Austin360 blogs > Out & About > Archives > 2010 > July > 23 > Entry
A Texan in Minnesota, Part 2
Dusk virtually kisses dawn during the short nights in northern latitudes.
On vacation, this diurnal reality affects late revelers and early risers, especially if quartered together in a forest cabin, as we recently were on the north shore of Lake Superior.
Personally straddling those social worlds, I found myself tiptoeing around the tensions among our party of seven old friends, plus two large dogs.
Vacations like this one tend to intensify social pleasures and problems. On road trips, families of all descriptions must negotiate new spaces, shared amenities and altered expectations about planned activities, personal intrusions and domestic duties.
Along on this trip to Lutsen, Minn. — arriving in two large vehicles — were my husband, book editor Kip Keller, Griffin School teacher Lawrence Morgan, Houston Community College teacher Joe Starr, airline steward Doug Sparke, California tech guru Paul Talley and Gustavus Adolphus College professor Robert Kendrick.
Complicating matters were our blond and chocolate Labs, Nick and Nora, who behaved beautifully in the rented SUV and the pet-friendly motels along the way, but lapsed on rules about begging and blocking indoors, foraging and flinging themselves about outdoors.
Yet the specific points of contention evolved around the loft-arranged cabin, landed through Austin’s HomeAway vacation rental service. A general absence of doors made the card players the kings at night; while the inveterate taskmasters ruled the mornings.
And those two tribes collided.
At approximately 5 a.m., the morning group rustled into the kitchen, filling the French press coffee makers, reading The Economist instead of local newspapers, and heading out for cool strolls along woodsy tracks smeared with lupines, daisies, dark-eyed Susans, Queen Anne’s lace and wild raspberries. They (we) startled ruffed grouse, Canada jays, sapsuckers, goldfinches and blackbirds.
At 7 a.m., the three of us — remember I joined both groups — headed to the Moondance Coffee House along scenic Minnesota Highway 61, just above Lake Superior. There, we spent one languid hour managing social media, answering e-mails and checking to make sure Texas didn’t slip into the oily Gulf of Mexico.
By the time we returned, the late party was beginning to stir. Or not. Sometimes a twitchy “quiet time” extended into the afternoon. Preparing brunch — never breakfast — presented special challenges. Somehow in the end, we all enjoyed the egg casseroles, pancakes, French toast and breakfast tacos at some point or another.
Early afternoon, we set off on adventures: Hiking Cascade River State Park, wading in frigid Lake Superior, swimming in Caribou Lake and Clara Lake, canoeing and kayaking on Holly Lake, heading up Eagle Mountain (the highest point in Minnesota) or down the slopes of the Lutsen Mountains aboard the Alpine Slide attraction (oh no, not me).
Before dinner got underway: A long reading siesta. On our summer and winter reading weeks, my friends don’t take up the same books by design, but three chose the delightful novel “The Siege of Krishnapur” by J. G. Farrell.
Overlapped for me were Katharine Graham’s “Personal History” (complex woman, tale well told); Edmund Wilson’s “To the Finland Station” (history of Marxism, reads like a thriller); Alistair Horne’s “A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962” (will we ever learn?); Dashiell Hammet’s “Crime Stories and Other Writings” (blunt words, punchy stories), Donald C. Farber and Robert Viagas’ “The Amazing Story of The Fantasticks” (tons of Austin lore); Jacques Gernet’s “A History of the Chinese Civilization” (overwhelming for a Westerner): and Jacques Barzun’s “From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life” (astounding erudition).
Don’t be fooled into thinking I finished these works. (Heavens!) My goal on vacation is to consume 100 pages in each volume, thereby assuring I’ll complete them upon return to Austin.
Reading was often interrupted by a little social dance: Should we market in one of the coastal towns? Who would cook what? Could we agree on a time to eat?
Five of the gathered seven cabin-mates are pretty accomplished cooks with definite ideas about how to grill, steam, bake, fry or sear. Minor sparks flew. Some pressure was relieved by a birthday dinner out at the ultra-green Angry Trout in Grand Marais.
After dinner, a few votes would be cast for movies, but more often than not, Hand and Foot, a Canasta-based card game, won out. This fiendish distraction was introduced to the group in a Durango, Colo. cabin last summer and brooks no interruption. Still, not everyone wanted to play, at least not until 4 a.m., just before dawn.
Eventually, the hardiest revelers, who happened to double as the thrill-seekers during daytime adventures, rubbed up against the earliest risers, who preferred gentle walks and drives through nature that brought us in contact with moose, fox, chipmunks, beavers (or their dams) and a lanky canid that I identified as an adolescent wolf, but a companion assured me was just another coyote.
Eruptions were inevitable.
“Why don’t you expand your known universe?”
“Why don’t you read something more substantial?”
“Well, why don’t you use an indoor voice in the morning?”
It all worked out. We remain old friends, after all. You don’t let minor frictions affect old friendships any more than family relations. At least, not without real cause.
Now about that wolf …
Photos by Joe Starr
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By wallymw
July 23, 2010 6:23 PM | Link to this
Michael,
Glad you enjoyed our home state of MN. My partner and I are moving to Austin and will soon be enjoying the later winter sunsets dressed in only a sweater while sitting on the North Shore of Lake Travis watching the sunsets over the hills.
Next time you'll have to travel a little further south to Duluth and check out Betty's Pies.