Year End Review (or is it Rear End View?)

December 27, 2014January 1, 2015 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

Photo credit: Heather Cowper

The end of the year calls for a review of the second year of this blog. Since last April, when I did my rather tardy year-end review for 2013, the number of my followers and views has grown, which is heartening. It’s always nice to know that the effort is worth it. Marie’s Meanderings received 3,000 views in 2014 (out of a total of 5,100 views), and has 126 followers.

I continue to receive the most feedback by sharing my blog stories with my Facebook friends. Between them and my followers, each story has the potential to reach almost 300 people.

The most popular post that I wrote since April was my social commentary on our local Christmas City of the North Parade. The story was shared among several of my Facebook friends who perhaps feel the same way – that sending our kids parading down the street in the dead of winter is a form of socially sanctioned child abuse. (Smirk.) And I can’t forget to say it was mentioned by fellow blogger Colette on her blog, WriterInSoul. Her humor is even quirkier than mine. I especially enjoy her “Things Men Have Said to Me” postings. Check it out!

Next comes “Why I am a Zumba Failure,” perhaps because there are many others out there who do not like to gyrate their hips in public.

Finally, is “The Planet Where They Don’t Give Christmas Presents” poem. My guess is its popularity has to do with the appeal of mild profanity among my Facebook friends.

But (or I should say, Butt) the most amusing aspect of my blog continues to be the international appeal and usefulness of the image that conveys the message “don’t flush toilet paper down the toilet.” It accompanied a post about my temporary roommate who had an obsession with toilet paper. That’s why I’ve chosen the image to decorate this post. It has received 69 clicks and downloads this year from many a country that must have sub-standard plumbing, including: Greece, the United Arab Emirates, India, Turkey, Romania, Pakistan, Cambodia, Kuwait, Malaysia, and the Philippines. I am proud that my blog serves such a purpose to the world, and hope to continue to be similarly useful in 2015.

Thank you, my friends, for reading!

If You Build a Seventy-Foot-Tall Hunk of Ice, Will They Come?

December 19, 2014March 25, 2015 / mariezhuikov / 4 Comments

Photo by Josh Parsons

So this winter, as a tourist attraction, someone wants to create a seven-million-pound, seventy-foot-tall block of ice right near the building where I work. What could possibly go wrong?

Said person is Roger Hanson, a computer software developer who hails from Big Lake, Minn. He’s been forming huge hunks of ice in his back yard since 2007.

Perhaps hearing that we were nervous, Roger recently came to our office bearing donuts and information. He said he started his hobby because he’s a hoarder. He has a geothermal heating system at his house that creates wastewater. He didn’t want to just dump the water into the river that runs nearby, so he got the idea of using his computer and technical skills to build an ice formation with it. He’s built some impressive ones that have garnered local and national media attention.

He uses a computer-controlled robotic water sprayer and metal cables to create the structures. And like any good hoarder, his piles of ice keep getting bigger every year. I think he reached 64 feet last year.

This year, he’s moving outside of his back yard for the first time, onto Barker’s Island in Superior, Wis. The island is man-made, composed of sand and soil dredged from the harbor in the late 1800s. The City of Superior, inspired by the unprecedented popularity of the natural ice caves at the Apostle Islands in Lake Superior last year, thinks Roger’s artificial ice formation will make a good tourist attraction. Roger explained that he wasn’t the city’s first choice – they wanted an ice castle builder instead. But those folks had scheduling conflicts. The city has committed Roger to a three-year, $135,000 contract and is advertising for vendors to provide hot chocolate and the like for the masses it hopes the ice will draw.

One of Roger’s previous creations by his house. Photo by Roger Hanson

Roger plans to build his largest formation yet at ninety feet wide and seventy feet tall. Already, he’s learning things and overcoming obstacles. For this endeavor, which he calls the Lake Superior Ice Project, Roger is pumping water out of the Superior Harbor. Although he thought he’d only have to lay one hundred fifty feet of tubing, he laid two hundred fifty feet out into the harbor in order to reach an eight-foot depth of water to be safe from a deep freeze. In the process, he ended up tripping on the tubing and got the cold shock of a dunk in the harbor.

