Book with universal themes is classic

I just finished reading “Emily of Deep Valley,” juvenile fiction written in 1950 by Maud Hart Lovelace. I have written about Hart Lovelace here before; she was a native of Mankato and based most of her juvenile fiction on experiences she had in the small but picturesque town that is but a short carriage ride from here.

I didn’t grow up a fan of Hart Lovelace books. To be honest, before moving here, I’d never heard of her. (My summer reading lists were filled with Agatha Christie mysteries, all of them on short loan from the St. Paul Public Library.) As I build my network in and around Deep Valley, I’ve met lots of Hart Lovelace devotees who like me hadn’t found her Betsy Tacy series or her high school books when they were young. They did, however, discover the books after they had had daughters of their own. With her characters unwrapped in the midst of mother-child bonding, I can see how the author can command such a loyal following with clubs and societies around the world charged with keeping her work available and her memory alive.

But what appeal can books written 60 years ago and set 100 years ago have for twenty-first century, text-messaging pre-teens who could just as easily flip on television for entertainment? How can Hart Lovelace remain as relevant in theme and plot in 2010 as she was during the Eisenhower administration? It was that question that led me to pick up and read “Emily of Deep Valley,” which is set in 1912 as Emily graduates from Deep Valley High. (Trust me dear ones, I don’t have many juvenile fiction titles in my home library and St. Paul Public is a long carriage ride from here.)

As it turns out, a girl in high school in 1912 suffered from the same sort of social challenges and self-doubt as girls in my grade had and, I suspect, as do girls in school today. “Do I fit in?” “Are my clothes fashionable?” “Am I smart enough?” “What am I supposed to do with my life?” And, of course, “does that boy I’m in love with even know I’m alive?” The more the world changes, the more the world stays … .

But Hart Lovelace goes deeper with her character in the book; she takes Emily face first into social issues of her time, social issues faced by the citizens of the real Deep Valley, and this is where Hart Lovelace snags me as a lifelong devotee even though I don’t have the advantage of sharing her work with an offspring.

Emily befriends a few children who belong to the town’s immigrant community: the Syrians. Her friendship leads to new introductions, discoveries and an education about a people with a rich culture; people, she learns, who have been largely shunned and marginalized by her community. Emily is able to find peace with herself when she turns her attention away from her worries about her looks and her future; her self image grows by leaps and bounds when she throws herself into helping others. That theme alone is a winner. It’s basically the call of Christianity.

But for me, the story goes deeper. I have ancestors who were known around another river town as “the Syrians.” And like the Syrians in Hart Lovelace’s book, my family was marginalized, called names by the “better” citizens of their town. Their immigration was not welcomed by those who felt the United States had enough people. They struggled with language and social structures and yet lived full lives in “shabby houses that needed paint.” I like to think that someone like Emily might have wandered into my ancestors’ neighborhood, into my ancestors’ lives, to extend to them some version of Emily’s small-town spirit of friendship. And why not? Hart Lovelace’s fiction is based on her early life experiences. Her stories are authentic. Her stories are timeless.

It is 2010 and the immigrants living on the fringe of our communities in shabby abodes hail from a different part of the world than Ottoman-controlled Syria. Yet, I’ll bet they hear people whisper derogatory names when they pass. I’ll bet some people feel they don’t belong here; the country is full enough. Still, I’d bet my carriage that despite the majority’s indifference to them, they are living out rich traditions and full lives in the shadow of the American dream like my ancestors once did. And I’ll bet somewhere in America there’s a teenager who, because of the example set by the fictional Emily Webster, is confident enough to step forward make a difference in their lives.

And so I’ve found the answer to my question. Maud Hart Lovelace remains relevant long after her death. We should all be so fortunate.

An ancient grain with bright future...

Chef son and I mastered Gluten Free Kibbi Nayyi using both Quinoa (his choice) and Amaranth (my choice). Each substitute grain garnered us taste and texture virtually indistinguishable from the Bulghur or cracked wheat that is traditionally used in the dish. I now have gained confidence to try a Tahbouli Salad with Amaranth, which closely resembles Quinoa in taste, texture and nutrition. I like Amaranth better, though, because this weekend I learned it may be something I can cultivate myself here next summer. And who knows where that might lead?

