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It looks like the ice on the pond is not going to be very safe for a while.  Do not go out there unless you are with a buddy and be sure to check the ice often.  When I was a youth in Upsala, we used to drag race our cars across the ice on Cedar Lake west of Upsala. To my knowledge, no one ever went through the ice. We got away with a lot of stupid things as kids.  One winter we made a game of standing on the hood from an old DeSoto, using it as a giant snowboard as we were towed in the ditch behind a car.  Dumb and dumber.

After a heavy snow we would party by driving into the Burtrum Hills with our old cars,  just to try and get stuck.  These were not SUVs; we had a 1954 and a 1952 Chevy. We simply packed a lot of boys in the cars with snow shovels in the trunk and went for it.  My sister Kathie and one of my classmates both ended up in casts after a toboggan run down a steep hill in the Burtrum Hills.

Try to not let your young children read these Friday notes.

Great River Chorale is presenting “On This Silent Night”, tonight at Church of Saint Joseph in downtown St. Joseph at 7:30.  Sunday’s performance is at 4pm in Bethlehem Lutheran Church in St. Cloud.  Tickets can be purchased at www.greatriverchorale.org  or at the door.  I hope to see you there.

“It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that things are difficult.”   Seneca

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My mother’s mother, Laura Ramlo, and her husband Bert, owned a grocery store in Upsala, Minnesota. Most of us called her Grandma Ramlo instead of Grandma Laura and some just called her Gram. They lived behind the store in small quarters. The bedroom didn’t even have doors. There were entrances from both the dining room and the living room with heavy drapes hanging from poles. They heated the living space with a fuel oil burner that was in the dining room, and it had to be filled often. The store was heated with a wood burning stove. The wood and the fuel oil were stored in the attached warehouse. That was convenient.

Gram was famous for her Thanksgiving dinners which were more like a feast. Owning a grocery store made it easy for her to offer all three: turkey, beef, and pork. Grandpa Bert would complain about her “raiding the stock” but not too hard. My job was to fill the crystal water glasses with water from the cistern pump in the kitchen. The kids would sit at card tables in the living room. We would always sing the “doxology” and express our thanks for the goodness in our lives and the food on the table. Every year, Gram would offer her apologies for the food, even though it was awesome. “I don’t know why I keep doing this, I just can’t cook anymore.” Not true Gram.

I trust that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving feast yesterday.  My family gathered at my son Erik and his wife Jena’s house in Wadena.  Erik soaks the turkey in salt brine and this year he added apple and cinnamon to the brine.  We could taste it.  

“If more if us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.” J.R.R. Tolkien author of The Hobbit.

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In 1998 Dad moved from his high-rise apartment in downtown St. Paul to my house in Upsala. He had been a city fellow for most of his adult life, but he was raised in Upsala. I was working in Minneapolis as a sales manager with the Xerox agency Albinson and I was gone most of the week. It wasn’t much of an inconvenience to have him there. His passion was cooking; however, I told him in no uncertain terms that I hated the smell of fried foods, and I did not eat leftovers.

In July of 1999 Albinson and Xerox parted their ways and they no longer needed a sales manager. I spent the summer painting old buildings and garages in the Upsala area and started working for Minnesota Public Radio in October of that year. If I did not leave a Post-it-note on the counter in the morning that said, “NO SUPPER”, there would be a home cooked meal on the table when I arrived home. The food was awesome. The baked potatoes were done in a very special way. He boiled them for 10 minutes first and then baked them for one hour at 400 degrees.

As Dad struggled with old age and cancer, sometimes the quality of the supper was not up to his usual standards. Also, many times the smell of burnt food or worse, burnt plastic, from the tea pot handle, would greet me as I came in the back door. He liked to take naps, and he burned three tea pots, with plastic handles, in the last six months. It got so that the only time I did not leave out the Post-it-note, “NO SUPPER”, was on Fridays.

