Shaking clean the roots

July 25, 2008


When she left me to myself in the pakasandra I would sit on the mat she would give me – an old car floormat – and I would see the pakasandra and see the weeds among them and I would drift.

My hands would reach for the neck of a weed and I would pull, slowly, feeling the base, taking the soil with it, the gentlest of pulls, causing the faint snipping sound of the roots breaking; then it would come completely, I would fall back the smallest amount, the weed would bring soil with it and shower the pakasandra with black as I shook clean its roots. Then I’d toss it into the pile and move to the next weed.

Some required two hands. Sometimes I could do two at once. I was being paid by the hour and wanted to be in the pakasandra indefinitely. I was more thorough than I needed to be. By the end I was spending five minutes hunting for weeds remaining. I parted the pakasandra leaves to see of there were weeds beginning underneath. The dirt was so black and most. She watered it often.

And all the while I was caressing every wall of my head. I was wandering around my head, teary with joy, wistful even, loving the surfaces, the many rooms, the old rooms, and empty rooms.

–An excerpt from You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers

I always think of this excerpt when I’m weeding.

And then, I realize how much I enjoy weeding.

Sick, eh?

(Note: the proper spelling is Pachysandra. It’s a type of plant. No idea why Eggers spelled it that way.)

Tags: Literature, Outdoors |

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Paper. Sticks. Logs.

May 14, 2008


The order is always the same.

Paper. Sticks. Logs.

I scrounge around for newspaper. I find the same box I’ve always found - one that we created when we first moved in, filled with newspapers dating back to June 2003. Each fire brings back the memories of that year, five years ago, when Kerrie and I anxiously awaited our wedding, just months after taking up residence again in our hometown of Sioux Falls.

The newspaper is twisted up like corn chips, creating a nest of instantly flammable organic matter.

The sticks come from everywhere. Sometimes we bring them back from camping trips. Sometimes they’re left in our yard after a prolonged wind storm. They’re made of lilac, birch, oak. They’re dried and thin enough to sustain a fire for several minutes - long enough for the heat to approach the best burning temperature.

The sticks are layered on top of the newspaper twists. They form a bed - a mattress for the logs to sleep upon.

The logs are mostly lilac, though many are left over from the assorted state parks we’ve visited over the years. We always buy our own wood at the park, knowing full well that what’s left over will help fuel a fire at home. It’s what we’d use if we had to create heat from scratch. It’s the earth providing warmth, secondhand, through ingenuity and modern materials.

The logs are set on top. The fire reaches them after a few seconds, licks at the bark and creates a hallow tube for which heat to burst forth.

We look around. We breathe in the smells. We wave at the people walking by. We sip a beer, sit back and enjoy the first fire of the newly warmed year.

Paper. Sticks. Logs.

Okay, summer. We’re ready for you.

Tags: Outdoors |

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A season over the air

March 31, 2008


Baseball season starts today. For Twins fans, at least.

And while television brings us most of the games, I’m still stuck on getting my baseball the old fashioned way. The way I learned when first rediscovering the Twins after several seasons of indifference. By radio.

To me, Twins season means toting my portable radio around, tuned to 1140 KSOO, bringing Dan Gladden and John Gordon around with me, lamenting the loss of the great Herb Carneal, pouring over every statistic in an old folksy way and learning names before faces, wondering later at how oddly they seemed to be spelled.

I used to listen to the Twins while working at the Parks Department in St. Cloud. I’d sit back in the shelter with the radio tuned to the day’s game, soaking in the stats, reacquiring the taste I once had as an errant Cardinals fan, the sun of someone else’s reception or event warming their heads, the sound of sport warming mine.

In past years, I’ve listened to the Twins while digging gardens, planting flowers and laying stone borders. I’ve listened to the them while cutting sod and cleaning the garage, while rewiring light switches and organizing our basement, during grill-out parties and while completely by myself.

It’s the smell of dirt and mown grass and dust and sunflower seeds, as if a little portion of the game itself was being wafted through the speakers toward me. Hard work. Leisurely rest. A glass of water or a bottle of cold beer.

What’s great about baseball on the radio is that no matter how long the season gets, you never have to stop doing what you’re doing to catch a game.

How much is a nostalgic longing for times? Times I was never old enough to experience? And how much is an actual dedication to great baseball on the radio is?

I’ll never know. Maybe it’s a little bit of old soul that’s been stuck in me. But give me the crackle of the radio any day.

