Wannaskan Almanac

  Last night, Jim and I went across the lake to visit family members who are also on vacation in Massachusetts. Although they planned to take some day trips to nearby attractions, they lay low, hung around the lake, and did nothing. Years ago, my friend Ellen gave me a quotation ensconced in a small frame that stated, "Doing nothing is a very important part of living. " The gift's timing was odd; we were both in the thick of our teaching careers and as English teachers, we always had a Sisyphean load of essays to read. Having a space of time to fill with nothing was sheer fantasy. I thought about that last night when my niece and nephew were extolling the pleasures of staring into space for two glorious weeks.   For sure, both doing and being define the head-tail-sidedness of life. External pressures and goals often dictate much of our time, but how do we slow down to tune in to the subtleties of who we are and explore our inner truths and callings? Shifting gears and sp...

  The Palmville Globe Volume 1 Number 22 Man Runs Over Tent Joe McDonnell, 78 and a resident of Palmville Twp, Minnesota, recently ran over a tent that was blowing across the freeway. "The tent wasn't moving when we first saw it." McDonnell tells the press. "We noticed the cars in front of of us moving left and right to avoid the tent which appeared to be a giant green rag. I moved right but just before we got to the tent, a strong wind puffed it up and scooted it into our lane. There was the sound of a tent being rapidly dismantled as we ran over it. Our engine started roaring and we slowed down. I wondered if the tent had disconnected our engine from the transmission. Then I realized that when I had stomped on the brakes, an iPad shot off the center console and knocked the shifter into neutral. No harm done. I saw the truck behind us, possibly the tent’s owner, stop and pick up the tent. Man Enjoys Boat Story  Joe McDonnell, 78 and a good listener, recently listene...

Hello and welcome to *gulp* the LAST Saturday of June (already!) here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is June 28th. We've blown through June, and here we are on the doorstep of July.  A friend of mine spent a week in June housesitting and dogsitting at her friends' cabin in the lakes country of central Minnesota. Her intention was to have a working vacation to do lots of writing. However, after she arrived and got settled in, the space had different plans for her. Yes, she still got writing done, but something unexpected happened. She became fully attuned to the magic of the cabin. In the 1980s, my grandmother owned a whole resort of cabins. As a child, cabin magic swirled around me like the misty wisps that came off the lake at dawn and dusk, daily tickling my senses and pulling me into the delight of the present. When she described her experience, I knew what she was talking about. As an adult, I, too, have tried to get a lot of writing done, whether that's at a cabin, at...

     Spring and Fall are the seasons for travel. It's cool then with fewer people on the move than in summer when the kids are out of school. Winter is a good time to stay home by the fire. And in summer we should stay home to tend the garden and enjoy the flowers. But this summer there was a family wedding that could not be missed.   The wedding was to be in Vermont. We thought to travel through Canada north of Lake Superior and then drop down by Lake Champlain. But prices for lodging along that route were outrageous so we decided on the more southerly route.    We got a late start on our first day and road construction in Duluth slowed us down even more, so by quitting time we were searching for lodging in small towns. We've gotten fussy the past few years and usually stay in chain motels, which, while boring, generally maintain certain standards.    We avoid the word budget in the name of our motel, but the Budget Motel in Ironwood, Michigan w...

  News Alert! "My blog posts catch up to me every week! Double-ditto this week. If you read last week's post, you know they're not ready to be published because something else has displaced an original idea. Or if I'm too tired to finish, I'll go to bed, wake up before 5 am, and finish the post; rereading it several times to make sure it is what I want. By the time it publishes, I'm usually content enough to call it 'good.' You won't know the difference, maybe.   "This evening I was tired after finally doing some long over-due projects (Yes, similar to finishing painting the house, but different.) For one thing, I vacuumed the basement floor, including the bathroom, laundry area and the old RAVEN office. Another thing I accomplished, (after several days of complaint by the wife), I finally capped off a flower planter by the front door that some kind of small animal unbeknownst to us had been trampling its mid-section with wild abandon. Ene...

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for June 25, 2025, the nineteenth Wednesday of the year, the first Wednesday of summer, the fourth Wednesday of June, and the one-hundred seventy-sixth day of the year, with one-hundred eighty-nine days remaining.    Wannaska Phenology Update for June 25, 2025 Lady’s Slipper ( Cypripedium reginae ), also known as the showy lady’s slipper or queen’s lady slipper, and the Anishinaabe call it ma-ki-sin waa-big-waan, or moccasin flower. Lady's slipper was adopted as the Minnesota state flower in 1902. This being lives in open fens, bogs, swamps, and damp woods where there is plenty of light. They grow slowly, taking up to sixteen years before producing their first flowers. Lady's slipper blooms in late June or early July, and you can see them now if you know where to look. But don't pick. Since 1925 this rare wildflower has been protected by state law — it is illegal to pick the flowers or to uproot or unearth these animate...

I know what you're thinking. "June? The fourth best month? What kind of dad joke is this?" Well, buckle up, buttercup, because your old man is about to drop some truth bombs funnier than my golf swing. Everyone always raves about December with its holidays and January with its "new year, new me" nonsense. And don't even get me started on October, trying to hog all the glory with its pumpkin spice everything. But June, my friends, June is the unsung hero, the quiet achiever, the reliable minivan of months. Why fourth, you ask? Because it's not trying too hard. December is basically a show-off, all lights and presents. January is that friend who makes too many New Year's resolutions they'll never keep. October? Please. It’s just trying to be spooky, but let’s be honest, the scariest thing about October is how early Christmas decorations start appearing. June, however, just slides in like a perfectly buttered piece of toast – warm, comforting, and e...

Originally published December 23, 2029...  Several weeks have passed since the prior post of Song 9: Darkness Rising, so I’ll make a quick transition to this fourth post (one more to go) in this part of the narrative. The main character (MC) has been sent on a “mission” to bilk an old fellow named Hertwig. These two meet and discuss and by the time they leave together, the MC has lost all interest in stealing anything from the old gentleman. In this segment, we continue to follow them to Hertwig’s lodgings where the exchange continues. At last, he leaves, and I wander behind as he makes his way through gray city streets to where, I do not know, and do not care Some odd force urges me to follow him to unveil whatever mystery he holds After a maze of dim streets and alleys Hertwig stops before a dirt-streaked black door  open to a staircase leading to darkness and still I follow trudging up the steps while Hertwig puffs and wheezes, “Almost there.” At a second door...

  The Palmville Globe Volume 1 Number 21 Man Assists with Food Distribution  Joe McDonnell, 78 and residing in Palmville Twp, Minnesota, was recently part of a group giving out excess food meant for those in need. “I’ve been watching reports on the news of charity workers being shot while distributing food, but this was nothing like that,” McDonnell tells the press. “Our charitable donations warehouse had received too much food and rather than let it go to waste, it was offered to the general public no matter how well off they might be. The food was in boxes on a long line of pallets in the parking lot near the rink. My pallet had frozen chicken breasts and breaded Brussels sprouts and grapefruit among other things. As the mostly SUVs slowly drove along the line, I threw packages of my items into the open backs  of the vehicles, often having to rearrange the food thrown in from the previous pallets. There was really no rush but it felt hectic and I almost got my foot roll...