Posts Tagged ‘friends’
Favorite Antidepressant
First of all, the weather yesterday was idyllic. That alone goes a long way to soothe a person’s angst. Beyond that, my favorite antidepressant is getting outdoors for exercise with a group of people who I know and love. I have known most of the people who showed up to ride for almost thirty years from the annual June bike trip called the Tour of Minnesota.
Our route along the Dakota Rail Regional Trail took us right past the home of my good friends, Mike and Barb Wilkus, so I brought a bunch of the riders off the trail to say hi to Mike.
He opened his garage to show us the camping trailer he was packing for a little getaway they have planned.
My biking group did this same warm-up ride last year but I failed to realize we were going right past the Wilkus’ place. Upon figuring it out, Rich Gordon and I stopped to surprise them. This year, I warned Mike that I’d be coming by, not mentioning the part about bringing 8 other cyclists with me.
The other thing we did yesterday on the ride was revisit a stop at the Big Stone Sculpture Garden in Minnetrista. A number of us reenacted last year’s pose in front of the word Love carved into stone.
We pedaled and visited for 30 miles which served to rekindle my deep appreciation for these precious friends.
Thank goodness Rich is adept at capturing pictures of us as we ride. Thanks for all the photos, Rich!
The joy of biking with these folks is the primary reason I have returned to the annual June biking and camping event year after year. Yesterday served as an excellent primer to inspire my preparations for the trip that will start in Albany, MN this year. Riding the country roads around my home all by myself isn’t as rewarding but getting in some preliminary hours on the saddle always goes a long way toward minimizing discomfort for a week of riding in the middle of June.
NOT having sore butt bones when you will be riding day after day is also an antidepressant, if you know what I mean.
I would be even happier if the week in June isn’t rainy or stormy, but I won’t frame that as a requirement. I’ll throw that inspiration out there as a potential bonus.
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Telling Trail
Our darling puppy was up to mischief while I was showering yesterday. When I opened the curtain I discovered a trail of evidence strewn across the floor. Somebody was nosing around in a waste basket where they weren’t supposed to be. Who would do such a thing?
Well, our little troublemaker wasn’t smart about hiding his tracks. Asher left behind a critical piece of evidence that gave away his presence.
On Monday, it will be three weeks since we brought home our adopted pup. Cyndie shared a graphic with me that refers to a general 3/3/3 guideline of the adjustment period for a dog after adoption. Three days to decompress/three weeks to learn our routine/three months to start to feel at home.
I didn’t really notice Asher needing to decompress during those first days, but I did wonder what he must be thinking about the change. He is definitely learning our routine and adjusting to it very well, for the most part. There have been several times when he has tested our boundaries. In a couple of months, he will feel at home and hopefully by that time he will have accepted all the boundaries we established.
Today, I am on another kind of trail. I will be joining some of my cycling friends for a ride on the Dakota Rail Regional Trail, heading west out of Wayzata. I need to get serious about putting in saddle time in advance of my annual expedition on the Tour of Minnesota which happens in the middle of June.
In just a couple of blinks, June will be here. I hope the ground dries up enough by then that I will be able to mow the areas I’ve been skipping because they’re too wet.
Here’s hoping the smoke from Canadian wildfires won’t make breathing difficult for bicycling today. I rarely find myself riding with friends at the beginning of my cycling season and I’m looking forward to the chance to visit with folks while pedaling along.
At least we finally have a weekend with pleasant weather to be outdoors without a raincoat.
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Relatively Damp
Am I prone to understatement? Not always. Sometimes I go to the other extreme. My natural inclination is to be contrarian, so instead of titling this post, “Soaking !#@$ Wet,” I settled on a genteel descriptor for current conditions. The ground around here is actually wetter than an entirely saturated sponge this morning.
I’m sure the trees are soaking this up with glee. Buds are sprouting from every stem and branch and noticeably increasing the hues of green emerging by the day.
Yesterday’s World Labyrinth Day event brought ten visitors to Wintervale, six of whom are family, four friends, plus a small dog. After some stutter-starts at the meeting of dogs, Asher settled into a wonderful acceptance of all the activity, people, and the one pet unfamiliar to him in his new home. All signs continue to hint that we will find success soon in Asher developing into the pet we are hoping he will become for us.
