It’s been a busy time since my last post over a week ago. My wife’s mother and brother came into town and we made our first trip to my family’s cabin in northwestern Wisconsin. My in-laws hail from warmer climes, and the weather on their arrival reinforced their image of the Upper Midwest as a cold place. It was 41 degrees on the morning of Saturday, June 10, and we had to turn the furnace on. Every night of the weekend featured a fire in the fireplace.

As I write this now, a little over a week later, it’s about 90 degrees and humid - the kind of variability to be expected in the Upper Midwest.

It was nice to see that the cabin and lake were there as we left them last year. Aside from a pontoon boat ride around the lake, we spent most of our time indoors talking, reading, playing with our two-year old daughter, watching TV (including the French Open finals, early World Cup matches, and the Stanley Cup finals), visiting with my aunt and uncle, and, when our daugher was asleep, playing bridge. I’m a novice at the latter, but the experts I played with were tolerant of my many questions on the mysteries of this confoundingly complex game.

On Monday we went to the amusement park at the Mall of America, and, commercial as it was, I got to experience the joy of seeing my daughter have fun. As we approached the theme park, she saw the carousel and took off, running with her arms waving and her diaper wiggling, oblivious to our existence as she raced to her first adventure.

There’s nothing quite like seeing a child experience new things, and I marveled as she went from ride to ride, expressing her wonder, excitement, and fear as she did so. This experience for parent and child no doubt explains the theme park phenomenon. Now I understand why families flock to Disneyworld; it’s an experience for the parents as much as the children.

Now we’re back to a more normal schedule. My delay in posting is partly due to preparation for some upcoming changes to this web site. Look for those in the near future. Look also for reviews of the new movie A Prairie Home Companion and the Pulitzer-prize winning novel, Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 16th, 2006 at 5:33 pm and is filed under Autobiography, Minnesota, Weather.