Beyond the borders of the United States, Amaranth is used in interesting ways. In Mexico it is popped and mixed with a sugar solution to make a confection called alegria or happiness. Milled and roasted amaranth seed is used to create a traditional Mexican drink called atole. Peruvians use fermented amaranth seed to make chicha or beer. Amaranth can be cooked as a cereal, ground into flour, popped like popcorn, sprouted, or toasted. The seeds can be cooked with other whole grains, added to stir-fry or to soups and stews as a nutrient-dense thickening agent. Amaranth flour is used in making pastas and baked goods.

Amaranth seed is 15 percent to 18 percent protein and contains respectable amounts of lysine and methionine, two essential amino acids not frequently found in grains. It is high in fiber and contains calcium, iron, potassium, phosphorus, and vitamins A and C. The fiber content of Amaranth is three times that of wheat and its iron content is five times more than wheat. It contains two times more calcium than milk. Using Amaranth in combination with corn or brown rice (or wheat) results in a complete protein as high in food value as fish, red meat or poultry; great news for vegetarians.

The name Amaranth is Greek for "never-fading flower" and its flower is what caught my attention yesterday. My friend Diane has three stands of Amaranth growing in her field, though she grows it purely for ornamental value. Amaranth is a bushy plant that grows five to seven feet tall with broad leaves and a showy flower head of profuse burgundy plumes. Hers are quite striking in her voluptuous bouquets.

But what intrigues me the most about Amaranth is that it seems easy to grow and though the seeds it produces are tiny, each plant is capable of producing 40,000 to 60,000 of them. I just paid about five dollars for a 16-ounce package of whole grain Amaranth, and a 22-ounce package of Amaranth flour goes for about eight dollars. I’m not saying I’m ready to plow under all my grass to sow Amaranth, but I can do simple math. I think it’s time to do a bit more experimentation in the kitchen to see exactly how valuable Amaranth can become!

A gritty twist on personal history

It rained today. It was a lovely rain. A million dollar rain if you're engaged in the business of farming.

I try to spend rainy days tidying up the farmhouse, and today was no different. I sorted through stacks of laundry, mail and old magazines trying to reduce, reuse or recycle as much as possible. In the midst of my cleaning, I picked up the 2009 Farmers Almanac, and while trying to determine its fate, I found something I had to share:

"Historians tell us that among the useful items the first European colonists brought with them to the New World was one that we might not have suspected: the earthworm. Earthworms didn't occur originally in much of the north, it seems; rather European species were carried here in the colonists' ships, hidden in the soil those vessels loaded as ballast and in the root balls of plants they carried.

Properly reflected on, the idea that a creature as familiar and ubiquitous as the garden worm should be an exotic can do us good. It can enlarge our perceptions of history, including personal history. For consider: If earthworms came to our continent with the colonists, then they necessarily have their places on the same historical timeline as their human importers. Just as the millions of today's descendants of the first European colonists can trace their ancestry to specific people and places, so the descendents of the earthworms who accompanied those pioneers must arrange themselves in a like heirarchy of arrival. Therefore, should you repine that your colonial pedigree isn't all that you might wish, five minutes' work with a garden spade can turn up an aristocrat, a Mayflower worm whose very presence in your vegetable patch must gentle your condition."

This seemed the perfect sentiment for a day when all the birds are smiling; their rainy-day quest for earthworm meals seems assured.

Memories as vibrant as surrounding vines

I was in the vineyard pruning earlier this evening, which is my favorite time to be in the vineyard because the angle of the light makes each leaf shimmer like gold.

I've learned there is an art to pruning, which is probably why it's become my favorite chore in the vineyard. I like helping these plants become all that their genetically meant to be, but not more; grapevines, you see, have a propensity to grow and grow and grow and if you've ever encountered grapes in the wild, you know what I'm talking about. They can become a tangled mess if not given the guidance of careful hand, a taut wire and a sharp snipper.