As long as he refrains from putting his nose on the kitchen counter, then his paws, and reaching for an unfinished scone on a plate, or shredding the cover of the pad in his crate, or getting back up on the living room couch again, or failing to recognize we are speaking to him and directing commands his way for compliance.
He appears to be relatively willing to suppress his natural instincts and behave exactly as we desire at all times.
Hah!
Yeah, we got this.
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Counting Candles
No, I didn’t actually count them. I did ask one of the staff how many candles and their response was, “A lot!” Last night we met our friends Barb and Mike for dinner at the self-proclaimed “hip, urban venue” Cafe Lurcat next to Loring Park in Minneapolis and then moved to the spectacle in a spectacle of a candlelight concert by a string quartet in St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral.
It looked as fascinating with the lights on as it did with them off, although the warm glow was a better setting for the performance of string quartet music from Bach to The Beatles. It almost felt like I was getting some high culture, except for the welcome casualness of the hostess and performers combined with tunes I actually grew up listening to.
It was nothing short of supremely cool. I am in awe of the musician’s abilities and really grateful that people rally to put on shows like this. Really, that’s a lot of candles.
No candles for us today. World Labyrinth Day has arrived and we’ve got lots of last-minute preparation to finish. Our landscape is soaking wet after multiple dousings yesterday, but if the next round of passing showers could hold off until after 3:00, that would be just great.
Let the wave of peace pass over the world uninterrupted! It’s already rolling along…
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Mud Returns
Pick your adage: Be careful what you wish for. What could possibly go wrong? You never know how things will turn out. How much worse can it get?
It’s March. We are ready to be done plowing and shoveling snow. We are looking forward to seeing the ground again. We want the snow to melt. However, the ground doesn’t suddenly thaw out all at once. Just like it freezes from the top layer on down, it melts in the very same way.
Well, the top layer has thawed just beyond the overhang and it is now a muddy, mucky mess. The water can’t soak into the ground because the next layer down is still frozen solid. Water is just standing in hoof-sized pools.
My perpetual quest to clean up manure beneath and around the overhang promptly becomes an unwinnable battle when fresh droppings land in the pockmarked slurry of muck the horses keep walking in. It is a Sisyphean task that I nonetheless continue to wage despite the mess and my limited success.
Meanwhile, the space beneath the roof suddenly becomes an even more luxurious oasis than it usually is.
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The long day of drizzling rain was beginning to become sleet blown sideways by gusty winds when I went down to feed the horses at dinnertime. Beneath the overhang, it was calm and dry. Once again, I found myself praising the location and orientation of this barn.
The mud might be around for a long time to come in the days and weeks ahead but we are already starting to get antsy for conditions to allow me to get back to landscaping projects and Cyndie to try walking the uneven terrain down to the labyrinth. We have hopes of being able to promote World Labyrinth Day on May 6 this year if the ground dries up enough for hosting larger gatherings by then.
I’d like to offer a shout-out to friends, Patty and Steve who plan to visit us in April to experience Wintervale in person for the first time. Here’s to the gift of unexpected connections/reconnections that seem divinely inspired. Thanks for reaching out to us, Patty!
We are three days from the vernal equinox. I’m sensing spring is preparing to be sprung. Is that too much to wish for?
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Subscription Confirmation
What did I click on without realizing it? I have no doubt that possibly happened. I also would not be surprised to learn that this company which I’m not going to bother naming chose to subtly opt me in without informing me.
I received an email with the subject line: “Subscription Confirmation.”
“You’ve accepted the following offer”
“Your subscription automatically renews until canceled.”
Huh? Wasn’t me. Cyndie assures me that she didn’t subscribe to anything. Ten bucks a month if we didn’t notice and cancel.
I will take great comfort in whatever struggle is involved in asserting my intention to get this subscription canceled.
