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No one could tell the story of the 60s better than Doris Kearns Goodwin, especially as seen through her and husband Richard Goodwin’s lived experiences, vivid memories, box after box of words and picture artifacts, and so much love, passion, and intelligence for and with each other and their friends and associates—key players all, in a time and in places never to be forgotten. And all here in An Unfinished Love Story:… Read More
Remember, labels and photos get separated when posts are transferred to a computerized blog book. Just enjoy, family members, who are the only people seeing these books…match as best you can! Posted December 26, 2023: My first home. Before the log and plaster addition, before fruit trees and spruce trees and willow trees grew into place. Before gardens. Then it lived as a home for a very long time. But eventually after… Read More
Posted October 15, 2023: Mizpah Elementary School. Graduating Class. 1951. And there I am. Between Carol and Larry. We were the tallest kids in the class all the way through school so consistently in the back row. Probably why none of the three of us achieved great fame and fortune. And over to the left, Pat. Whom, just last week, I just met for lunch in International Falls and spent a pleasant… Read More
Posted October 7, 2023: My immediate family is small, even when cousins are included—but many of my first and some of my second cousins and their children feel very immediate to me. I visit every year or two and they grow older, bigger, wiser, with new additions every now and then—Robert and I are the last Nesets in this U.S. branch so guess the name goes away here soon. Fortunately the Nesets… Read More
Posted September 23: I just drove 2,000 miles, mostly on two-lane roads, small towns far apart, little traffic and few rescuers if things fell apart car-wise or otherwise. No problem. Then. Almost immediately after I pulled into in bro Robert’s driveway in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, Ghost’s battery ‘gave up the ghost’ so to speak. Died dead away. If it weren’t for a world full of homeless people including millions of refugees, war,… Read More
Cousin Audrey’s youngest daughter, Terri, is the lure that will always bring me back to MInnesota…even if Robert and Marsha permanently decamp to Florida some day. Terri seems to be a center around which the extended family of Hahns, Nesets, Tacks and more can revolve. Audrey is nearby in a nursing home but no longer able to be active physically or very present mentally. The eldest son Randy died some years ago,… Read More
The Old Place is the 80 acres of woods and swamp and fields where I was born: actually I was born ten miles down the road in Blackduck but Robert was born on this very land. It is, for reasons I cannot exactly explain, the most important place in my life. I was a very happy young child there, free to roam the woods with book in hand, or walk up and… Read More
That time of year thou mayst in me beholdWhen yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hangUpon those boughs which shake against the cold,Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.In me thou see’st the twilight of such dayAs after sunset fadeth in the west;Which by and by black night doth take away,Death’s second self, that seals up all in rest … Said Shakespeare, just in time for the birthday party. … Read More
It was May 3, 2021 and we were emerging from the pandemic—when last I wrote. Now it is August 1, 2021 and we are…what? I am as confused by life as everyone one else right now. So here’s a back-to-blog-world post about my very own pandemic-free month…kind of like ‘what I did on my summer vacation’ but with the expectation that I’m returning to the new-normal…you know, the socially-distanced, when can-I-take-another-trip normal…. Read More