Pruning is also one of those activities that, if you resist the urge to plug in the iPod, allows your mind to drift. Tonight, I was recalling my sixty-something grandmother taking me off a beaten path in search of grape leaves. The beaten path was Mississippi River Boulevard in St. Paul, where we parked my mom's car, then the three of us carefully stepped down the incline that ended in a churning rhapsody of blue-grey water. The hillside was teeming with wild grapevines during the 1960s, and Grandma, not letting the fact that she was neither homeowner nor farmer deter her, figured the city wouldn't mind us helping ourselves to a couple hundred leaves that would end up as part of my all-time favorite Lebanese dish, Stuffed Grape Leaves (also known as Greek Dolmas).

Grandma was a frugal to be sure. She picked leaves from public land and turned them into wonderful treats, she filled ice-cream buckets full of strawberries at the pick-your-own farm in Cottage Grove, she haggled at garage sales and flea markets and always showed us, with pride, her latest treasure picked up for a song. And as I bent to snip shoots off the lower part of each trunk, I marveled at Grandma's ability to climb over brambles and tree trunks with the agility of woman half her age in search of free grape leaves.

I'm sure no one would have cared about her interest in wild grapevines anyway. And like I said earlier, grapes will grow and grow and grow if you let them, and I can't. And so I snipped and pulled, shoot after shoot, some six-feet long with large, lovely leaves evenly spaced. I snipped and pulled and thought about Grandma standing on an incline in pursuit of the same resource that I held in my hand with every intention of heaving into the fire pit.

And then on my way to the firepit, I made a detour -- through the kitchen. It is June after all, the month when grape leaves are young and tender yet some are large enough to stuff and roll with a combination of lamb and rice and tomato and onion and lemon juice. And so I cut short my pruning and headed indoors with an armful of shoots that had been sacrificed for the good of the vine. And then I pruned again, this time with a different art in mind...the art of cooking.

Once all my leaves were cut off the petioles, washed, dried and bagged, I made my way to the firepit with the debris. I'm not sure when I'll have time to actually finish what I started tonight; rolling stuffed grape leaves takes a bit of time. Of course, the effort is worth it...especially when you start the process with fresh leaves.

You can buy grape leaves in a jar and make Dolmas any time of the year. But they won't taste the way they taste in June. That's something Grandma never articulated to me. She didn't have to. Watching her tiptoe her way down toward the river over downed tree limbs told me all I needed to know about the value of cooking with tender young leaves. And here, I've got rows and rows of them. If only I had Grandma here to help me.

Today, there'd probably be a law against this...

This picture, borrowed from the Michigan historical society, depicts a record number of logs ever loaded and hauled on a sleigh, at least as of 1893 when the photo was taken. Cool, huh?

I recall history, in school, was limited mostly to dates, wars, and consequent land exchanges. We never heard about the lives of immigrant loggers and miners and bootleggers, hearty citizens all. Pity.

Let us not forget to whom we owe our gratitude ...

Before the hors d'oeuvres, before the turkey and cranberry sauce and smashed potatoes ... before sitting to enjoy any of it, remember where it all came from. And, as our nation's first president instructed, give thanks to the one who provides. (Click image to read the original proclamation declaring a national day of thanksgiving in the United States.)

Remember also, as tough as our times seem, with news of bankruptcies and bailouts and economic woes numbing our senses, Americans are a free people who experience a higher standard of living than most of the world's population. So we can be grateful for tough times too, for they can make us more accutely appreciative of what we do have. And if you count among your blessings good friends and loving family, as I do, thank God, as I do. I thank God for you.

Adapting tradition for a new age...

I’m not sure how it happened, or when, but Thanksgiving has definitely become my holiday. I faintly recall motivation on my part, probably around 1991, to host both sides of our family at my place. My thinking went like this: cooking a large feast for twenty or more people had to be less hassle than traveling across several counties with rambunctious twin sons.

