AMusing Marilyn

Tag: 2020

South Dakota: From the Prairie to the Palace
Driving across the United States

PART 4: South Dakota, prairie to palace

“Look, I think those are trees.”

Prairie Dog Peek-a-Boo

Roadside Chapel; Henry, (SD)

Very limited seating.

Corn Palace, 2005

Aw, shucks!

We got to see the construction phase.

The Palace gets a new face every year!
South Dakota is about 380 miles wide, east to west.

Our introduction to South Dakota takes us from the prairie to the palace. Palace, you ask? Okay we did drive through miles of prairie land to arrive at the Mitchell Corn Palace. It turns out that South Dakota is a very diverse place. It was also our first view of the Great Plains region of the United States from the ground. Those of us who don’t live here think of the Midwest as flat. It turns out it is; and it isn’t.

If you stand by your car and look south you would swear you could see Texas. But there is an east-west tilt that gradually increases your elevation as you go west. The elevation at the Minnesota border is about 970 ft (295 m) but when we reach the town of Wall, just outside the national park, we will be at 2,825 ft (861 m). That is nearly a 2,000 foot climb.

The sky looms large all the time here because there are no large clumps of tall buildings, trees or mountains to break it up. I’m told people love “wide open spaces” but it makes me scrunch my neck down into my shoulders like a turtle avoiding a poking finger at its nose.

Tiny Roadside Chapel in Henry, South Dakota

Henry, South Dakota, we learn, has a population of 266; plus or minus 1 or 2. There literally is not much to see because the main attraction, the Roadside Chapel, is literally so small. Like many of these types of buildings that dot the world, it was built to provide a bit of respite to travelers.

It is very well kept up; immaculately clean inside and a welcome stop for us. Maybe because we have an affinity for little white chapels? After all, we were married in the Little White Chapel in Las Vegas.

The Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota

Proving that we are not early morning people, we checked out of the Comfort Inn at 11:00 a.m. Proving that we are not big spenders, the Corn Palace was free and the Doll Museum was only $5 per person. Lunch, of course, was corn-on-the cob with one BLT for me and a Corn Dog for Rob; the bill was $12.75, including sodas.

I am so glad the Mitchell Corn Palace exists. It really is a remarkable place and makes such a statement about the kinds of people you find all across the United States. Not the celebrities of headlines, but real people like those who work the land growing corn and wheat that supply food to humans and herds. When long, growing season days turn to cold winter months, what better way to spend your time than to be creative.

It doesn’t take a stretch of the imagination to see how someone came up with the idea to decorate the outside of a building using corn when it grows by the mile in these parts. What is “a-maizing” (get it?? :>) is how delicate some of the pictures appear. That, and the fact that the façade must be replaced every year. Corn, after all, is biodegradable.

The Science of Corn Painting

The residents who do this have it down to a science. The artist draws pictures for whatever theme is chosen for the next year and then uses a projector to help enlarge the image onto black roofing paper. They use a coded system to mark which areas are to be filled in with what kind (or color) of corn. This is a true corn-by-code “painting” system developed for the volunteers to follow when placing corn stalks and ears.

The Corn Palace itself contains a small history with photos of previous versions, an explanation of how the façade is created, and a gymnasium with a basketball court that can be used for community activities. After looking around, we sat in the bleachers and listened to a tour guide speak to a group of retirees who had arrived by bus that morning. Half a million people a year visit the Corn Palace and believe me, they are not flying in on jumbo jets.

Later, when coming out of a shop, Rob stopped short when he saw the name tag on one of those visitors – showing he was from Rochester, New York! It turned out he was actually from Greece, a suburb that we are familiar with, as Rob’s mother lived there once. Another case of “it’s a small world after all.”

The Enchanted World Doll Museum

The Enchanted World Doll Museum was enchanting! What a treasure. There were nearly 5,000 dolls of every make, model and description. And they came from nearly everywhere in the world. Some are very old, some are just exquisite, some crudely made – in its entirety, it was well worth the time and minimal cost.

I use the past tense because, I am sorry to say, we just learned that the museum closed in 2008. The collection was most likely sold at auction and the building now is empty. What a terrible loss for everyone involved and to the many visitors to South Dakota.

Just one of the many cases filled with dolls.
Mitchell has a Castle, as well as a Palace

A piece of my heart is broken today.