More pressing things are on my mind as we pack up to drive home this afternoon. Mother Nature is keeping me occupied by delivering messy precipitation before I finished clearing all the snow that fell last Thursday. In our haste to drive to the lake on Friday, I left the deep snow around the hay shed and in front of the barn unplowed. I also didn’t finish clearing snow off the pavement in front of the shop.
As we were leaving Friday with our eyes on yesterday’s American Birkebeiner ski race adventures and a weekend with our friends, the Williams family, I felt it was well worth skipping out on snow-clearing chores at home.
UMD student Ella skied the big 50K race in pretty decent winter conditions. I thought the wind was a little brisk for spectating, but that would be a rather petty complaint to make in the face of the many hours-long efforts the skiers exert.
This morning my phone alerted me to a storm warning for tonight and tomorrow at home that will start with rain and turn to snow. I really dread dealing with that on top of the areas of snow I have yet to clear.
I didn’t sign up for that. In fact, I’d like to cancel any subscriptions that involve rain during our winter months.
Thank goodness the ski race in Hayward happened in good snow conditions. Just moments ago, while I was writing this in the sunroom overlooking the frozen lake where several deer had run across toward the island, one of the local eagles flew into the large pine tree just beyond our deck.
It did some wiggling with wings flailing on the far side of the trunk and Cyndie wondered if the eagle was eating something. Then the powerful bird took flight with a good-sized branch it had broken from the tree and headed for its nest over our tennis court on the far side of the fateful footbridge over the lagoon.
I would rather sign up for more of this than tomorrow’s weather adventures expected to occur at home.
But heck, either way… ADVENTURE!
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Accident Scene
Something clicked when we reached the intersection of Hwys 63 & 77 in Hayward. I told Cyndie I felt a moment of post-traumatic stress at the sight of the interchange as it triggered a memory of driving through it toward the emergency room at Hayward Hospital.
I went through that intersection twice more that night, on the way to and from the pharmacy in Walmart where I also needed to find wide-leg sweatpants for Cyndie to put on before leaving the hospital. I found a mauve-colored, elastic waist velvet number that Cyndie is prone to describing as “hideous” but she always follows that with the clarification that she loves them and they became her favorite pant during those weeks of recovery.
I asked Cyndie if she wanted to revisit the scene of her accident last November at the footbridge over the lagoon.
Without hesitation, her response was an emphatic “NO!”
Beyond the fact she didn’t want to get that close to the memory right now, the amount of snow and her hobbled condition make that walk ill-advised. From the comfort of the cabin, I took a photo in the general direction of that bridge.
I didn’t feel like walking out there, either.
In fact, we are watching the start of the American Birkebeiner while snugged on the couch.
We will be heading out to see Ella Williams ski her second Birkie after her wave crosses the start line. Trying to pick her out of the online streamed view of the thousand skiers staging for their wave is our first thrill of the day.
Soon we will don our winter wear and venture out to a convenient crossing at 00 (doublel-oh) to cheer her on in person. Then we will drive to town to watch the finish.
It will be an interesting test of how much walking Cyndie’s ankle will tolerate outdoors in the cold.
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Fine Grill
Despite the dreary conditions yesterday –rain all day in February!?– Cyndie and I braved the low-visibility drive to meet our friends halfway for dinner on Valentine’s Day. Barb and Mike drove east from the far side of Lake Minnetonka and we drove west from our place and we arrived at the St. Paul Grill at the same time –ten minutes before our 6:00 reservation.
Their car was immediately in front of us in the line for valet service. What were the odds of that?
It is such a treat to be pampered by professionals on a night out at a fine-dining restaurant. The doorman wearing a deadman wool felt top hat guided us in dropping off and picking up our cars with wonderful panache. He had us feeling like Hollywood royalty.
Once seated at our table, we met our server, Hillary, who paced everything to a T with the support of a precision crew of runners and bussers.
I guess it proved the adage of getting what you pay for because this was not an inexpensive night out.
It would have been great if I’d captured a shot of the scrumptious food as soon as our plates arrived but doing anything other than eating when dinner is placed in front of me becomes near impossible.
By the time I thought to pull out my phone to capture a record of the aftermath, it was all napkins and coffee cups. You miss out on seeing the fancy Delmonico ribeye steaks, pan-fried walleye, signature hashbrowns with bacon and white onions, and asparagus spears with hollandaise.
