to streams of data, large chunks of ideas and my focus would be tight. Cooking was ramen noodles, mac and cheese. Lots of coffee, pencils, outlines and summaries. Finals stupid and move stupid are very similar though move stupid has occupied a longer period of time. They both simplify and constrict the flow of information, ratcheting down to those matters relevant to the task.

It’s simplification and constriction that produce the effect, the shoving out of irrelevances, pushing them to the periphery and maintaining attention, a most precious cognitive resource, where it needs to be. But these are not states I would want to last very long. They produce an intense concentration on particular results, necessary, yes, but there are other pursuits that call to me.

Colorado, The Move

The Scout and The Homesteader

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Fall                                                                                       Falling Leaves Moon

Kate’s in Gilpin County right now, or on her way there, looking at the house we both liked. She’ll see several others over today and Monday.

Meanwhile I slept from 11 pm last night until 10 this morning. All that house hunting energy that kept me awake yesterday morning dissipated and left me sleep deprived. Got up at 5:45 am to feed the dogs, back to bed at 5:59. Being sleep deprived is difficult for me, I don’t like the feeling, call it sleep stupid, and my backup personality comes closer to the surface. That is, impatient, easy to anger. Well, it’s my backup personality in my estimation.

Maybe, it just struck me, that sleep deprivation puts me in a particular mood and keeps me there for the duration. I’ve become intrigued with moods recently. Moods are the local weather of the psyche while personality is the climate. Maybe I experience temporary global warming heating up my weather during sleep deprivation.

Gotta go outside and strengthen the silt fencing again. Rigel, and in her trail, Vega were playing in the resurfaced area, the part where we had to have a bobcat take care of their efforts over the last three years.

In this moment Kate’s the scout and I’m the homesteader. Gotta go done homesteader stuff.

 

Colorado, The Move

Move Stupid

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Fall                                                                                         Falling Leaves Moon

Saw an ad for Army Strong. Well, I’m move stupid. There seemed little room this week for Latin or leisure reading or relaxing into an idea, letting the mind drift. Yes, a bit of time for art but even at the Walker I felt rushed. Thank goodness the garden has gone to bed. Sleep tight, baby.

These pursuits, which I consider my normal activity, the stuff that gets me up in the morning and excited about the day after, have been crowded out by movers, mortgages, the hunt for a new home, diving-Scrooge McDuck like-into our finances, tweeking and checking, ordering the septic tank pumped out, figuring out medicare when we move, a long list of things, intensified by meeting with the stager and the realtor on Wednesday.

These are all boxes that require check marks. So, it’s not like this is optional activity.

And, yes, the move gets more exciting as we press further along. It got very real last night and this morning.

Poking around on a real estate website, I found a house I wanted. Kate agreed. It was in our price range, in a location we considered desirable, with an idiosyncratic design. It’s sort of a conch shell turned broad side down with smaller areas as you move up.

Last night I got so excited I had trouble sleeping. We had to move on this right away. I just knew it. That was where the tweeking and checking came in. And so. When we did move on it around 9:30 am, we found that an offer had gone in earlier this morning. And, most likely, was accepted. But, we could make a second offer. Since we’d only seen pictures we couldn’t do that blind.

Kate left this afternoon for Colorado for a viewing of this house and a few others. We probably won’t get it, just a half-inch too late. But we have no chance if Kate doesn’t evaluate it and decide whether we put in a second-place offer. We got her on a Spirit airlines flight scheduled to leave at 2:07. She called me at 3:45 to say, “Guess where I am?” Terminal 2? Yep.

All this made the whole process more intense for a few hours. More imminent. I imagine I’ll be move stupid for days, if not weeks to come.

Art and Culture, Faith and Spirituality, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., The Move

A Mind-Full Lunch

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Fall                                                                                Falling Leaves Moon

 

At the Walker. Shocked out of my move fixation, gladly so. What I hoped for.  A major exhibition covering years when art turned over on itself and the Walker made its reputation as a nationally significant contemporary art space, Art Expanded, 1958–1978, challenges boring old representational painting, stiff granite sculpture, and anything else considered traditional or usual at the time.

