Nothing's Better Than a Ham Sandwich

Scene: Matt, Maia and I are driving to the recycling center. Maia is occupied with pointing out Ford pickups.

Maia: There's one! And another one! And one over there! AND ONE RIGHT THERE!

She sees another one with an old-school bouncy horse in the bed

Maia: And another one! WITH A PONY IN IT!

Me: Wow, a Ford pickup AND a pony!

Maia: YAH!

Me: It doesn't get any better than that.

Maia: Yes, it does.

Me: Really?

Maia: Yah.

Me (incredulous): What could be better than a pickup with a pony? What would make that better?

Maia: FISH!

Feeling At Home

Every year we go down to the lighthouse to watch the town shoot fireworks over the ore docks for Independence Day. Even though there is only one road in and out, traffic is not an issue because it's such a small town. We can see Duluth and Superior and Port Wing fireworks from where we sit, and the railroad turns the lights off on the docks so they don't ruin the show.

When a shell is shot in the air, the docks echo with a curious descending groan. When the shell explodes, the docks rumble and shake as if someone is banging them together. It's like two shows in one.

Matt and I have been feeling more and more comfortable here. Even though it's hard to fit into a small town, we are happy with who we know and the level of involvement we have with things. But more than that, we're happy with the town's values -- what it's willing to pay for, what is important to it.

A couple weeks before school was out, I went to the school to help out with a big landscaping effort. After several years of raising money, the PTA was ready to break ground on an outdoor classroom. This involved all the classes planting trees, bushes and flowers that day. Everyone helped and the result was beautiful. The next day, the kids dedicated the plantings with a presentation that included poems and songs, and then finished with the whole school singing "This Land Is Your Land." It felt good.

Last night, we set off some fireworks after we came home from the city's show. As I was setting up some of the cones, Maia and John caught lightning bugs. The quiet greenish light shone on their hands as they stood still, holding the bugs carefully.

June Flowers

One thing I enjoy very much about living here is getting to know our land and the way it changes throughout the year. When I walk in the woods, I like to take the same walk I took the day before, or even that morning, and see what has grown or bloomed or died back. If you had told me in college that I would become a wildflower hobbyist, I would have backed slowly away. But I have, and I love it.

So far, in the years we've been here, a different flower seems to have a surge every spring. Two years ago, we had a ton of Clintonia. Last year we had a bumper crop of sarsaparilla. This year seems to be a good year for bunchberries. In June, almost everything that blooms is white. The crop of white flowers is set off by marsh marigolds in the middle of May and bluebells by the middle of June.

The first white flowers we see are the anemones. They generally show up at the beginning of May, although everything came late this year. These are the first real flowers we see after the spring bulbs are done. They open up (as this one has) on sunny days, then close up and droop on cloudy days. They are long-lasting and I sometimes spot them, in cool places deep in the woods, into July. Then there are always a few that bloom in the fall, just for fun.

We had a terrible pollen season this year. I took the anemone picture a couple weeks ago when the pollen was thick on everything; you can see it on the leaves. When it rained, our driveway looked like it was full of yellow paint.

As I said, this is a good year for bunchberries. I learned that the bunchberry flower is not a flower -- the actual flower is the group of little nodules at the center, and the plant grows four white leaves around the nodules to trick bees into thinking it's a flower. The white leaves start out as green (as seen here) and seem to turn white as they get more sun. In the summer the kids can pick and nibble on the bunchberries. They are edible but because of the large stone it's really more for the novelty of picking and eating something right of the plant. A good patch of bunchberries can be very pretty, although not as impressive as a field of trillium.

This is a trillium, but not the kind of trillium I wish we had. We have nodding trillium, which hides its flowers under its petals. It's hard to find on the forest floor; you really have to be watching for it. The good news is last year I saw two plants (both of which produced blooms), and this year I've seen five, all of which produced blooms.

Speaking of sarsaparilla, here is what it looks like when it blooms. We have a lot of it this year, although not as much as last year.

If I recall correctly, this is a Canadian mayflower. It's about as tall as the length of an adult finger and just as cute as it looks here. Unfortunately it was never sunny when I wanted to take a picture of it, so it looks a little drab here. I have never been to the BWCAW, but as I understand it, these are very common there.

Using blossoms is cheating a little. And really, these are a little more pink than white. Instead I should include a shot of our white apple blossoms, which are just starting to come out. However, I include the plum blossoms because they smell so fantastic. I would wear plum-blossoms scent as a perfume if I could. Including this photo would make more sense if I had a smellovision blog.

This is called the starflower, and it's my favorite of the spring white wildflowers. It's a little less common on our land than some of the other wildflowers and is a treat to find. The blossom is about as big as a thumbnail so it almost feels like you're finding a little jewel when you see one.

Tuning In

At the end of April, some vandals cut down the Honking Tree, a huge white pine on the road near town. When locals came back to the North Shore, they would greet the tree with a honk. I was sad and mad about it, but that was about it. It became kind of a joke among former (and current) newspaper people, because the newspaper covered the hell out of it, until there was really something of a backlash ("It's only a tree! SHEESH!"). A friend of mine has done some work for MPR, and mentioned to someone in St. Paul that I could write a commentary about what the tree meant to people. They liked the idea, I wrote it, and this morning I went into Duluth and carefully read my essay into a giant microphone in a glass booth. This evening we listened to it on the radio. There isn't a link from the Web site, but here is the original essay. I read an edited version for broadcast.

When I heard that a 113-year-old white pine near Two Harbors, Minnesota, was cut down by a vandal or vandals April 29, I was sad and angry. There are other trees, but not another honking tree.