Since it was Valentine’s Day, conversation was peppered with recollections of our first dates, engagements, and some foggy details about discovering first pregnancies. I won’t go into detail about the story of a card from a game that read: cooler of organs being misread as “cooler of orgasms.”
Our hearts were filled to overflowing with great friends and great food leading to a really great night out. We didn’t let all that rain dampen our spirits one tiny bit.
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Prom Night
It might be a little early in the calendar year for the school prom but that’s where we were last night. Cyndie, Elysa, and I made the long drive to the Chanhassen Dinner Theater to attend a performance of “The Prom” because a Hays relation is in a leading role.
Elysa got us discounted tickets provided to MacPhail Center for Music which led to a festive number of connections throughout the evening.
In a wonderful web of fewer than six degrees of association, Cyndie and I met Austin Wahl. See if you can follow this:
- Our friend, Gary Larson hosts periodic music evenings in his home and invited me to play guitar.
- On one of these occasions, we meet his friend, Ned Wahl who also plays guitar.
- We soon learn that Ned already knows our daughter, Elysa through his interactions at MacPhail.
- Ned’s son, Austin takes a position teaching at MacPhail.
Elysa was exchanging greetings with multiple people from MacPhail connections early on. When she said, “This is Austin Wahl,” Cyndie and I exclaimed, “Ned’s son!”
That was a wonderful bonus on top of the main attraction of our night. Monty Hays performs in the role of Emma, an Indiana teen whose prom is canceled because she is a lesbian who wanted to bring her girlfriend as her date.
Monty’s dad is my nephew, Beau Hays, son of my brother, Elliott.
Family resemblance? If not clearly apparent in our faces, the mannerisms tend to be revealing.
We guessed that it has been 13 years since we have seen each other. Beau reminded me that he has yet to visit our place in Wisconsin because he missed the big family gathering in 2014 when a tire blew out on his way here.
We’ll have to remedy that because brief greetings amidst a swirl of energy during the opening weekend at a dinner theater among friends and multiple generations of family relations is a tad chaotic. They need to come to hang out with some horses and linger with us.
Opening night of “The Prom” was Friday but Monty’s parents, Beau and Katy, were out of town until yesterday, so this was their first time seeing the show. We gathered in the bar after the show to greet Monty where emotions ran high at the sight of not only Mom and Dad, but also unexpected relatives.
A rare sighting of these five Hays relations in one place at the same time.
Monty’s performance is stellar and the musical is an entertaining dose of humor, real-life drama, live music, great singing, and impressive dance routines.
A STORY OF LOVE, ACCEPTANCE AND EMBRACING THE PERSON YOU WERE MEANT TO BE!
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Blind Spot
In my opinion, eyewitness testimony is not as reliable as it is generally made out to be. After a recent incident of missing puzzle pieces, I have lost all confidence in my own ability to see what’s right in front of my face.
Upon completing the first of the latest puzzles my sister shared with us, there were two missing pieces. Having knocked plenty off the table while assembly was in progress, my initial response was to search the rug below. I laid down to scan the surface but found nothing.
A day later, we spread out the 2000 pieces of the next puzzle. I assembled all but one piece of the border and started wondering if that last piece might have fallen to the floor. By merely bending over to scan the floor, I instantly caught sight of one of the missing pieces from the previous puzzle.
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Where the heck was that piece when I looked for it the day before? More importantly, how did my eyes fail to see what was laying out in plain sight?
A short while later, between drying baking bowls and utensils, I spotted the last border piece that had been evading my eyes up to that point. I had abandoned the Vikings game after it became an obvious losing effort to join the party going on in the kitchen. Since my skills aren’t in the preparation of food, I make my contribution by cleaning up afterward.
Our friend, Melissa and our daughter, Elysa came for the day to help Cyndie in a second round of Christmas Cookie baking.
Unfortunately for me, I don’t seem to have any difficulty seeing the expanse of cookie options covering our countertops. My A1C levels might not be at their preferred number for a while.
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Relative Something 