On Friday November 18, 2004, I came home, and he greeted me with, “I must go to the hospital, but you can eat first. Your supper is in the oven”.  I responded, “No way, we will go now!”  I put on the oven mitts and grabbed the baked potatoes and the dish of meatballs from the oven and shoved them in the frig and we drove to the VA in Minneapolis.

That was Dad’s “Last supper”, he never did come home. That weekend I ate my first “leftover meatball supper”. It was a very tasty meal.

“There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself.”  Howard Thurman

PS: The Chamber Music Society of St. Cloud is presenting “Pro Musica Minnesota”.  This Sunday afternoon at 4 in Stephen B Humphrey theater,  with a program of Ravel, Boulanger, and Brahms. Tickets at Chamber Music S  T cloud dot org.

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Comments Off on November 21, 2025

I was an army brat. Dad served in the Navy during the second world war and later he joined the Army. In 1950 he was a Sergeant in the 5th Army, stationed in Vienna, Austria. We lived on the second floor of a very nice apartment building at 41 Gregor Mendel Strasse. There were two marble faced fireplaces and a baby grand piano along with a crystal chandelier in the dining room. I ran with a group of other army brats. I was nine years old and the oldest in the group. 

One day in February we were hanging out in front of the large estate located across from our apartment. One of the kids stuck his hand through the chain linked fence and a dog took his mitten. I bravely offered to go through the gate and recover the mitten. I still remember starting my walk across the large yard toward the two “Boxers”. They greeted me by jumping up and knocking me to the ground. They proceeded to chew on my arms and legs until an Austrian man who we referred to as the “fireman”, (he took care of the furnace in our apartment building) came in and pulled the dogs off me.

I walked home nearly naked. My mother fainted when she opened the door. I spent about 6 weeks in the Army hospital. It took me a while to get over my fear of dogs. The occupant of the estate on the corner was a Colonel in the U.S. Army, and his wife gave me a new winter coat. 

In April of 2019 I returned to Vienna, and I was able to take a cab ride to 41 Gregor Mendel Strasse.  I told the cab driver to wait for me, and I approached the front door. A resident was getting into his car, and he asked me if I needed help. I shared with him that I had lived there as an Army brat in the fifties and was hoping to see our apartment. He told me to push the button for Benedict, the owner of the building.  Someone buzzed me in, and I walked up to the second floor.  The lobby looked very familiar.  The elevator was new.  The faucet which provided water for the flower garden was still there.  Marcus let me in. He was a live-in boyfriend of the owner, Verena Benedict.  He let me in, but he would not allow me to take pictures. It was an amazing experience.

Lesson learned this week: “Any sentence that starts with, “Don’t you”,  “Didn’t you…”  , “Shouldn’t you….”,  or “Couldn’t you…”   implies that the person that you are addressing is “deficient”.   GMO

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Comments Off on November 14, 2025

Years ago, I met a woman whose father was a doctor in Cold Spring.  His brother was also a doctor, (Doctor 2 for purposes of this story) and they would take turns covering for each other during vacations.  One year Doctor 2 and his family drove to California in their “woody” station wagon.  At the end of the first week the doctor received a telegram from his brother in California telling him how great a time they were having and asking him to wire some money so they could stay a little longer. No problem, brothers should help each other. The money was wired.

The next week another request for more money arrived. This time, the doctor sent a telegram back to his vacationing brother telling him that there would be no more money and that it was time for him to come home.

Some time went by and one day the railroad station manager called the doctor and told him that he should come to the depot.  There was a C.O.D. for him. 

The doctor argued that he had not ordered anything C.O.D.  The station manager told him to get down there, that there was no doubt that the package was for him. When the doctor got to the train depot, he discovered that his vacationing brother had loaded the “woody” onto a railroad flat car and shipped himself and his family home, C.O.D.

“We judge others by their actions, and we judge ourselves by our intentions.”  Gary Osberg

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Comments Off on November 7, 2025

Tonight is Halloween, the night before All Hallows Day. According to Wikipedia, the origin of the word Halloween is Christian, the holiday is commonly thought to have pagan roots.