This post is one in a series that document our 400-day trip round the world (2005-2006). Each segment will be linked in at RTW.
2020-08-16
Two cities, twice the fun: Chicago and Minneapolis
- St. Croix River bridge up stops morning traffic.
- Tug boat pushes barge in Joliet, Illinois.
- Chicago view from our high-rise hotel room.
- Fun sculpture in Grant Park, Chicago.
- Chicago skyline from the Navy Pier.
- Tall ship with sails down, Chicago.
- Dinky helps celebrate Rob’s birthday.
- Navy Pier, Chicago
Chicago and Minneapolis are two of the largest cities in the Midwest and we haven’t been to either. We need to fix that!

When you arrive anywhere in the dark, it is always refreshing to wake to sunlight. It is a visual transformation to see how less threatening everything looks.

I’ve heard of Joliet but neither of us has ever been here before. I’m ashamed to realize I don’t even know the name of the river just outside our window. There is a lot for us to discover about the Midwest.

No need to rush this morning because the traffic is stopped outside. A bridge over the river is up as a wide, heavy-looking barge is being nudged along by a tug boat.

The Des Plaines River, the longest stream within the Chicago region, flows southward for 133 miles (105 miles in Illinois) through southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois. It eventually meets the Kankakee River southwest of Joliet to form the Illinois River, a significant tributary of the Mississippi River.”
Des Plaines River from “I fish Illinois”

Today is Robert’s 44th birthday so a leisurely casino breakfast seemed like a good choice. Our travel plans were changed last night. In the morning we will head north. So much for we only Go West!

It was almost noon when we said our farewells to the casino bed — and home. This journey is going to have a lot of “homes.”

Chicago is the Windy City and home to the Navy Pier

It is only 72 miles from Joliet to Chicago. This is his day, so Rob has his choice of what to do and where to eat. He wants to walk over to the Navy Pier and check out the harbor. So we did.

The Navy Pier is 3,300-feet long. That is almost a half mile so a walk to the end to look out onto Lake Michigan takes a while. Especially since I like to window shop and look around like the tourist I am.

Birthday turned into another beautiful night given to strolling. We stop along the Pier for a birthday dinner of hot dogs. Not fancy, but good American summer picnic food. Then we continued on, to look out over the southern tip of Lake Michigan and back at the Chicago skyline. Rob’s birthday has been a typically beautiful late-summer day. A good counterpoint to yesterday’s long drive.

Driving across the United States

PART 3: Joliet and Chicago (IL) to Minneapolis (MN)

Midwest States

Minneapolis (“Minnie”) is the City of Lakes

It seems we are mixing long drives with short ones. Leaving Chicago we drive 435 miles into and through the southwest corner of Wisconsin, into Minnesota. Tonight’s home is a motel by the gigantic Mall of America in Minneapolis.

Ever practical, we cannot take a year’s worth of clothing with us. In fact, we have only about eight day’s worth of clothes so a Holiday Inn is in order. It has laundry facilities as well as internet access. Besides, we’ll be able to check in with niece, Kelly, for a weekend visit.

University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum

Saturday morning we pick Kelly up and head out of town to the University of Minnesota’s Landscape Arboretum. Another nice sunny day. We all feel healthy for the walking. The arboretum covers a lot of ground and is picturesque by design.

I take a lot of pictures of favorite things. But Kelly and I spend more time catching up on each other’s lives. Despite the physical distances between us, we have a special link in that we share an April birth date. Some in our family say we also share a particular temperament, as well.

Kindred Spirits

There is the family story about the time Kelly’s Mom, Barb, called my Mom to ask what she would do if I were outside at 9 o’clock at night, arms wrapped solidly around a light post, refusing to come inside. My mother said, “I’d leave the door unlocked and go to bed … she’ll come in eventually.”

Arboretums and gardens are always a fun place because you literally are encouraged to stop and smell the roses. There are also wonderful water features and stone bridges that form pathways through boggy waters. When we have a house again, I think I want it to have a shallow moat.

The next best thing about this type of outing is that just as you think you cannot take another step, there will be a cafeteria. Yes, time for a sit down with good food at reasonable prices.