I was right. Since then, I perfected the turkey, streamlined the menu, timed appetizers and dessert around backyard football and, hopefully, gave all my guests a holiday gathering they would want to participate in again and again. Through the years, the dishes have changed, new faces have emerged, some we have lost, but always we gather around turkey and stuffing and wine and pie – together – and we are nourished simply because we are together. This is why Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

This year, our tradition is being rewritten. First, our twenty-plus crowd has dwindled to ten this year as the cousins are grown and off to places east, like Madison and Michigan and Virginia and China. (Any further east and they’d be west!). We also have changed kitchens this year, requiring our guests to put in a bit of travel time to reach our table. We’re grateful they accepted.

Finally, and most drastically, I’m turning over control of the meal to our budding chef. I have every confidence that he’ll cook magnificently for us; he’s already shared with me his plans to braise the turkey rather than roast it. He explained it all to me in great detail and his description simply made me hungry. I’ll be on hand in the kitchen to observe, of course. It’s not often this old dog gets a front row seat to new cooking techniques. Parents are supposed to stay involved in their children’s education!

But I admit this change of kitchen control, this passing of the baton — or, more appropriately — the baster, will be hard for me. It’s not that I want to be top chef forever, mind you. It’s just that we have house rules that dictate the cook never has to wash the dishes. It always seemed like a good rule, as long as I was the one who was cooking.

A reunion tour 30 years in the making...

It’s been said you cannot go home again. Yet it seems human nature to try regardless, if only to catch a glimpse of the person we once were or to find that piece of ourselves we lost somewhere along the way, oftentimes through no fault of our own.

For a large part of my adolescence, high school was “home” and so thoughts of going back, of going “home” weigh on me as I pass a combine parked along Waseca CR-3 on my way toward the city and a reunion of classmates. Accommodating farm implements is part and parcel of life now that home is the farm; the city of my birth, meanwhile, is just a place I visit less and less. Yet inside a suburban school building significant chapters of my personal history were written. I was interested to see if the pages read the same as I’d remembered.

At first opportunity, I broke away from the crowd to explore on my own the halls that I’d walked for four years; they appeared neither wider nor narrower than when I’d walked them in saddle shoes. The walls were brightly painted and the lockers, too, the latter in green. The lockers looked newer, which isn’t to say they were new. It had been thirty years, after all. I imagine the life of a locker doesn’t exceed fifteen. And the walls were adorned with sketches by student artists named Emily and Britney and Sydney and Raul. I passed a room full of computers and saw that the library was now a media center. And there was a boardroom where the teachers used to take their lunches. And all along the way, lights clicked on as if welcoming my silent exploration. At one point, I startled the custodian (Kellogg High, class of ’77) who told me my alma mater was a good employer. I was heartened to hear it as much as I was to learn that service to others and worship is as much a focus for students as getting good grades.

Yet my visit did not fill me with a sense of warmth the way one expects when one comes home. I was in a school, but not my school. My school was gone or, perhaps, it had simply changed. Or, perhaps, it was I who had changed. Or, likely, both the school, and I, (all of us really) had changed in ways great and small. Certainly, the priest who presided over our Mass, a classmate, had changed. He shared some of the details with us; the others we were left to interpret at the place where his history intersected ours. Had any of us come “home” this night?

It’s been said you cannot go home again. You could debate the truth in that statement until the cows come home. Here’s what I think. The answer depends upon how you define home.

Communicating angst without profanity...

I want to write about my frustration, my anger, my disgust, my angst, my utter disbelief at the current state of economic entanglement that is sending Treasury into bed with Wall Street and sticking us with the hotel bill, but I can't. I'm too depressed. And when I'm depressed, I snack.

And frankly, I can't type and eat at the same time. I don't want to muck up my keyboard.

So, I've invited a guest blogger to speak for me. Truth be told, I didn't invite him (I don't actually know him) but I've heard him speak in person twice and I respect his passion, his patriotism, and his candor.

And so, for an opinion on the state of "Washington," I present a recent tome by Mr. Ben Stein.

Distinguishing a hobo from a tramp...

I met a hobo today. Actually, I met him in May and I've seen him every couple of days since. It was just that today, I learned he was a hobo.

My hobo friend, his name is John, told me the word hobo was borne out of the post-civil war era. When the war ended, soldiers were released and left to their own devices. Many picked up a hoe and traveled the rails, from farm to farm, offering to work for a meal and a small stipend.

