dual personalities

Perhaps because it is summer, I have been thinking often about my days as a camp counselor. Sometimes this personal history comes up at work, because I’m surrounded now more than ever by students who obsessively professionalize from day one of college. (Graduating Honors College students have résumés that are twice as long as my own.) I find myself proudly explaining that I was “just” a camp counselor every summer in college — and it was the life! (Cue “three meals a day, for which you didn’t pay…”) I miss being paid to teach 10 year olds how to french braid (an important life skill!), having rest hour built into your daily life, cultivating a deep but natural tan in the Michigan sun, and spending days off on Lake Michigan. And, inevitably, at Walmart.

I recently regaled DN with tales of the 4th of July at camp: we had a parade that consisted almost entirely of the coordinators riding in the bed of a pickup truck, and we got to eat donuts freshly baked on premises. We wore kitschy American gear and, apparently, short shorts. It was a simpler time.

Another category of camp memory consistently pops up when I hear certain songs. Each summer, the counselors chose one song to theme the camp sessions, and eventually, we taught the campers a “flash dance” to this song. My first year, it was Katy Perry’s “Firework,” and another, it was One Direction’s “What Makes You Beautiful.” I was recently in a WaWa gas station bathroom and nearly burst into grapevine steps when the chorus to “Firework” began. I was always terrible at these dances, but I could probably remember the choreography in two minutes if necessary. I can’t help but wonder what this year’s “song of summer” might be!

Finally, I shouldn’t leave out the central message of camp, an “MSRP” way of life that does not refer to manufacturer’s suggested retail price. The acronym refers to four categories: mental, social, religious, and physical. We were encouraged to practice and develop these “folds” in a balanced manner. Is there an area in which you could be standing taller?

From William Danforth’s I Dare You

All in all, a formative experience for sure. I don’t think I would have learned more about myself or about the world in an internship, do you? Now I just have to figure out how to get back there!

Now that I’m home I fully intend to stop posting about the Big Trip. I don’t want to turn into one of those people who inflicts vacation photos on everyone ad nauseum. I may already have entered that realm, but allow me one last hurrah. So far, I have focused on spectacular vistas and outside activities, although we did make a few stops that involved interiors — and what stops they were!

First off was the famous I-80 Truck stop in Walcott, Iowa,

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which also has a very cool truck museum, complete with its own 1930s snow mobile. Really, if you like trucks it worth a stop and it’s free!

Of course, we visited John Wayne’s birthplace and museum in Winterset, Iowa. Winterset is a lovely town and I enjoyed the museum very much.

Though small, it has a great collection of items from JW’s best movies. I’m happy to say the museum seems to be doing a roaring trade.

Next, we visited the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota. The building is covered in corn cob murals that they change every year. This year’s theme salutes the military. The corn palace is Mitchell’s only claim to fame, and judging by the rest of the town, it’s chief source of income.

Here I am in the Corn Palace ‘corn field’.

In the middle of nowhere Idaho, we stopped at the first experimental nuclear reactor, which is now a museum.

It looked exactly like a 1960s sci fi movie set! The DH makes a great mad scientist, don’t you think?

Finally, we stopped at the world famous Idaho Potato Museum in Blackfoot, Idaho. It has collections of potato mashers, peelers, and advertisements, potato processing machinery, and toys, featuring Mr. Potato Head. I learned a great deal about all the different types of potatoes, the history of the potato in Idaho, and how they are grown and distributed. What a great place! After perusing the displays, we went to the café, where the DH had a baked potato and I tried potato ice cream (it was tasty and slightly starchy).

The DH being a good sport.

I can’t remember what connection Marilyn Monroe had with Idaho potatoes, but the photo op was irresistible.

Next time you feel bored, go for a drive and pay attention to funky billboards. Why not stop and explore? You might learn something new, and you will certainly be supporting some local enterprise. Of course, you could end up in a horror movie situation, so be careful how you choose!

What are you reading these days?