Over lunch we share memories from our separate trips to Peru and Machu Pichu. Kelly walked the Inca Trail with friends; we took the train and bus. She tells us about her adventures to the temples of Angkor Wat in Cambodia. That is already on our list of places to see. Apparently that birthday bond includes a bit of wanderlust. Or is it that we have inquiring minds?

Minnehaha Park and Mexican Dinner are a great combo

Back to “Minnie,” Kelly directs us to Minnehaha Park, the home of — you got it — Minnehaha Falls. The waters rise each spring to cut the bowl surrounding the falling water. It must be something to see. Unlike the more peaceful arboretum, hundreds of families are milling about in the park. Some are picnicking, others are just out for a stroll much like us, enjoying the sunny, hot day.

Eventually we decide we are hungry again and off we go, back toward Kelly’s neighborhood, to a Mexican restaurant for more great food and drinks. This is not a fast food spot or Tex-Mex mix; tonight is real Mexican food. I thoroughly enjoyed the best Pina Colada I’ve ever had. It turns out it was made with tequila instead of rum. Will I remember that?

We decided to keep moving after we dropped Kelly off. This is counter to all those rules about early starts as it is about 6:30 p.m. It seems prudent, though, to backtrack south and move down toward Albert Lea because we can catch up with the interstate in the morning.

As every day ends, we think about how far we’ve come and how far we have yet to go
Another Marilyn Musing

Tomorrow we will start the long haul across the country. As we get ready for bed, we realize that we will be looking at new territory for the next third of the trip: Minnesota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

A third of the way to California

Rob calculated that we have already driven more than 2,000 miles. That is a lot more than we would have guessed. Americans tend to split the U.S. into thirds: two coasts and the flat, middle bit. And we all know from grade school that our country is 3,000 miles wide, right? I’m not at all sure exactly where that 3,000 mile line was measured, but we are not driving straight even if we were near it. Side trips are too much fun.

Tomorrow morning will be another kind of new beginning.

University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum

Orchids

Orchids

Stopping to smell the roses

Great idea for a boggy walk

Minnehaha Falls, Minneapolis

Minnehaha Park, Minneapolis

This post is one in a series that document our 400-day trip round the world (2005-2006). Each segment will be linked in at RTW.
2020-08-09
The rebirth of house calls by doctors

Now this is a much more pleasant way to wait for the doctor!

Say “2020” and everyone thinks COVID-19, Coronavirus and pandemic. On a brighter side, 2020 marks the rebirth of house calls by doctors. Not the old fashioned kind of house calls where “Doc” climbed the back stairs and knocked on the door. People who knew about house calls often lament their passing as the world became a more hectic, efficiency based place to live.

I still have childhood memories of Doc Gordon and his little black bag. It had magical, hinged racks inside that yawed opened to reveal a miniature pharmacy. He was our family doctor and the one who opened his office one night so our entire family could come in for the new polio vaccine shots.

Today my doctor’s house call uses Skype to connect us, face to face, electronically. I sit in the comfort of my home while I wait for my doctor to make his call. Calmly sipping my morning green tea, I finish one online jigsaw puzzle and start on a daily Sudoku.

Tablet hums and my doctor joins me via computer call

My Samsung tablet sits open, wedged between my desktop monitor and keyboard. I live in a very technically outfitted home. Rob waits nearby to help if the call comes in and I forget which button to press. Buzz …. Skype call comes in.

My doctor and I acknowledge that we can see each other. He comments on my haircut and we both laugh. In all the pandemonium of the pandemic, getting a haircut has taken on a whole new level of necessity. I admit that I finally gave in and got it all chopped off.

He asks how I’m doing and we discuss what brought us together this morning. Five minutes later he signs off and I’m good for the day. No muss, no fuss. Why did I bother putting pants on, I wonder. I push the button to disconnect the call and feel fortunate that today’s technology allows such human interactions despite the need for stay at home recommendations.

I think I’m going to miss these calls. Maybe our doctor will realize he can “see” more patients in a day using Skype? It might be better for all of us than having patients waiting impatiently in his waiting room. A new norm, born of a pandemic.

Another deadly virus remembered

Just as this rebirth of house calls by doctors has brought memories of Doc Gordon, it also brings memories of another deadly virus: polio. Those memories come tumbling into my mind, as vivid as if today were 1955. I recall the family conversations about whether or not to get the Salk vaccine. Even as a child, I understood the facts about polio. It was a disease everyone feared for their children.