He’s spent the past month setting up. Now the wind and the weather just need to cooperate. He explained that he designed the computer system for the prevailing wind direction for this area. Darn wind has been blowing from elsewhere, and the air temperatures have been too warm for him to begin spraying water for ice.

Roger also mentioned he dropped one of the seismic sensors he brought along that helps him predict when the structure will break up in the spring. He described how huge chunks of ice fall off the formation when it starts to melt. The stress on the structure can be measured with seismic sensors, and when the time between fractures starts getting too short (like labor contractions), Roger knows the thing’s going to blow – something very useful when there may be onlookers who need to be moved away for safety. But never fear, Roger was able to fix the sensor with some ingenuity and PVC pipe.

What the ice formation on Barker’s Island looks like now (because the weather is not cooperating).

If nature cooperates, he hopes to have the formation built by mid-February. He will light it up at night and give periodic tours. The city has a traffic flow plan in place. And although the city is spending thousands of dollars on this project, a city staffer who visited us admitted they have no advertising budget. As was the case with the Apostle Islands ice caves, the city hopes that social and news media will do the advertising for them. Also, the ice formation will be visible from a nearby highway and the city hopes that people driving by will see it and be drawn to it.

So we have a new location, finicky weather, seven million pounds of pressure atop a sandy island, no ad budget, huge blocks of ice calving off the formation, and massive amounts of meltwater come spring: what could possibly go wrong? Nothing, I hope, but stay tuned . . . .

Challenge: Describe Your Community in One Word

November 25, 2014November 25, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

Duluth city lights as seen from the water at night.

In a short chapter in Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love, (Chapter 33) Gilbert and her friend discuss how every city and its inhabitants can be defined in a single word, and that each community is different. For instance, their word for New York City was ACHIEVE. Their word for Stockholm, Sweden, was CONFORM. For Naples, Italy, it was FIGHT.

During a lunch outing a few years ago, my girlfriend and I decided that the word REMOTE fit our city of Duluth, Minn., not only for geography but for the people. Duluth is often the butt of jokes from the rest of civilization as being at the end of the world. This since it is so far north, and it serves as the end of the line (or beginning?) for highways, railroads, and shipping routes. If traveling north, we are a last bastion of goods and services before one reaches our friends in Canada.

As for the people, although we are “Minnesota Nice,” we can be hard to get to know. Some of us have lived here for several generations and we have our own cliques – like in the state of Maine, there are those from “here” and those from “away.” And you’re not really from “here” unless your grandparents were born here.

The harshness of the long winter can also make Duluthians seem remote – it’s too damn cold to shoot the breeze when you meet someone on the sidewalk, or we’re too tired from shoveling snow to have energy to socialize. It can take time for new residents to break through and find connections.

Imagine my interest when I saw an article, “Remote Minnesota: Where is the most far-away spot in Minnesota?” in the latest Minnesota Conservation Volunteer magazine (produced by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources). The author describes his quest to find the most remote and primitive spots in the state. He defined remote as a place farthest from any type of road, including Forest Service roads and private driveways.

Of course, with so many roads and driveways, it wasn’t Duluth. With the help of a Geographic Information System specialist, the author finds the spot on the shores of Knife Lake in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in northern Minnesota — twelve miles from a road.

The most primitive spot in the state is the bog country north of Red Lake. The author and his wife visited both places and described their experience. They found these wild spots “places where our imaginations can simmer.”

Now that the most-remote place in the state is official and it’s not Duluth, maybe I should change the defining word for the city. Also, several years have passed since my girlfriend and I defined it, and in the meantime, Duluth has earned national accolades, such as “Best Outdoors City” to live in. Not to mention all the microbreweries popping up everywhere. Perhaps we are getting too hip for REMOTE.

Duluthians, what do you think our defining word should be now? Readers outside of Duluth, what word would you use to define your community? I’d be interested to hear!

The Christmas City of the North Parade: Socially Sanctioned Child Abuse or Festive Community Event?

November 22, 2014November 19, 2015 / mariezhuikov / 4 Comments

Huddled masses watch the Christmas City of the North Parade.