It got me immediately into careful looking, following disinhibited artists as they struggled to use a radical new freedom, going with them to places absurd and funny. An example of the latter is a small notation for a happening:  Turn the radio on, turn it off at the first sound. This zeitgeist was mine as a young adult, traditional sexual mores, traditional career paths, traditional power structures, traditional decorum was all suspect and suspect in such a way that the burden of proving itself useful to the human project lay on tradition.

The Walker is an osmotic membrane, the world of art pushes at its curators and they try to let through only the most innovative, most balls against the wall, most beautiful, most lyrical of the very new. It is an antidote to burying myself in the minutiae of moving. So easy to do. Artists trying to replace sculpture with three video screens, two larger and one smaller between them, stacked vertically, with strings like those of a bass arranged in front of the screens and a stool behind for the screenist to use while playing push me away from the taskiness of the move and back into the realm of, “Oh! What’s this?” A place I consider my natural habitat.

So it did not surprise me when I sat down to eat lunch that my mind strayed to a mind-full meal. It went like this. I had a fruit salad and a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich. Fork into grape. Huh. Roots captured water, distributed it up a vine and into the developing fruit, swelling this taut case until it was full. The leaves captured solar energy and created carbohydrates. Sweet. Wine. Kate and I at the KSNJ dinner on Kate’s 70th. Mogen David. A melon. Kate makes melon salads every summer, puts them in a long plastic container and we eat them throughout the week. Pineapple chunk. A happy worker makes good fruit. The Dole plantation philosophy on Lanai, now abandoned to the techno-baron Larry Eliot and his desire to create a sustainable, profitable community. Strawberry. California’s Central Valley. Drought. The precious water contained in this strawberry might have come from last year’s snow pack in the Rocky Mountains. Then, the bread. I don’t eat bread anymore, but half a grilled cheese sounded so good. I went ahead. Diabetes. Why do the things I like a lot turn out to be bad for me? Days of grilled cheese and Campbell’s tomato soup. An Alexandria, Indiana gourmet lunch.

Now this is not mindful in the way of savoring the grape as a tight oval, bursting with juice, breaking the skin with sharp front teeth and feeling the first squirt of liquid on the tongue sort of mindful. No, this is a mind-full lunch in which I allowed free association to guide and slow my eating. The blueberries. Those Augusts on the North Shore wandering through burned over or clear cut forests, gathering wild berries, eating as many as I picked. The blueberries we have outside in our orchard. That sort of mind-full.

Great Wheel

May the Circle Be Unbroken

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Fall                                                                                  Falling Leaves Moon

sun calendarThis calendar, circular, with the sun’s hourly presence each day indicated in the middle by a somewhat squashed circle, displays a yearly calendar  that conforms to my understanding of time. Rather than day running after day in small squares, linear fashion, on this calendar the days and the months follow each other in curved segments of a circle, finally rejoining, December 31st and January 1st. As opposed to most Westerners, I privilege the circularity of time, the Great Wheel, which, like this calendar, follows the earth around the sun and, like this calendar, begins again where it has been artificially ended.

It’s easy to forget, in our casual way of saying what hour it is, or what day it is, or what year it is, that none of this segmentation has any but the most abstract relationship to the natural world. The year, for example, marks a spot in earth’s revolution around the sun, erects a flagpole, or, better, a timepole and says this is a lap marker. Each time we pass this timepole we’re going to add one unit to the last one. By not so common agreement we start counting units for calendar purposes on a date supposedly coincident with the death of a man claimed to be a god, two-thousand and fourteen laps ago. I say not so common agreement because the various numbers to put on this “year” vary a good bit among Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Chinese and Old Church Orthodox, just to name a few.

Though this is a very common human meme, the calendar and its year, it is not given in the nature of earth’s orbit. What observation of the orbit suggests is the linked nature of time, it’s non-divisable reality (perhaps even its non-reality). What I choose to emphasize is the turning of the Great Wheel, with its repetitive though not identical seasons, its warm periods and cool periods, its fertile days and its fallow days. In this way, too, I choose to emphasize the ongoingness of human life. The human cycle, which follows the Great Wheel by analogy, understands birth as the springtime of a life, adulthood in the fertile seasons, and the time of aging and death, analogous to the fallow time. And this cycle, though it apparently begins and ends in each individual’s life, in fact, goes on with births following deaths and deaths following births.

May the circle be unbroken…