We recently returned from a trip to the beach, which means we have had a chance to dig in our heels (literally, in the sand — very exfoliating) and read some good books!

I continue to work my way through the Mitford series, which strike the perfect balance of easy-to-read and intellectually engaging. And they provide spiritual comfort to boot. For example, if you are having trouble sleeping, maybe you will enjoy this hymn that comes up in These High Green Hills:

Save us from troubled, restless sleep,
From all ill dreams Your children keep,
So calm our minds that fears may cease,
And rested bodies wake in peace.

— from “To You Before the Close of Day”

I also returned to the nineteenth century over our vacation. I had somehow managed to never read E. D. E. N. Southworth while getting my degree, so I remedied that by starting her most famous novel, The Hidden Hand. (P.S. I am a big fan of her name, which really is an acronym: her name was Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte before taking her husband’s name, Southworth.) This novel is a tangle of characters good and evil, adventure, suspense, and romance. I seriously can’t read it if I am already stressed out. I get too worked up!

I purchased the book on Amazon from one of those sellers who cheaply print open-source books, and the back has a spirited (if ill-written) blurb, by which I am overly amused. Please read the whole thing:

I plan to use the final line on all future course descriptions: “19th Century Literature really can rock if you let it!”

DN has been reading (as photographed above) Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels. We both started them a couple years ago, and I gave up on book four. As he diagnosed, they’re bad to binge, which is what I was doing. I also lost patience with the characters, who are too “real” for my liking, which is to say they aren’t particularly good or admirable. They’re flawed and make mistakes. DN can take the reality, I guess. He says: the novels’ style feels mundane until, suddenly, the reader is hit with an epiphany, a moment when so many of the previous, seemingly quotidian details “pay off” with meaning–and then, just like in life, the moment recedes and the ordinary resumes.

We have not, however, made headway on our backlog of New Yorkers 😳

We’re home! We were gone for 25 days, drove just over 6,000 miles through fourteen states and a province (Ontario), slept in nineteen different beds, visited all three sons and my brother, and saw loads of wonderful sights. And now we are finally home again.

My last post was from North Dakota. From there, we drove straight through Minnesota and Wisconsin to Marquette, Michigan, where we lived for a year way back in 1990-1991. It has grown a great deal and seemed to be thriving, but I didn’t take any noteworthy photos. After a night of reminiscing, we drove down state to Grayling, where we met up with my brother at his cottage there. It’s a lovely place! Our field guide (aka darling brother) took us for several short hikes to see the local flora and fauna.

Next day we drove down to his other cottage in Algonac, where Joanna, Tim and Abbie joined us, and a family of minks cavorted around the boat house.

I took this photo through a window

Lake St. Claire is flooding but we could still go out on it and the weather cooperated beautifully. Tim and Abbie even took the canoe out.

Sunsets are beautiful there. Quelle stunning vista!

On the 4th, the birthday boy took us shooting. It was Abbie’s first time but she was brave! Here she is firing the shotgun from the hip.

After a delicious barbeque, the celebrant opened his presents, including my DP’s gift. 

Music followed. It was great to see Tim play with his uncle Chris.

Then, of course, there were fireworks all around the lake (but I took no photos)! I experienced deja vu as I recalled another visit five years ago, when my DP and I, with our husbands in tow, went to Algonac to celebrate our brother’s birthday. Where did those five years go?

Our trip home was long but blessedly uneventful, although the traffic was thick and people drove like maniacs (those Canadians are crazy drivers!). Now I have a week to catch up and then it’s off to St. Louis to visit my dear, darling DP!

Happy 4th of July from daughter # 2! I would be remiss if I didn’t share some lines from Walt Whitman, one of my favorite Americans:

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,

Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,

The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,

The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,

The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,

The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,

The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,

The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,

Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,

The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,

Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

Don’t you just love those last few lines?

Wishing everyone a robust and friendly celebration today — and hoping you have a strong, melodious song to sing!