Tags: Baseball, Minnesota Twins, Outdoors, Sports |

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On picnics

August 25, 2007


On picnicsI find comfort in knowing that, regardless of how big Sioux Falls gets and how many people flock to its parks to bask in the warm late-summer sunshine, I can still find some uninhabited green spaces – areas where, if I shut my eyes, I can imagine being in a National Park, or somewhere in another country.

Forgive me for being too Garrison Keillor for you. I went on a picnic today – my first in a long time – and I left feeling refreshed, like that first spring walk or the first fall rake. Refreshed in rediscovering something I always take for granted. Refreshed in the beauty of an open green field.

Picnics are never on my priority list. I just don’t see the trouble, sometimes. You sit on the ground, you eat food, you spend more time packing than you do enjoying and, no matter what, the weather takes a turn for the worse; blazing heat peeks through the shade you struggled to find, or clouds break open to release torrents of picnic-hating rain drops.

Today, though, it was just the thing. The food was good. The day was wonderful. And our location was perfect.

Sioux Falls is an incredibly green city, and I tend to forget this. My daily Interstate-bound travel path and my corporate-tied industry and my reluctance to leave home once I’ve returned, exhausted and ready for bed takes a toll on my nature-watching.

But there it is – in the middle of Sioux Falls, a green area that could just as easily be grassland that has never been tampered with. We walked through a city park, onto the bike trail, and then about a football field’s length off of the trail. We laid our blanket down and looked around. Despite our proximity to the city park, and despite our arrival via Sioux Falls’ most used recreational trail, we found relative peace and quiet.

With our backs turned to the trail, we glanced over an often forgotten corner of the park, separated by an often dry stream and located just off of a trail bridge. We looked up and imagine we were in Hyde Park, or laying below Edinburgh Castle in Scotland. We looked around and found ourselves in the rolling hills of New England, or on the edge of a darkened Minnesota forest. We turned around and reminded ourselves that we didn’t need to travel to get beautiful green fields and darkened woods – we could get them right here in Sioux Falls.

We ate, and we talked. We discussed future parenting and we tried to un-fuss Sierra’s day. And we picnicked. We took on an ancient ritual – that of eating on the ground, the way nomadic people did before tables, before sturdy homes, before anything of substance was nailed to the ground, places set and order succumbed to. We imagined the prairie the way it was before the park, the city, the trail, the bridge, and we simply got down to basics – enjoying each other, enjoying the day.

And I vowed to myself not to take picnicking for granted anymore.

Tags: On..., Outdoors, Sioux Falls |

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From dusk til’ it’s gone

July 18, 2007


Dusk, by far, is the best time in our area to walk. It’s the perfect combination of the day being left behind and the night slowly creeping ahead. It’s a mellow cool that forgets all of the hots and colds of the past twelve hours. It’s a time of maximum voyeurism, of inhibitions being shed with the work that has passed, of the lights burning bright while the shades stay up.

In an effort to get the labor ball moving, we took a long walk through our gentle McKennan Park neighborhood. This is the routine you begin when pregnancy is about to become parenthood – you walk a lot, and hope that the baby decides to kick labor into high gear. And soon.

As dusk approached, I thought of how long it had been since we had taken a walk under the slowly darkening sky. It’s one of my favorite things – and since the summer makes night come a lot later, I had gone without for a while.

It’s one of my favorite things because of how open everything seems. It’s the one time that everyone is making a similar change, from day to night, from work to relaxation, from lights off/shades open to lights on/shades closed. I’ll admit – I love to walk around our area of town and see the lives inside their houses, safely, from sidewalk level, as people make their way from high stress to low impact.

While we walk, we dream. We point out our favorite interiors. We see if a beautiful exterior hides a unkempt interior. We think about our next house, just like we thought about our first house long before we moved back to Sioux Falls. We place ourselves inside, marveling at the ancient details and loving every wooden banister, every stained glass window, ever hard wood scuff and every last cobweb and other pest.

Some houses are as familiar as our own – houses we pass often, families who never have their shades closed, themselves voyeurs to the outside world, hoping and praying that everyone who walks past gets to see what they’ve worked so hard to create. It’s as if their life was painted onto the glass, securing the Norman Rockwell vision for all to see.

I’ll admit, I’m like that myself. If I had my way, I’d leave every window open, every light blazing, so people could see what I’ve designed. I’d invite everyone in to tour my modest little house, to see our national park themed basement, our quaint living room, our abandoned dormer. I’d take them from room to room, asking them to admire every last detail, every small change we’ve made in the name of perfecting our personal space.

