Scarlet Stone

It’s time for a little update on what’s been happening in my orbit. In the spring, I traveled by plane down to Kansas City, Mo. with my son and his wife to visit my brother, my wonderful sis-in-law, and family. We hadn’t seen them in a year, so it was very exciting. During the trip, I was getting tired, dizzy, and was holding onto my son’s arm for support when we were walking. Others would be standing in various museums or shops and all I was thinking about was finding a bench to sit on. On the return trip north, once we drove away from the Minneapolis airport, my son turned his head around and with the tone of a reprimanding father, delivered these words, “Well mom, I think it’s time for you to start that exercise program.” I felt bad hearing that but could not disagree...even though I was envisioning myself giving him the finger! Who needs to hear that from their kid? Then a couple of weeks later, I went to see my doc and I discovered I was extremely low on iron and B12, which made sense since I had been taking three-hour naps since winter, but did not know that I was so deficient. I ended up having to get infusions that are still ongoing, but that was the beginning of some beneficial changes in my life. 
In early May, I quit a second job that I’d held since 2017, and my health immediately improved with blood pressure dropping way down and stress becoming a less-than-daily occurrence. The choice to eliminate a job was not easy but has freed up so much time for me to enjoy my cats, take bike rides, garden, sew, and enjoy the calmness of everyday life more than the previous few years had allowed where I felt like I was often on call. This new-found freedom is one of the great things about receiving Social Security for a financial cushion and yet being able to work part-time and pursue things I have thought about doing for a long time. A fun project I did this spring was to create a very attractive main floor bedroom for myself as I plan to close off my upstairs this winter to avoid having to heat it with the expensive fuel costs looming on the horizon. I also had time for doing some interior decorating and sewing projects for the new bedroom and other parts of my house that had been on the back burner awaiting that burst of motivation. Projects include covering pillows, sewing curtains, cleaning and painting my entryway, and readying a basement apartment for a friend to rent. My summer days have been filled with triumphs and a few trials.
In recent weeks, so many of us were held captive by winds carrying hazardous smoke our way from the fires up north of Ely. I was lucky to get one of the last two air purifiers that Menards in Virginia had available, so I did not suffer with headaches or respiratory issues but the spreading fires sure messed with our comfort levels. My son Keaton and I were traveling to Duluth for an appointment one smokey day and had the discussion concerning possible evacuation and what we would do. We made a mental plan as we were driving along because things can move from fiction to fact very rapidly with wind and fire fueling the scene caused by such arid conditions. Keaton lives in Ely with his wife and I told him it was a good thing for us to discuss what might happen and he agreed.
I listened as he verbally listed the things “that really mattered” that they would take from their apartment...including their two cats, then discussed loading up their second vehicle and driving it over to Soudan to park in my yard. We roughly planned how his in-laws, with their elderly cat and dog, could stay at my house too... with my four resident cats....plus my renter that is here. What a zoo we exclaimed... trying to inject humor into the scenario wherever we could. I thought people do all kinds of things and make it work, and we will too. I told him it’s all just material stuff and most of it is not missed once we don’t have it. He was able to gain some insight into all the things we were talking about as we empathized with people that we knew were evacuating and what it was like for many of them. 
A person can grumble about how it is ruining one’s summer, but it does no good to grumble and other people have much worse problems than we did. So now as I write this...the fire situation is easing and folks are returning home.
As of late July, in addition to my graphic and sales duties, I am now working as the Timberjay reporter who will cover the Breitung Township meetings. This requires a whole new skill set because I am more of a storyteller and enjoy weaving things together with comedy and nostalgia, but with this comes reporting the facts and using a specific writing format. Jodi Summit of the Timberjay, is an excellent teacher, and over the years, I have seen her patiently train so many people for new tasks. My listening skills are really being put to the test as I sit in the meetings and so is my makeshift shorthand note-taking style. I tried using my phone recorder and then taking the recording and importing into an app called CraftNote, but I still had to go back and edit very much of that because it was not accurate. Over time, I am sure I will learn a more efficient way. It is good for old dogs to learn new tricks, and we make mention of new skills being good for our brains back in the newsroom. 
The month of July always brings the Blueberry Festival and the Tower-Soudan Garage Sales. While the canceling of this year’s festival brought difficulties, creative minds found ways for vendors to recoup some of their losses by setting up in Ely, Babbitt and Tower. For me, it concluded my third year of organizing the annual garage sales. Although for the past two years I did not have a sale, I still did the social media, newspaper advertising, signage, and created the maps and put them in stores and online. Signage goes out the week prior and on the eve of opening Friday, when you can find me driving around in my Jeep adding more signs. I have to be careful so that while I am placing a sign at the side of the road I don’t get bumped off by a fast-moving vehicle and disappear into the tall grass because cars do not slow down. It was a little difficult this year because I am wrestling with plantar fasciitis in my left foot and it was tricky to stand on it and push the signs into the ground with my right foot while maintaining my balance. I was in good form the next morning after icing my foot, and I was one of the first people to arrive at a few of the sales in Soudan. So, the saying, “the early bird gets the worm”... is true. I got a lovely still-in-the box bird bath and at the same sale a taupe bead-and-button necklace. Fact of history....my favorite necklaces all came from garage sales, including the one from a bright yellow house with pink trim down in Cable, Wis. I found years ago when I was living in nearby Hayward that adds the very “boho look” I have embraced in this chapter of my life. This year, I went into the sales knowing that I was going to hold back the reins on buying because I usually end up overdoing it, bringing home too many things. So, all that I purchased this year was the birdbath ($7), necklace ($3), and a 500 piece cozy cabin jigsaw puzzle ($3). I also bought a taco-thingy basket from a food vendor in Tower then immediately went home to ice my foot. It was a fun day for everyone who was out and about.