Since it’s almost Independence Day, I thought I would post about a quintessentially American experience, a visit to the rodeo. On our way through North Dakota, we stopped at Jamestown, a small city about 100 miles east of Bismarck, so we could go to the James River Rodeo at the County Fair. We could also have watched stock car racing — boy, is that a noisy sport; it almost drowned out the rodeo announcer — but we restrained ourselves. The midway was pretty standard, although the food offerings were certainly exotic: pork chop on a stick, freshly battered cheese curd, and something awful with shrimp, the name of which escapes me. We were not brave enough to try any of it.

Without doubt the highlight of our evening was the rodeo, which cost a whopping $10.

I loved everything about it, including the fact that they started with the Cowboy’s Prayer, by Clem McSpadden (they begin every rodeo this way):

Our gracious and heavenly Father, we pause in the midst of this festive occasion, mindful of the many blessings you have bestowed upon us.

As cowboys, Lord, we don’t ask for any special favors. We ask only that you will let us compete in this arena as in the arena of life.

We don’t ask that we never break a barrier, draw around a chute-fighting horse, or draw a steer that just won’t lay. We don’t even ask for all daylight runs.

We only ask that you help us to compete in life as honest as the horses we ride and in a manner as clean and pure as the wind that blows across this great land of ours.

Help us, Lord, to live our lives in such a manner that when we make that last inevitable ride to the country up there, where the grass grows lush, green and stirrup high, and the water runs cool, clear and deep, that you, as our last Judge, will tell us that our entry fees are paid.

Amen.

Everyone stood, removed hats, and bowed heads for the prayer, and then placed their hands across their hearts for the national anthem. The whole thing reminded me of how great our country can be. People were simply out enjoying themselves; there was no drinking or bad behavior of any kind. By the way, in our travels throughout the north and west we never saw any political signs or slogans of any kind. We did see lots of veterans appreciation monuments and evidence of religion — how refreshing! Back in Iowa we even saw signs for the Bar None Cowboy Church (check it out!).  But I digress.

Rodeo events in Jamestown included bareback bronc riding, tie down calf roping, breakaway roping, saddle bronc busting, barrel racing, steer wrestling, ladies’ goat tying, team roping, and bull riding. You name it, they did it. All the cowboys and girls were from the region (North and South Dakota or Montana) and they all behaved very professionally (no swearing, no arguments, no tears). I didn’t take a lot of photos, but these few will give you an idea. Some of the contestants were quite young (high school) and one of the barrel racers was about 10.

Those broncs could really kick!

Ladies’ barrel racing was great, but they moved so fast it was difficult to get a good shot.

And the bull riding was so wild that my photos are all blurry. Seriously, those bulls were mean! In fact, they were so crazy that not one of the riders managed to stay on for the allotted time, but several of them did get stepped on. Fortunately, no one got seriously hurt.  Watching this made me glad that my boys are all grown up and not given to dangerous sports.

The rodeo was well run, friendly and thoroughly enjoyable. If you’ve never been to one, try to go — it’s nice to see all those cowboy hats!

If all goes well, by God’s grace, my next post will be from home sweet home! Happy July 4th!

I (daughter #2) recently got to host cousins Ellen and Foster for a night while they made their way to the Shenandoah Valley. This midweek stopover was brief, but it was a wonderful chance to catch up for the first time in several years!

One thing I always appreciate in a guest (family or otherwise) is when someone takes a look around and notices different things in our apartment. Old photos, samplers, and antique store finds are great fodder for conversation! And in chatting about who stitched what, where the vintage photo of Mom was taken, how the gallery wall came about, etc., I get to take a bit of pride in our 1-bedroom apartment, even though its diminutive size can be frustrating…

Do you notice something about these photos? Brown furniture! We are fully on board with scoring a nice chest of drawers from an antique emporium or the side of the street. These pieces bring me a lot of joy, maybe because they remind me of my mom, or due to some separate history of their own, or because of sheer aesthetic appeal.

Nice furniture helps me to appreciate my home: though she be but little, she is fierce packed to the gills with good taste! 😉