Historian Nicholas Rogers, exploring the origins of Halloween, notes that while “some folklorists have detected its origins in the Roman feast of Pomona, the goddess of fruits and seeds, or in the festival of the dead called Parentalia, it is more typically linked to the Celtic festival of “Samhain”, which comes from the Old Irish for “summers end”. Samhain was the first and most important of the four quarter days in the medieval Gaelic calendar.

Samhain was seen as a time when the ‘door’ to the “Otherworld” opened enough for the souls of the dead, and other beings such as fairies, to come into our world. “Guising” – children going from door to door for food or coins is a traditional Halloween custom and is recorded in Scotland at Halloween in 1895. The practice of “Guising” at Halloween in North America is first recorded in 1911, where a newspaper in Kingston, Ontario reported children “Guising” around the neighborhood. I am not sure that there are any outhouses left to tip in central Minnesota.  I do remember trying to tip one in the back streets of Upsala.

Stay safe everyone and please vote on Tuesday. The only thing that counts is that you show up and do the hard work.

“Life is easier than you would think.  All that is necessary is to accept the impossible, do without the indispensable, and bear the intolerable.”  Kathleen Norris

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Comments Off on October 31, 2025

Next Tuesday I will reach a milestone.  I will have represented Minnesota Public Radio for twenty-six years, in central Minnesota, western Minnesota, southwestern Minnesota as well as Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  Until April of 2024, I also represented KWRV 91.9 in Sun Valley, Idaho. We sold it to Boise State Public Radio. I love this job.

In April of 1999, I was promoted to sales manager of the Xerox agency Albinson in Minneapolis.  I lived in Upsala at the time, so I would leave home at 4am every Monday. I rented a room from my cousin Kevin in Golden Valley.  I would return to Upsala on Thursday evening and work from Albinson’s St. Cloud branch on Fridays.

On July 13, 1999, I had supper with my son at Byerly’s in Golden Valley. I told Erik that I would keep the old parsonage house in Upsala, but I was planning on moving to Minneapolis, since I had my dream job with a great product and I would be making a very good living. 

The very next day I found out that the owners of Albinson didn’t like the new contract that Xerox had presented to them, so they decided that they didn’t want to be the Xerox agency anymore. They would no longer need a sales manager. My boss told me that I should pack my things, and they would pay me thru the end of the month.

I spent the summer of 1999 painting old buildings in the Upsala area. I drove to Randall and went to the back room at Bermel’s Shoes & Boots, the local Red Wing boot dealer. I picked out a good pair of sturdy work boots and started climbing ladders. My first job was painting the Post Office in Upsala and then I painted an outbuilding on my cousin Dave’s farm. Per my brother Bill’s instructions, I used oil-based primer and latex paint. He let me use his power washer. The two buildings that I did the summer of 1999 still look good. The boots are in pretty good shape too.

In August of 1999 I read an ad in the St. Cloud Times for a “Development Officer” for Minnesota Public Radio. I didn’t know what a “Development Officer” was, but it turned out to be sales. A perfect fit. It took two months and seven interviews to get this job, but it worked out well. Compared to “slamming boxes for Xerox”, this is more fun than it is work. I have no plans to retire anytime soon.

“It matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul” From the poem “Invictus” by William Ernest Henley.

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Comments Off on October 24, 2025

I spent a lot of my youth in Upsala, Minnesota.  There were “Farm Kids” and “Village Kids”.  Some were “summer kids”. They were kids whose parent or parents grew up in Upsala and who were sent to Upsala to spend some time with Grandma and Grandpa during the summer.  Some stayed for a few weeks, and some stayed for the whole summer. 

Larry was a “summer kid” and he ended up marrying one of the Upsala beauties.  She was chased by all the boys, but Larry won her heart.  He was also one of the eight couples that camped on our lakeshore on Cedar Lake west of Upsala every fourth of July.  He was a fun-loving fellow who died way too young.   