Many families chose not to get the polio vaccine at first but it was our collective agreement that we would. We were fearless and believed in Jonas Salk as a healer and as a man of science. So one night we walked uptown to Doc Gordon’s office. We would get the vaccine as a family. But one of us didn’t.

Doc Gordon said my Dad’s limp was from polio he must have contracted as a child. Dad always thought he hurt himself falling during a basketball game but Doc said it was more likely he fell because he was ill. Before that revelation, I had bought my Dad’s story that his leg was carved out of wood and each hair was inserted by a master craftsman.

He even let us stick pins in it one day and never blinked. I think now that Doc Gordon had more to go on for his diagnosis than just seeing the limping gate.

Will we ever learn from our mistakes?

Associations of ideas and concepts are what get my mind to musing. Today I cannot help but wonder if future generations will learn from our foolishness during this pandemic. After all, we as a society apparently did not learn from the Spanish Flu fiasco of 1918, nor through polio. Some people today prefer to get their information from strangers on the internet.

Personally, I think humans are the only animals that don’t learn anything from those who came before them. Even crows can pass along the need to be wary of men wearing Nixon masks. Here we are, in 2020, surrounded by people who think the Coronavirus is a hoax.

Doc Gordon has lived fondly in my memory all my life

I was still just a child when Doc Gordon died, quite tragically. After carrying his two boys to safety, he ran back into his burning home for his wife. Neither came out. Over the years I’ve thought of them often. Doc and his boys. My mother said they went to go live with an aunt. I was never sure that was true or if she said that to calm me.

I remember him as kind and caring. He once visited my brother who was sick, in bed. After giving him a shot, he broke off the tip of the syringe and gave it to my brother to use as a water gun. Moments like those are what we are thinking about as we speak of “the good old days.” No rules and regulations to protect us from ourselves. We lived and learned by the rules of common sense.

2020-07-28
Happy anniversary to us

Married in Las Vegas, we partied in Albany and then in Buffalo afterward. Twice the cake!

Our anniversary lunch-dinner was more elaborate than our wedding day dinner. After we married at the famous Little White Chapel, we had just enough time to change into travel clothes and grab a quick dinner at a Johnny Rockets at a casino before moving on to the airport for our red-eye flight home with our surprise news plastered on my chest via the T-shirt in the photo, above.

I was reminded that today is our wedding anniversary by my older (ha!) sister’s electronic card in my inbox this morning. And then Facebook’s compilation of photos. Both did a great job in their selections.

We were an unlikely pairing from the get-go. Robert and I shared a middle class upbringing and I spent two years at the same university he graduated from, BUT the elephant in our room was age. He was not yet four-years-old when I arrived as a freshman. Or is it a freshwoman these days??

He was so young when we met that when I look back on photos I wonder at my boldness. In my defense, I did try to fix him up with a couple of young women I knew. He was such a nice guy and smart and ….. well, they were much to involved in partying to care. In the end it was their loss; and my gain.

Celebration

If you know us, you’ll understand our anniversary blow out took the form of an eye appointment for me and then lunch/dinner at a nearby Carrabba’s. That is one of my favorite restaurants. First, it has lots of booths so you can carry on a conversation with the people in the booth and not have to listen to everyone else’s discussions. Second, it has professional waitstaff who are very well trained. Third, but not last, it serves the best steak in town. It is, after all, Carrabba’s Italian Grill. Not that I had steak, mind you, because their chicken Marsala with mushrooms is very tasty, as well.

Rob also had a $20 gift card so it wasn’t a big out of pocket expense. Not that we pay cash for anything. This is where knowing us, especially knowing Rob, comes into the equation. He is all about research. He puts stickers on credit cards to remind us (that means me) which ones are for restaurants, or for gas, motels, etc.

I do not clip grocery coupons. Never have. But over one memorable several-year span I bought thousands of dollars of books for free. Walked into the store, made my selections, handed over a fist full of $5-off coupons and left with nary a dime leaving my pocket.

When we came home from our world journey, there was about $300 worth of coupons in the storage unit. Fortunately, I used them all up before Waldenbooks went out of business.

Cheap, thrifty, frugal or what?