That personality is the real allure, I think. We don’t gaze because people have expensive or exquisite furniture or amazing views. No – I’m interested in the fact that these people have polished every detail for themselves. When you look into someone’s dusk-riddled home, just after the lights go on, you’re looking into that person’s personality. You’re seeing their tastes and their hobbies and every physical aspect of their life.

For just a second. Just a glimpse, you can imagine yourself there. And then, when the key turns and you’re back inside your own house, you can appreciate the differences. You can appreciate that there’s no other house in the world that could feel as comfortable as the one you’ve spent years building up and placing just right, like a hibernating animal going down for its winter nap.

That’s dusk. The mixture of light and dark. The fleeting moments when everyone is open to the world. And then, just like that, the shades are pulled and your access is gone.

Tags: On..., Outdoors |

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Play ball!

June 26, 2007


The BirdcageHow many thousands of people have written about the experience of being at a baseball game? It’s a tired subject, sure, but it’s an important one all the same. And we’re not talking about just the game itself. We’re talking about the the auxiliary sounds, smells and events. It’s an amazing paradox – a sport that, at times, is less exciting than the experience.

But that’s what makes it fun – especially minor league baseball. Very few take it truly seriously. The atmosphere is loose, the egos are contained. No one is preening in front of a multi-million dollar check – they’re all fighting to move up or fighting to stay in the game.

So going to a minor league baseball game – we have the Sioux Falls Canaries – is an experience in the national pastime as it’s supposed to be played. It’s kids running for balls, people talking over beers, the sickly smell of onions on a bratwurst, of beer breath and fresh air and the darkening sky as the stadium lights turn on. It’s nothing but pure life, boiled down into a 5,000 seat area, with a baseball game to distract us when life gets too dull.

Baseball has grown on me. A friend of mind mentioned how baseball isn’t an instant pick-up. You can’t just suddenly “like” baseball. You have to grow into it by slowly learning every nuance. A strike and a ball mean so much more in so many situations. There’s a hidden strategy that makes the game unbearable for the new fan but incredibly rewarding for those who discover it. Baseball isn’t a sport – it’s a board game, it’s Risk, it’s numbers meeting physics, the ultimate clash of two long-learned sciences.

I had a blast tonight, just Kerrie and me, sometimes watching the game and often focusing on the people around us. We got cupcakes (thanks, Chamber of Commerce!) and watched several odd yet strangely exciting fan-participation games. We sang “Take Me Out To the Ballgame” and talked like we were people-watching at a bar. We sat outside and enjoyed the breeze. And we watched the Canaries lose 9-4, but not before a very late “rally” sparked our attention near the end.

I know professional baseball’s been going on for a few months. But for me, it’s as if the season just started.

Could you pass the peanuts and Cracker Jacks, please?

Tags: Baseball, Outdoors, Sports |

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At the dog park

June 8, 2007


'Dog Park' by Donna ColemanI always wonder what dogs think when they’re thrown into a situation filled with other dogs.

For instance: today we took Becket to the dog park. Once there, he encountered at least 15-20 other dogs, all running around in circles, sniffing each other’s privates and drinking each other’s saliva. Becket would prance from dog to dog, encountering not just a new animal, but an entire cacophony of smells – hundreds of pieces of that dog’s environment, clashing together in disharmony.

At times, he would break out into a run in order to follow a group of dogs. Other times, he would completely ignore the same dogs, instead focusing on a section of fence line or a specific spot in the grass. When we wanted him to run, he would stand and sniff. When we wanted him to stay or come, he would barrel off. He was in his own world.

At the dog park, you’re not in human territory anymore. Human rules don’t hold up. With the thousands of scents left by former dogs, it could only be doggy paradise.

No one is in charge at the dog park. No dog is more important than the others. Such is the benefit of a dog park – everyone is on equal footing. Each human takes care of everyone else’s dogs.

Every dog is friendly. Scuffles are laughed off, with even the dogs seemingly shaking it off and retreating to another new friend. People who wouldn’t normally talk are amazingly latched together, all by virtue of a common thread – dogs, and the love for them.

What do dogs think when they meet not just one new friend, but a dozen? How does the overabundance of scents affect their noses? Are they having fun? Or are they just over-stimulated enough to become docile?

The only thing I’m sure of is that Becket seemed to smile the entire time.

Tags: Outdoors |

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