That desire to work for his keep elevated the hobo -- or "hoe boy" -- from his counterpart, the tramp, who was considered too lazy to work.

One hundred miles to the south this weekend, Britt, Iowa, hosts the National Hobo Convention. Hobos from around the country gather with other hobos, as if returning to a family homestead. John will be there. He promises to bring me a brochure so I can learn more about hobos and the hobo lifestyle.

History Matters...

I spent two hours in my favorite south central Minnesota town tonight listening to a conservator from the Minnesota Historical Society talk about some of the simple things we can do to slow the impact of aging for those precious family keepsakes, including photos. Allow me to pass along a few notable ideas:

• First, when you're shopping and see the term "archival" on a scrapbook or frame or album, beware. Archival is a generic, even meaningless term tossed on products for the purpose of sales, much like the label "no added sugar" on food products.
  
• Public Enemy No. 1 of organic products, meaning paper or textiles (including photos) is ultra-violet light. If you have something you wish to preserve for decades, you need to limit its exposure to light. You can do this by displaying the item in a windowless room, framing it using glass that has a UV filter, or simply storing it in darkness.
  
• If you have cardboard backing up any precious framed photos, get rid of it right away and replace it with acid-free paper.
  
• Never use adhesives to mount photos, prints, or anything in a frame. Use photo corners, adhesive mounts (where the adhesive doesn't touch the art) or even corners clipped from an acid-free envelope.
  
• Always make sure framed artifacts, including photos, don't touch the glass of the frame. Use a window mat or spacers to get a slim cushion of air into the frame. Once an old photo gels up (possible on humid days) and sticks to glass, it's there for good.
  
• Never laminate photos or documents, but do place brittle papers in polyester film to protect them from further deterioration.
  
• If you plan to use plastic to protect anything, including photos and slides, look for plastic that is labeled as having NO PVC. If the label isn't clear, put the plastic to your nose. If it has that "plastic" smell, don't use it.
  
• If, like me, you're fond of storing family treasures in a cedar chest, either line the chest with a acid-free paper, or wrap treasures in a cotton sheet. Don't let the cedar (or any wood product) come into contact with something you wish to preserve.
  
• If you are a gun collector, keep the old guns and lead bullets out of an oak cabinet. That goes for silver too.
  
• Last but not least, label the backs of photographs with identification using a dull, No. 2 pencil. Remember, a photo without a name has no value at all!

Red wine can improve your health. Really!

Researchers have been studying alcohol consumption and after 10 years of study, conclude that moderate daily intake of alcohol improves cardiovascular health. In one study, conducted at Harvard University, it was suggested that red wine in particular is the most beneficial to heart health. The cardio-protective effect has been attributed to antioxidants in the skin and seeds of red grapes.

The antioxidants, called flavonoids, reduce the risk of coronary heart disease in three ways:

• By reducing the production of low density lipoprotein (LDL), also known as bad cholesterol.


• By boosting high density lipoprotein (HDL) or good cholesterol.


• By reducing blood clotting.

Furthermore, consuming a glass of red wine along with a meal may favorably influence your lipid profiles following that meal.

Another study found moderate red wine consumption may inhibit tumor development in some cancers. Yet another study indicated that red wine aids the formation of nerve cells, which may be helpful in treating diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

The wine with the highest concentration of flavonoids is Cabernet Sauvignon, followed closely by Petit Syrah and Pinot Noir. White wine has significantly fewer amounts of flavonoids compared to red wine; drier red wines contain higher levels than sweet red wines.

So what is meant by “consuming in moderation?” We Americans have trouble with this concept. One serving per day of red wine, for women, equals four ounces. Men will benefit from consuming between one and two servings per day, somewhere between four and eight ounces.

For those who prefer not to drink alcohol, rest easy. Research has shown non-alcoholic red wine contains the same antioxidant profile as red wine. Grape juice, meanwhile, has anti-oxidative benefits, but does not significantly lower LDL cholesterol compared to red wine.

Bringing that Easter snow indoors...