Sometimes I say we are cheap but that really is not correct. We will pay good money (where do these terms come from?) for a piece of art we like but we will not pay any money for a cheap trinket or an ugly vase.

Thrifty sounds like we only shop at dollar stores and that isn’t true, either. We have standards. We will go to the local flea and farmer’s market for specific sorts of items like sunglasses. Who would pay more than $7 for a pair of sunglasses anyway?

Frugal sounds like a cake Grandma Moses would have made for Christmas. It might fit us, though. After all, we got married on the fly, returning home through Vegas from an artificial intelligence conference and Rob wrote off part of his expenses.

I think I just worked around to savvy. You have to love a word with double Vs, yes? There may be calendar years between us, but there is no gap when it comes to money. We both worked hard for it; we both benefit from putting money aside in savings for our future; we both understand that choices have consequences; and we have discussed and agree on a lifestyle.

No wonder today is a happy anniversary.

2020-07-22
Poetry as a muse

The first poem I wrote was as a sophomore in college. Totally depressed at the time, I had little purpose and wanted to be anyplace else on Earth, doing just about anything else. There was nothing amusing about my mood but maybe that is why I came to realize poetry as a muse. Inspiration comes from many places.

My English professor was also one of my best friend’s lover. That’s right. I had to face this man at the ungodly hour of 8:00 a.m. every Saturday morning. I wonder now if there wasn’t a correlation there, somewhere. My class had been tasked with writing a paper about ourselves because, to paraphrase, “…we were too inexperienced to write about anything else.”

Tortured, I handed in a paper that was rapidly returned with a note that I could do better, dig deeper. So I capitulated and tossed five pages of catharsis onto paper, double spaced and typed on a rickety old typewriter. Then, slurping a soda in the Rathskeller one afternoon, I started writing a poem about a tree. About me.

We’re one, this tree and I …

In the end, I drew that tree and handed in the drawing, the poem, and my revised paper as one. I will never forget his note: “I could have graded you on the drawing of the tree alone, as it is that revealing.” Damn. Then, to my surprise, he wrote: “Unlike other young poets, you did not sacrifice meaning for rhyme. A++”

A young poet? Me? Apparently not a proficient one as I’ve learned that poems only come to me every so often. Words fill my head, an idea blooms, and if I’m very lucky there will be a pen and paper nearby.

Poetry is personal

I refused to share my poems with anyone for a very long time. They were personal memories held tight and hidden. A near lifetime flew past and we moved to Florida where I became a member of a Creative Writing Club and then a Journalism Club. I’ve learned from those that I enjoy writing but am not goal driven.

Another couple of years later and a Florida friend drew me into a group called the Poetry Pals. We are not an official club-club. We just are a handful of women who enjoy hosting each other for a lunch and to share poetry. Usually the hostess picks a topic but any poems brought will do. One woman is a prolific, published poet; two of us write when the heavens move us; the others just enjoy the shared time, stories and poetry.

Somewhere in there, Rob encouraged me to publish two short stories online, through Smashwords.com so Maybelle and Mattie: Each with a story of her own to tell is available for free to the world. I don’t advertise that and rarely look to see if anyone is still reading them. By now they must be way-way-way down the list. It isn’t as easy to format poetry so those never got recorded.

Not too long ago, my husband and I were discussing blog and website development. Rob said I really should publish my poetry so it will be there when I’m not. Okay, maybe not that bluntly, but I got it. I surely cannot leave him with a binder of poems and the burden of not knowing what to do with it — with them. AMusingMarilyn will be my vehicle.

If you stumble across my poems and enjoy one or two, thank you for the compliment. Please feel free to share my words but remember that written words are copyrighted as they are written. Always give an author credit for her work, for her words. I share them like leaves floating into the ethos but they are my leaves and I really do not want to see them crumpled and distraught.

This sharing business will obviously take a leap of faith on my part.

I understand that cheating in schools pre-COVID19 had become rampant — the new norm. That bothers me because cheating only cheats the one who cheats. To plagiarize is bad enough as it admits defeat in your own strength to create, to accomplish. That is not a satisfying path to wander. To steal someone else’s work entirely is far more offensive. Taking someone else’s intellectual property and putting your own or anyone else’s name on it is mean and illegal.

~AMusing Marilyn

2020-07-13