It only took me fifty years to figure out how to stay warm while watching Duluth’s local winter parade in person. One could watch it on the television and stay warm, but that doesn’t count. I needed to watch the parade in-person because my son was marching in it for the first time as part of the high school band. This Northland rite of passage requires parental attendance. I did so for my oldest son, thus for my youngest, too.

It’s almost always below freezing for the parade, which challenges both marchers and spectators. I marched in the parade myself for at least four years for various school bands, and due to this, have little love for it. I recall the numbness of cold appendages, frozen valves on my French horn (which my boyfriend thought could be solved by pushing down hard on all the keys, thus breaking the strings and rendering the instrument tuneless) miserable school bus rides to and from the staging area, and the pain of thawing fingers and toes. (This was before the time of hand warmers.)

But we band rats didn’t have it as bad as the cheerleaders. Back then, before someone got wise and invented flesh-colored thermal tights, they danced in short skirts and skimpy nylons. I am half serious when I say that I thought then and still think now that the Christmas City of the North Parade, far from being an event that brings the community together, is just a case of socially sanctioned child abuse.

Truly, most of the participants are children — from dance schools, high schools, and community groups. Only in Duluth does it seem like a good idea to make our progeny travel a mile-and-a-half down a frozen road, performing for our amusement and joy. Even the television anchors from the station sponsoring the event stay indoors now, much to the disgust of the hardy spectators.

Pleasant parade memories aside, this year, I did it right. The parade route changed so that it passed several eating establishments. I met some friends (thanks Charlotte and Katie!) at an arts café over an hour before the parade began. That way there was still plenty of parking (found a nearby free spot on my first try) and ample time to eat before the parade. I had eaten at home, so I just drank some wine.

Wine! Silly me. Why had I never thought of combining alcohol with parade watching before? The beverage filled me with warmth and goodwill toward this thinly veiled community child abuse event.

Our kids are in there somewhere . . . .

When the parade started, we stood outside on the curb, waving to the passing floats, facing the cold wind blowing down the street. When we got chilled, we went inside the café lobby and watched the event on television and through the café windows, which fronted the street. All of us had sons in the same band, so once we saw the band approaching on the television, we worked our way to the curb to see it pass by in person, and to wave vigorously to our sons.

Then I headed for my car. Why stay and watch the whole event if I didn’t have to? As I passed the café windows, I noticed an empty table in a prime parade viewing spot. I thought, “Next year, that’s where I will sit.” Although my son will be in the parade then, too, since his maiden voyage is over, I can get by with even more comfortable viewing arrangements in the future. Just look for me and my friends at the center table, sipping our wine and staying warm, while the rest of the world marches by.

Yooper Duane

November 12, 2014November 16, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

My friend Duane

My meanderings last week took me Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, also known as “da UP.” Residents of the U.P. are affectionately known as Yoopers, and I visited a long-time Yooper friend, Duane.

Duane and I met thirty years ago on Isle Royale National Park (abbreviated in Park Service talk as ISRO). The island is one of the most isolated national parks in the country – only accessible by boat or sea plane. Duane was a carpenter for the park service and we became friends over coffee and doughnuts in the snack bar when I was a waitress on ISRO.

I’ve kept in touch with only a few people from my time on the island. Even Duane and I had long stretches where we lost track of each other. I managed to track him down a few years ago when I knew I’d be driving by his town for a book tour.

During my trip last week, we only had time for lunch. I wish our visit was longer, but I had to press home to a long list of responsibilities. But the time we were able to spend was vintage Yooper. Duane took me to Buck’s Café in downtown Ishpeming, and he wore the requisite Yooper regalia (see photo).

I expected to reach home by nightfall, but car issues forced an overnight stay at the edge of Yooperland (the MI/WI border). I found a mom and pop hotel complete with mouse droppings on the bedspread. But the mice stayed hidden, I slept well, and was able to successfully continue my journey home the next day.

Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks for the short taste of Yooper heaven, Duane!

The Bench

October 12, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 7 Comments

A sailboat off Park Point Beach in Duluth, Minn.