My family and I moved to Two Harbors almost four years ago. We hadn’t planned on it – we looked at houses in Duluth before stumbling upon one here on the north shore. Living here meant a half-hour commute each way into Duluth to my job, but that was half as long as I had been driving into Minneapolis, and besides, the view was better, too.

Two Harbors is a small town, with a lot of people who have lived here their whole lives and raised their kids together. Matt and I are from larger towns – he grew up in Duluth and I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska. We were warned about what we were getting into, with a small town – people will know what you’re doing! All the time! They’ll know your business! -- but we figured we could make it work. We dove into the local history – 3M was started here; the railroad shut down in 1967, devastating the town; and everyone here seems to have a nickname. And in the 100-year history book Matt bought, we found three sentences and a photo about the honking tree, a white pine in the median of the expressway about three miles south of town. We learned that North Shore residents honked at the tree, which was spared by a highway worker when the expressway was put in, to mark their return home. We were charmed, and started honking.

I worked as a copy editor in Duluth and my shift ended late at night. After making it back safely through snowstorms and herds of suicidal deer night after night, I honked quietly at the tree when I came by– you didn’t need to lay on the horn for it. It was a little like checking in with your parents after a night out, to let them know you were back. It felt homey.

We pointed it out to our children and greeted the tree when we came back from visiting grandparents in Duluth. On our way home from longer vacations, spotting the tree meant we really were home, we were on the North Shore, and had returned from far lands without lakes or tall white pines or seagulls. And in fact many visitors from points south hailed the tree as they came up for vacations or to open up cabins. So it meant different things to different people – for some it was escape, a holiday, Someplace Else. For others it was familiar, a haven, home. It belonged to anyone who knew about it, to anyone who honked.

My family has lived in many places and has struggled in many places. Moving to Two Harbors felt right in a way that other moves hadn’t. Even with job slowdowns and small-town uncertainty, the life we have made for ourselves here feels like a long-term decision, a good decision. Learning the local lore was part of that, and now this town is where my son and daughter play hockey and have sleepovers, where my husband works, where I greet people at the grocery store and stop my car in the road to talk to a friend.

Yes, there are other trees, and yes, it’s ONLY a tree. But when people find and then recognize and then love something, it becomes an icon. It becomes something everyone shares. There is comfort in coming home after a long day and seeing the door opening for you. It is, after all, ONLY a door, but it welcomes you home day after day, and you are sad and angry if someone takes an ax to it.

Change

A year ago, I was running myself around trying to figure out what to do with the kids all summer. Maia's day care was closing because the woman running it was having a baby, and John was doing a bunch of summer activities and I didn't know how he was going to get to them. Matt was working bizarre hours training on his new job. And I was starting to realize that my job was turning into something I didn't want it to be.

The weather now is reminding me of that time. May and June on the North Shore are marvelous. Spring, in Nebraska, lasts about four days, and then it's a long, hot summer. Spring here comes so slowly, and then retreats a little bit, then blooms out again, then it snows a little bit. But once it's here, the air is cool and soft and there is sunlight from 4 a.m. to after 10:30 p.m.

Last year, I put the kids in an excellent summer-care program run by the schools. I juggled some scheduling so I could see some of John's baseball games. I took a week off for his summer play. I struggled to do a job I loved in a tense, unhappy office while the sun shone and the kids played on the grass. At work, I parked my car under a basswood tree and would spend a few minutes smelling the blossoms and listened to the kids -- not mine -- at the daycare across the street squealing and laughing and running around. And I would think, Something is going to change here and I am going to change it.

And I did.

This year, the summer is stretching before us, uncharted and inviting as a hidden lake. Matt, having qualified and been certified as a train engineer, is now furloughed for some time and mapping out summer projects. I am writing and editing just as much as I want to, getting involved in new projects on my terms and cutting loose things that don't fit. The kids are scheduled for lots of fun things this summer -- swimming lessons and baseball and summer hockey and soccer -- but nothing feels overscheduled, because I am not overscheduled. There will be time to read in the treehouse and explore across the creek (they are now old enough to cross it themselves!) and to indulge in that special summer boredom that inspires the greatest summer memories.

There is uncertainty, of course -- both Matt and I are, essentially, unemployed. But it feels like it's on our terms, and things are different than the last time we were unemployed. We are very lucky. We are very grateful. And we are excited for this summer.

What Are They Thinking?

I had a nice Mother's Day -- a Sunday NYT, breakfast in bed, dozing until 10:30...perfect. Maia's card was a little fill-in-the-blank essay about me called "My mom is the best mom in the world!" The bold words are Maia's answers, and no, she didn't call me Krupskaya, and no, I'm not quite sure why I still use that pseudonym when everyone else on this blog has a name.

Her name is Krupskaya.
She is 38 years old.
She weighs 100 something pounds.
She has brown eyes and brown hair.
Her favorite food is scrambled eggs.
My mom looks pretty when she smiles.
I love my mom because she makes good food.
The best present I could give my mom is a bracelet.

Very sweet, but hundred-something pounds notwithstanding, they need to stop focusing on how moms look, methinks.

This Walk Brought To You By The Rune Wunjo

Once I was in a park full of oak trees and I was just kind of sitting there, not really doing anything, when I noticed there was an oak tree that looked exactly like the rune fehu, the first rune in the futhark. I wondered if that was where the ideas for runes came from (that, and of course they're easy to carve into stone). In any case, I found another one in the woods yesterday: Professor Internet says this is the rune wunjo, joy.