My need for and comfort with being a free spirit is a function of both nature and nurture. My mother says I was born that way but being single and living alone until later in life further nurtured this natural tendency. Paul and I live independent lives that have often included being separated by distance for long periods of time by professional obligations, competing priorities and personal preferences over the years. Every other year, Paul runs a six week summer program for university students that toggle between the Netherlands and Switzerland. I often join him on the back end of the program when we shuffle off to a new European destination for a respite before returning to the states. This is the case again this year as I enjoy a solo early summer at the lake before joining him in Italy in several weeks.
This is my life so I am often surprised when people ask me where Paul is, which is usually followed by a question related to being “home alone.” My response is that I love being home alone and have a rich full life independent of where my husband happens to be, which seems to puzzle some folks. In an effort to describe my reality for those seldom alone I thought I would share this weekend’s experience “home alone.” It started out with early happy hour on my porch Thursday evening with a gaggle of lake ladies. We ended up watching the sunset so “happy hour” quickly became relative. Minus the wind, Friday would have started with a kayak around the island but, alternatively, I wrote an article for my column and then ran errands and stopped for a quick visit with area friends. A nice lunch at home was followed by preparing fabric for rug weaving which led to a two hour late afternoon nap. Refreshed, I was ready for a night out but, alas, I seem to have aged out of this form of entertainment and settled for reading a great thriller that took me thru much of the night before lights out. Saturday, I was up and off for a day of weaving at the loom room in Milan after which I stopped by the Spoon Gathering. This annual event is a Scandinavian tradition held at the Milan Village Art School during which you too can carve a piece of wood into an elaborate spoon for decoration and/or home use. This event has been gaining momentum over the years and people come from all over the country to participate. After planting a few lone peppers in my perennial bed, I had a lovely solo dinner of homemade lasagna accompanied by a nice red wine followed by the completion of my thriller.
I slept in Sunday morning and wrote several more articles for my column before heading out on a mid-afternoon road trip. My cousin was farm-sitting baby goats at her son’s house in Hendricks, SD, need I say more. The countryside greened up nicely after our weekend rain and, after a detour thru Gary, SD when I thought I was lost, I finally found my cousin waiting for me at the designated gravel road intersection. After my first viewing of the 14 goats (4 moms and 10 babies) we settled in for a nice visit after which we toured the fine town of Hendricks and had supper on the local golf club restaurant/bar patio. Then it was back to the farm and it was time to bottle feed two baby goats. We mixed up their formula, that smelled amazingly similar to my protein shake powder, and I commenced simultaneously bottle feeding two very hungry black baby goats. What fun that was and my cousin got some good pictures that I will post on Facebook. I then made a beeline back north on a secondary paved road (marked 7, 15 and 1) at dusk on which I think I saw more deer than cars. The sun had just set as I rolled into Big Stone and slowly made my way home along Hwy 109 with the peach colored sky in the west. Now I am writing again and will soon watch several Food Network shows before turning in for the night. As you can tell, there was nary a coming home minute to be lonely or bored this weekend. Oh, and I did have several nice phone conversations with husband Paul who was cavorting with colleagues in Normandy and Paris this weekend. 2018