I saw the bench in passing as I was hauling a box of my novels into a local community center where I was to take part in a local arts sale and book signing. My first thought was that the bench offered a nice place to sit if someone got tired on the walkway up to the center.

On my second trip, I noticed the red crabapples that had fallen onto the weathered wooden slats of the bench from the tree that sheltered it. On my third trip, I saw the small sliver plaque that had tarnished beyond readability and how the main metal support on the bottom of the seat was hanging askew. That bench had been there for a while, and no one was taking care of it.

On my fourth trip, I realized I was having all these reactions to the bench, and that I should pay attention. It’s funny and sad sometimes how intent we get on what we are doing (in this case, setting up my book table) that we miss creative fodder that’s right along the path.

Where will the path of life take you? To the beach!

After I was done hauling books and moving my car across the street to allow arts sale patrons the best parking spots, I took time to appreciate the bench. I unpocketed my camera and shot some photos of it and the surrounding beach. The bench photos don’t do it justice. I think my words describe it better, but I got some good beach shots.

I’ve been thinking a lot about mortality lately, what with “shallow graves” occupying my mind, and attending a visitation for a fallen media comrade. This bench spoke to me of a life remembered. It served as a token of respite and peace in a busy world, but a token now forgotten and in disrepair. How fragile human memory is! How fleeting! Yet the bench stands in testament that someone once cared.

Like any good, self-absorbed artist, I wondered if anyone would care enough about me to dedicate a bench in my name, and if they did, how long the intent would last to keep it in good repair. And in the big scheme of things, does it really matter? Dust to dust, ashes to ashes, and all that.

I suppose a poem is in that bench somewhere. I wonder if I will have the opportunity to step off the path of my busy life and write it.

Okay, I changed my mind. Here’s the bench.

A Shallow Grave

September 30, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 5 Comments

Does it bug anyone else when television news makes a big deal about the body of murder victim being found in a “shallow grave?” As if a deep grave would make any difference. Oh yes, so-and-so was killed, but at least they were buried in a deep grave, so everything’s cool. Gah!

How I got Jane Goodall to Stick her Head in a Potted Palm Tree

September 23, 2014September 25, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

My story from the Minnesota Daily, May 7, 1986, page 1.

A recent news story about chimpanzee researcher Jane Goodall reminded me why she’s one of my favorites of the scientific glitterati. Here’s a link to the Huffington Post video story. Basically, she’s saying that researchers need to have empathy with their subjects in order to conduct ethical and meaningful science. I agree!

I had the chance to meet Jane (I don’t think she’d mind if I call her by her first name – she’s that kind of a person) back in my glory days as the environmental reporter for my college newspaper, the venerable “Minnesota Daily” (best college newspaper in the country!) Jane came to town to give a talk on chimpanzee behavior and DNA, and how similar they are to our own.

She presented to a packed auditorium and afterwards, hosted a news conference. I sat in the front row along with a photographer for the paper. I don’t remember what questions I asked, but I do recall being impressed by Jane’s seeming kindness and approachability.

During the news conference, the photographer and I surreptitiously discussed good locations in the room to take her photo afterwards, both agreeing (with the logic of college students) that the potted palm next to her podium would be ideal. She did work in the “jungle,” after all! However, the thought of asking Jane Goodall to stick her head among palm fronds filled me with anxiety. Would she be insulted? Have us thrown out of the room? Turn around and walk off in a huff?

Once the news conference was over, no other reporters seemed to want to talk to Jane, so I approached – probably gushed about what a big fan I was – and put forth to her the photographer’s plight of getting her photo against an interesting background. I couldn’t believe our luck when she pointed to the palm and said, “Well, why not here?”

Amazed and relieved, I agreed. Unfortunately, the palm tree photo did not run with the story — the photo editors ran a boring head-shot instead. But I will always remember how gracious and accommodating Jane was, and how willing she was to stick her head in a potted palm for a college reporter.

On the Ice Bucket Challenge and Apologizing for Happiness

September 17, 2014September 23, 2014 / mariezhuikov / Leave a comment

Smileyes By Ramesh NG via Wikimedia Commons

My youngest son wanted me to video his friend dumping a bucket of cold water over his head, joining the masses participating in the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. This was back a couple of weeks ago when it was all the rage. I agreed and probably laughed about it. My son then proceeded to make a snarky comment and went outside to join his friend who was waiting in our driveway with the bucket.