Holidays take on an entirely different flavor when your children are adults. For one thing, they are less hectic. We no longer include in our pre-holiday plans visits to the mall for the obligatory snapshot with junior on Santa’s lap; there are no more brunches with the Easter Bunny to attend. We don’t have to color eggs, buy baskets, decide which treats will best fit into plastic eggs, or spend two weeks vacuuming that annoying green and pink plastic grass.

Another benefit of not having little ones around to busy up the holidays is that it allows more time to ponder the “reason for the season.” Easter, of course, is a celebration of Christ’s (and our own eventual) triumph over death. It also closes out the period of Lent when, hopefully, we’ve been working on the penitential journey toward becoming a better person – more Christ-like. It also makes it easier, slightly easier, to get to those Holy Week services at Church.

So for those of us currently (but hopefully not eternally) without little ones to infuse chaos into our holidays, the calm is welcome. Life, after all, offers plenty of opportunities to encounter stress. Entertaining is easier too; the food and conversation can move to the center of the Easter banquet. Then again, as I look out the window at our second consecutive day of snowfall, I recall with fondness those hectic holidays. And, I think about bunny tracks.

When our children were little, hubby and I fleshed out the Easter Bunny myth for them each year by doing more than simply filling and hiding their Easter baskets; we spread white bunny tracks all through the house using flour. Each Easter Saturday eve, after the kids went to bed, we tracked through the house with homemade paw print stencils and a sifter full of flour, spreading tracks all over the floors. The next morning, the children dashed around at dawn following each track to its end, where a stash of sweet treasure was to be found.

The flour tracks, of course, represented snow that Easter Bunny carelessly carried inside while delivering treats; the kids never seemed to notice that these white tracks appeared even on Easter mornings when temps were in the 40s and 50s and there was no snow to be found anywhere in the state. The myth played out for all of us.

Of course, spreading flour all over your house does add a bit of added work to an already busy day. Somehow, though, the expressions on the faces of your bunny-enamored youngsters make the mess more than worth it. Recalling my children's faces, their sheer exuberance over it all, leaves me wishing I could trade this now-quiet holiday in for a chaotic one, if even for a little while. Happy Easter to all.

Our Easter morning in 1982. Note the bunny tracks circled in yellow.

Later that Easter day (?) or perhaps one year later.

Before Macy's, before Marshall Fields, was the Dayton's annual

Breakfast with the Easter Bunny! I'm guessing this was in 1992.

The passing of a great writer ...

For his many fans, Jon Hassler’s name will forever be linked to the mythical village of Staggerford, or the stalwart Agatha McGee, the heroine of many of his works of fiction. I’ve read a few of Hassler’s books so I’m familiar with old Agatha. And, I know enough about the man to know Staggerford is loosely based on Hassler’s boyhood home of Plainview, Minnesota, the same town where the Jon Hassler Theatre has staged a half dozen productions every year since opening in 2002.

Also in Plainview, housed in the Hassler boyhood home, is the Rural America Writer’s Center, a place where writers like me can commune with others to work on the craft and learn from those who are more advanced.

Hassler, who died today from Parkinson’s Disease, wasn’t as well known as Garrison Keillor, perhaps. But in my opinion, he did more to help and inspire local writers than any other Minnesota author. Hassler was shy and introspective, yet focused. One must be focused to create the body of work he did. One must make sacrifices too, and Hassler understood this. His first marriage failed because of his devotion to his craft.

I met Jon Hassler once on an extraordinary autumn day: September 11, 2001. I met his wife, Gretchen, too. I had gone to their house in South Minneapolis to take the author’s portrait for an upcoming magazine feature we were producing. The sky was crystalline blue that day. It was nearly 80 degrees and the blue canopy, devoid of typical airline traffic, was eerily quiet.

It was an odd day to be sure. Gretchen was torn between television coverage and a phone that was ringing off the hook; it was family calling. All of them, trying to make sense of what was going on out east. Hassler was polite and patient as I framed some shots of him in the kitchen and then in the backyard. Neither of us spoke much about the attacks; I don’t think either of us understood what had happened, how the world was about to change. Forever.

I have, framed in my office, the portrait of Hassler that I took that day. It takes on special meaning on this day of his death.