MEA weekend is a special time of the year. Many a father/son(daughter) combo head for the woods or ponds to bring home the “bacon” in the form of grouse or duck. Larry, the “summer kid”, knew that I had never taken up hunting, but he wanted my son Erik and myself to experience a weekend of grouse hunting up north at “the shack”. Larry invited our friend Ron and his son Matt, my son’s best friend, to join him and his son Danny. So, there were three dads and three sons along with a black lab, “Bear”. We formed two teams, and I was the “bird dog” on the DADS team. Bear went with the boys.

The first day we brought back 17 grouse, and Larry fixed a meal of grouse with wild rice and cream of mushroom soup in the giant iron skillet that hung from a nail in “the shack”. It was one of the most memorable feasts of my life. I trust that you are doing something special with your family this weekend.    

“Remember, it’s not about having time it’s about making time.”  Erik Osberg

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Comments Off on October 17, 2025

I moved into this cottage during a blizzard on March 18, 2013.  Two men from Red’s Transfer and I started at 8:30 am and we were done by noon.  I was alone in Mill Stream Village for a few months before Tom and Helen Kresbach built a standalone house on the corner of Colman Court and College Circle.

Last year a lady bought the last two empty lots and built a beautiful new home.  Now you have a chance to move into the Village also.  There is a house for sale next to the new home.

Here’s a link to the listing > https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/115-Colman-Ct_Saint-Joseph_MN_56374_M89840-19431

Tonight, the Chamber Music Society of St. Cloud is presenting the Ivalas Quartet,  with a program of Hayden, Ravel, and Derrick Skye.  Details and tickets at www.chambermusicstcloud.org

Tomorrow night the St Cloud Symphony Orchestra opens their season with “Prosperous Voyage”, in Ritsche Auditorium on the campus of St. Cloud State University.  www.stcloudsymphony.com

Heartland Symphony Orchestra is also performing tomorrow night at the Charles D Martin Auditorium in Little Falls at 7:30.  Tickets at www.heartlandsymphony.com  

On Sunday, the Heartland Symphony Orchestra is performing “Opening Nights”, featuring “The Lark Ascending” published by Boosey and Hawkes. ^h at 2:30 in the Gichi-ziibi Center for the Arts in Brainerd. 

Enjoy your evening Classical Music weekend.

“Ahh, Bach”  Radar in the hit TV show Mash. 

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Comments Off on October 10, 2025

Today is homecoming in Upsala. In my day, the football team was the Upsala `Cardinals’, but some time ago Upsala football merged with Swanville and now it is the USA (Upsala Swanville Area) `Patriots’.  I am planning on being there, but it is too warm to wear my letterman’s jacket. 

In 1957 I was an overweight freshman on the Upsala Cardinal football team. Freshmen wore the old uniforms and old helmets, and we did not win any fashion awards. John Atkinson, a senior running back, ran with his knees pumping up and down high and hard. He still managed to make forward yardage. In practice, I would simply bounce off of his knees. The memory of the pain is still with me. That was the year when no other team even scored on the Upsala team. Clarissa got to our three-yard line, but our defense held.

A couple of years ago, the 1957 Upsala football team was inducted into the Upsala Sports Hall of Fame. I was one of nine of the twenty-nine original members of the 1957 Upsala Cardinal football team who showed up for our induction into the Sports Hall of Fame. One of the guys, Dave Chuba, came all the way from Ohio. Bob Soltis was the quarterback and captain of the 1957 team. That same year Bob was named to the All-State Football Team.

It was the second year that inductees were chosen for the Upsala Sports Hall of Fame. Bob’s brother Ralph was chosen the previous year and another brother John, who was a junior on the 1957 football team, accepted an individual award for his brother Bob that same year. There were lots of Soltis boys and they all played football. No one lifted weights in those days, they just threw bales of hay all summer. Us “village kids” had a tough time keeping up.     “GO PATRIOTS”

“Man’s finest hour is the moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle victorious.” Vince Lombardi’’

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Comments Off on October 3, 2025