Stunned by my fifteen-year-old’s comment, I stood in the kitchen, at war over whether to call him out on it, but also feeling pressure to go outside and take the video. He doesn’t usually say such things, but the past few days, I’d noticed an edge to him that hadn’t been there before.

When he came on the porch looking for me, I motioned him into the house. I told him that if he wanted me to do something nice for him (take the video), he needed to be nicer to me and apologize for his comment (the words to which I can’t even recall any more).

He apologized and we had a rather heated discussion about what was wrong. It turns out, it’s all my fault. I was laughing too much. It annoyed him.

Now, even if I do say so myself, my laugh is not annoying. In fact, back when phone contact was the norm, my Allstate agent used to call me and crack jokes just to hear me laugh. He actually admitted this to me. My laugh is hearty, yes, but not unusually frequent. And I’m not one of those people who goes around smiling all the time. But, as you can probably tell from this blog, I do have an easy and strange sense of humor, and enjoy laughing when I have the chance.

Before I knew what was coming out of my mouth, I apologized to my son for being a happy person. In part, I did it to show him the absurdity of his complaint. I also did it because he had apologized to me and I was trying to move the discussion forward. Other parts of our conversation revolved around the need for him to find a way to deal with hearing his mother laugh. I have many things I could be sad about. I’m nowhere near as resilient as I used to be, but I’m not about to stop laughing any time soon. Afterwards, we went outside and commenced with the icewater dumping.

Last night, we had an airing out session about several things, and we talked more about the Terrible Awful Problem of having a happy mom. I told my son it’s rather normal for teenagers to get annoyed, especially when they are sleep-deprived. The day before the annoyance incident happened, he had his friend over for a “sleepover,” which usually involves almost anything but sleeping. We also talked about how annoyance over little things can be a waste of time and energy, and we both laughed about how silly it was to be annoyed by happiness. He assured me his annoyance wasn’t because he was unhappy, but because of hearing my laugh so often lately.

If having a happy mom is the worst issue for my son, I’d say we are doing all right.

The Fantasy Suite (er . . . Room)

August 21, 2014August 21, 2014 / mariezhuikov / 4 Comments

Hmmmm. What to do with an empty room?

Have you ever had an empty room in your house? I do, and it’s wonderful! Remember my temporary roommate? Although she moved out over seven months ago, I am still housing her furniture in my spare bedroom. She wasn’t making any concrete progress to find her own apartment (she’s still living with someone else who doesn’t have room for her furniture), so I decided to move her stuff to my garage. [Thank you friend who helped me move it!]

And now I have this echo-y empty room. What to do, what to do? . . . The possibilities are limitless. I don’t need to make it into a bedroom at this point, so I’ve decided to make it into an exercise and yoga room. Why? Because these lyrics of Paul Simon’s song, “You Can Call Me Al” resonate a bit too much with me: “Why am I so soft in the middle / The rest of my life is so hard.”

I’ve already got my yoga mat, hand weights, and stepping stair in there. Now I just need to drag the elliptical strider up from the basement. I figure there’s a greater chance I’ll actually use it if I see it every day. Sure, I could join a fitness center, but as a single mom with aging parents and a needy dog, the demands on my time are varied and great. My fantasy is that now, I’ll be able to just pop into my exercise room instead of making a big production of things by driving somewhere else.

It’s not like I need to lose weight (although dropping ten pounds would not be bad), I just need to get fit again. I sit almost all day at a desk job, which is the hardest thing a person can do to their body. And in the evenings, I often sit some more blogging and writing novels. Unless a person has some form of exercise, the sitting will catch up to them. I have already learned this the hard way in the past, and I’d rather not have those back problems back, thank you.

Maybe I can wire the room with a sound system for exercise-inducing rhythms or New Age yoga music. Add some mood lighting. Put some art on the wall. Here we go. Wish me motivation!

Marie's Meanderings

Internet home for Marie Zhuikov: Blogger, Author, Poet, Photographer

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