Hassler never wrote about skyscrapers or terrorists. He wrote about small towns. He created characters who were flawed and deeply human. He wrote simply. Most of his characters were simple, good people trying to get along in the world, in a simple world, a small town world. A world, I hope, which still exists.

Locally grown means eating seasonally

Locavore. Have you heard the term? It’s used to describe a movement that encourages people to buy and eat food that is produced locally, most times within 100 miles of your home. As an indication of the movement’s rise in popularity in the culture, “Locavore” was proclaimed the word of the year for 2007 by the Oxford American Dictionary.

In an era of $100 per barrel oil, more and more people seem determined to get the “oil” out of their diet. That’s not easy considering most of our food now travels an average of 1,500 miles before ending up on our plates. The globalization of the food supply affects the environment, our health, and quite predictably, our ability to discern how fresh food should taste.

One of the casualties of this centralized food system is that we can no longer trace our food to its origins. A bag containing lettuce, even lettuce that is labeled “organic” for instance, is processed in a large facility far from the consumer; its contents could have been grown in any number of places even farther still. This becomes a problem when contamination enters the picture. Recall the E coli outbreak in fresh spinach in late 2006 that spanned 26 states. The source of that contamination never was discovered and so who’s to say it can’t happen again and again? It already has. According to the U.S Centers for Disease Control, between July and December 2007, there were nine recalls of suspected E coli in processed food products. There have been four such recalls so far in 2008.

Here’s a test for you. Walk into your kitchen in the next few days, pull a packaged food item out of your cupboard or freezer and try to figure out where it came from. You know, originally. Maybe your pork chops came from Iowa or maybe they came from Canada. Does it matter? That’s up to you. Your answer might hinge on whether the item ends up making you or someone you love sick. Then it will matter. But even then, you won’t be able to find out where your food came from. That’s how the system is set up, to keep you out.

What drives the Locavore movement is a desire to have a “relationship” with a food source. When you buy locally, from a local farmer, a farmer’s market or farmers participating in Community Supported Agriculture, you break apart the anonymity of the industrialized food system. Eating becomes more personal, even sustainable.

Of course, eating locally really means eating seasonally. Eating locally means eating asparagus in spring, not in August. Eating locally means waiting for June or July to enjoy the tastes of summer. Eating locally means the vegetables you enjoy all winter spent their summers underground. It's this requirement to wait for food, which may prevent the Locavore movement from catching on.

There is a deeply-embedded American expectation that all foods should be available all the time. Few people think twice when they see a fresh tomato or cantaloupe for sale in the market in February. But it wasn’t always this way; food companies starting moving food to new markets during the 1950s and 1960s, when fuel was cheap. Well, those days are over.

Sure, you can buy tomatoes and melons in Minnesota grocery stores in February, but should you? If, like me, you remember what a locally grown tomato or melon tastes like when you picked one up at the farmer’s market last summer, your decision to buy the same in February is likely to be based more on taste than on the price of oil. Does that mean I’m a Locavore? Maybe. Or maybe I just like the taste of summer and am willing to wait for it.

At the end of a long day: satisfaction

From late September through early November, the fields around here are busy with farmers working sun-up to well past sun-down, seven days a week, pulling in their crops. Well, today, I kinda know how they must feel when their last acre finally gets cleared.

Last August, I started work on a corporate video (part history, part promotional piece) for a bank that operates in southern Minnesota/northern Iowa. Today, I shipped them the finished product. On Friday, bank executives will gather in their board room to view my interpretation of their company. I hope somebody remembers the popcorn.

The last few years, it seems, all the creative projects I've undertaken have required months, and sometimes years, to complete. (Four Cedars is a great example.) I guess God has blessed me with ample amounts of stamina and fortitude. Maybe that's why I'm so mezmorized by farming or so intrigued when I see the headlights of a combine lighting up a dusty field when all I can think about is going to bed.

Splitting my blog-personality

Call me crazy; I've started a second blog.

Don't panic, dear ones. I'm not abandoning my mission of sharing insight garnered from life at Four Cedars or periodic updates on the new vineyard. (BTW: The countdown to planting has begun! Sharpen your shovels!)

