SoMinn
State of Mind
Rich Larson is the editor of Southern Minnesota SCENE, who is in the market for fishing gear and a bike that will support a very large man. Hit him up at editor@southernminnscene.com.
RICH LARSON SCENE EDITOR
M
y love of summer is well documented. Not as well-known is my distaste for something nobody ever talks about at this time of year – the New Year’s Resolution. I think they’re stupid. They’re emotional promises made from empty optimism and the sentiment that comes with seeing a year come to an end. I’ve tried a lot of them, but a couple years ago, I just threw my hands up with the whole thing. They never stick. And if I really do need to make a change in my life, I’ve decided to do it, I’m just going to do it. I don’t need an arbitrary date to tell me that it’s time to get on a tread mill. God knows I’ve known that for a long time. However, after a long and arduous winter like the one we’ve just come through, I am feeling like there are things to do this summer that I’ve normally taken for granted. I’m very much a live-and-let-live kind of guy, and will admit that I enjoy going wherever the moment takes me. But I’m thinking that this summer there are some things I absolutely have to do. So here, then, is my list of summer resolutions:
• I will learn to love the heat. After something like 60 days below zero, and many of those well below, I will no longer complain when my rotund body has to deal with a temperature that is 89° above zero. From now on I will embrace each number above nothing a little more, the higher they get. 68°, I know we’ve always shared a special relationship, but you’re going to have to learn to share my love with your larger brothers and sisters. Incidentally, this goes for humidity, too. I
learned over the winter that -22° is accompanied by air so dry it feels like your snorting broken razor blades. 88% humidity might be oppressive, but at least it doesn’t feel like it’s trying to suck my soul from my body.
• I will use my car less. Anyone who doesn’t believe in global warming should come and sit in my car after eight hours in the plush and secret Scene headquarters parking lot. We can have a three word conversation about the greenhouse effect and the joys of spontaneous perspiration. The only good thing about cars that aren’t convertibles in the summertime is the radio, and maybe air conditioning. But, at $3.50 a gallon, air conditioning is not exactly a cost effective commodity, and I own a variety of personal music listening devices. I live in a small town, I no longer have a 50 mile one way commute, and as I alluded to earlier, I’m about a cheeseburger away from a heart attack (Aaron Sorkin’s line, not mine).It’s time to buy a bicycle. • I will take better care of my lawn. This is for my neighbors. You know who you are.
• I will fish more. Which is to say, I will actually go fishing. I love to fish, and I never do it. Anybody with a boat and extra gear who wants to go fishing with a talkative writer that has an abundance of enthusiasm but no real know how should give me a call.
• I will do nothing for at least an hour each night. Nothing, that is, except sit on my deck, perhaps drink a frosty bottled
adult beverage and strum my guitar. I have yet to determine whether or not this comes before or after I do all that extra yard work. • I will catch as much live music as humanly possible. This is not necessarily a summer specific thing, because I’ll do this in the dead of winter, too. But at least I can sit outside in the summer.
• I will attend a baseball game at Jack Ruhr Field in Miesville and at Memorial Park in Dundas. I’m also going to go have a burger at King’s Place in Miesville, and I’m going to sit on the patio at the L&M Bar in Dundas after those games.
• I will take a summer road trip. All that money I’m saving on gas means I can drive somewhere else, kind of far-ish away. Chicago (Wrigley Field)? Kansas City (Kauffman Field)? Cleveland (Rock & Roll Hall of Fame)? Just not Wisconsin. Look, it’s like this – life doesn’t shut down when the leaves fall off the trees, but when there’s no ice on the roads, and you don’t have to spend five minutes preparing to go outside; when it’s at least as pleasant being outdoors as it is to be indoors, then life becomes easier. When the days are longer, and the sun doesn’t set until 8:00 instead of 5:30, we have more time to do things. It’s a simple natural effect. Shouldn’t we all try to take advantage of that while we can? And shouldn’t we all be a little happier about that? Dammit, this year I’m doing something about it.
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Owatonna
Faribault
Chris Bednar NMLS 258590 Mortgage Advisor
214 South Oak Ave
315 North Central Ave
507-455-1858
507-334-9465
chris@chrisbednar.com · brenda@brendabednar.com
www.brendabednar.com
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