My new blog, called The Importance of Storytelling, ties to my work in personal, family and corporate history. Eventually, the blog will be hosted on the Histories in the Making web site. That will happen once I get all the necessary components in place. If you know anyone who is interested in the field of personal or family history, send them over for essays on the topic.

In the meantime, I'll put a link to the new blog on the side of this one, along with a link to Becky & Jason's new blog: Air Land & Sea. Regarding the latter, I think we should expect some spectacular aerial photography to appear from time to time.

Window to a new world

This is the view from the Great Hall, from the inside looking out at the other buildings on Ellis Island, the first glimpse of the new world for many twentieth century immigrants.

An old house holds many secrets

An old house makes a lot of noise in the winter. The wood that keeps our roof overhead is almost 120 years old and thus when touched by extreme cold, the result is all sorts of creaking and popping sounds – each one reminding me to be grateful I’m indoors on a night when the temperature slipped below zero.

I’m also grateful that two stories below my bed, down in the scary cellar, a twentieth century marvel – a forced air propane furnace – continues to pump warm air throughout the spacious rooms of this prairie box. It’s an old farmhouse but it’s fairly cozy even though the windows are often so iced over you can’t catch a clear view of outside.

As I ponder the creaks overhead, I wonder about the people who’ve lived in this house throughout its history. Who pulled the woodstove out from the middle of the dining room and patched the hole in the ceiling? What year did the bathroom go in? Who decided to run the floor boards in the hallway upstairs in two different directions? Who replaced the long narrow windows with short ones and who decided the bedrooms at the front needed only one window instead of their original two? And, who set the house facing the road instead of overlooking the lake?

I can only venture a guess at these questions, of course. Who can know the past unless someone in the present takes the time to write up the details of domestic life and then takes further action to save it. Maybe someone once did this; maybe the history of this house sits in someone’s attic in Orange, California. How could I know?

The stories of the past link one generation to the next. In a way, they keep the past alive. This is important for many reasons, the very least of which is waking up grateful your heat comes from the basement instead of wood stove in the middle of the dining room.

America's collective memory; open to all

First, a math lesson: One aging mother moving into my home (which is full of books) PLUS mother’s two television sets PLUS one missed appointment between me and the cable guy EQUALS one stressed out daughter in need of a quiet library wherein I might hide.

Thank you Mr. Jefferson!

Litera Scripta Manet. This Latin phrase can be found in the Librarian's Room in the Thomas Jefferson building of the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Translated, the phrase touches this writer’s soul: The Written Word Endures.

The Library of Congress is the nation's oldest federal cultural institution. It was founded in 1800 when the seat of federal government moved from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. Its original mission was to create a collection of books useful to Congress; the library was housed in the Capitol building until 1814 when British troops set the building ablaze. Within a month, retired President Thomas Jefferson offered his personal library as a replacement.

Jefferson had spent 50 years accumulating books, "putting by everything which related to America, and indeed whatever was rare and valuable in every science," as he stated about his collection. Jefferson’s library was considered to be one of the finest in the United States; his collection included books in foreign languages and volumes of philosophy, science, literature, and other topics not normally viewed as part of a legislative library. Jefferson wrote, "I do not know that it contains any branch of science which Congress would wish to exclude from their collection; there is, in fact, no subject to which a Member of Congress may not have occasion to refer."

In January 1815, Congress accepted Jefferson's offer, appropriating $23,950 for his 6,487 books, and the foundation was laid for a great national library. The Jeffersonian concept of universality, the belief that all subjects are important to a collection of American legislature, was the rationale behind the comprehensive collecting policies of today's Library of Congress.

I, for one, am grateful for Jefferson's vision; my first book, "The Bond Between Brothers," is part of the Library's collection. In fact, today, the Library’s collection contains books, recordings, photos, maps and even unpublished manuscripts – all readily available to the American people. Much of its collection can be viewed online.

The Library vows to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity for future generations; in this way the Library of Congress is more than a repository of knowledge. It is this nation’s collective memory -- one that will last long after mother forgets what she missed on television because I missed my appointment with the cable guy.