Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

An emergency road service ordeal February 5, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 2:12 PM
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IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN a hassle-free situation. That is why we have emergency road service coverage through our auto insurance. It is for times like this—when the car breaks down and you are stranded.

That happened to our eldest daughter Friday evening as she was leaving her St. Paul office for the commute to her Minneapolis home.

When a light came on in her car and when she had difficulty steering, she quickly got off the road and pulled into a convenience store.

Getting a tow truck should have been easy, worry-free, as promised by the insurance company. It was anything but.

A call to the insurance company came with a promise that help was on the way. But, as the minutes ticked by and no tow truck arrived, my daughter called to check on the reason for the delay.

She was told the tow truck driver couldn’t find her, although she was at a busy convenience store just off Interstate 94 and had specified her exact location. The driver, claimed, however, that he couldn’t find her. He was from Columbia Heights, not St. Paul.

So my eldest, by this time frustrated, called a St. Paul towing company.

They were “really nice,” she told me when phoning to update me on her situation.

Well, “Minnesota Nice” soon changed to “Minnesota-Not-So-Nice.” The driver first asked for $90 cash to pay the towing fee.

Who carries $90 cash?

Not my daughter.

Instead, he accepted her credit card, which, for whatever reason, wouldn’t work.

So she asked if he would take a check. He would. She wrote out a check and was already en route to Minneapolis with a friend who had come to her rescue when her cell phone rang.

It was the manager of the towing company saying the firm could not accept her check and would be towing her car back to the convenience store.

What would you do?

Probably exactly what my daughter did. She explained that she was not trying to rip off the towing company, that she had plenty of money in her bank account. It didn’t matter, so she headed back to the convenience store to use the ATM which the towing company rep told her was located there.

She withdrew $90 cash, paid the tow truck driver, ripped up the $90 check in front of him and left, two hours after she first called the insurance company that promised worry-free, drive-and-sign emergency road service.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Whole wheat and we’re not talking bread February 4, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:35 PM
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MY FRIEND MIKE called Thursday morning, just after I switched off the vacuum cleaner. Thank goodness I didn’t miss his call or I would have been so mad at myself.

You see, Mike is a color expert, a former floral designer, an interior decorator, a guy with an eye for color.

I needed his advice on the paint color for our living room.

 

My living room walls, patch primed for painting, are currently boring beige. I've been looking for a neutral color with some warmth. Here the couch is pulled away from the wall in prep for painting.

I’d narrowed it down to two Sherwin Williams’ colors. But all week I’ve gone back-and-forth, back-and-forth. Nomadic Desert or Whole Wheat. Whole Wheat or Nomadic Desert. Whole Wheat. Nomadic Desert.

Every day was like a tug-of-war as I held the paint samples against the living room walls at different times of day and night.

 

The expanse of beige behind the entertainment center.

But, more and more, I was leaning toward Whole Wheat.

Yet…, I wasn’t sure and I’m not the kind of person who likes to paint so I had to be certain.

Then Mike called and the weight of making the right or wrong decision lifted from my shoulders. When he arrived at my house, Mike quickly looked at my preferred paint samples and a few others from the paint sample card pile of possibilities. He held the samples to the walls and briefly contemplated.

But he didn’t agonize, didn’t sigh, didn’t even hesitate and promptly endorsed my selection.

I was giddy, relieved, thankful—all rolled in one.

However, my friend warned me that initially I might find the color too dark, too bold, compared to the existing beige walls. I figured as much. But he assured me Whole Wheat was the right choice.

Then he burst my happiness bubble. “Be sure to apply two coats of paint.”

My enthusiasm deflated. “Why?” I asked.

He explained that no matter how hard I tried to cover the white primer, the primed spots would still show. Two coats would also add depth to the color.

I expect he’s right. Mike is a color expert. I’m not.

“I suppose you don’t like to paint?” I asked.

“I do like to paint,” he said.

But Mike is too busy right now coordinating a fundraiser on Saturday night. I know, though, if he had the time to help, he would. Mike is that kind of friend.

#

I ALSO WANT TO THANK my blogger friend Dana at Bungalow ‘56 up in Canada. She read my February 3 post, “Stressing over a home improvement project” and sent me a link to “Nesting Place Paint Colors & A Linky For Your Paint Colors.” As luck would have it, I clicked on one of the links and found a kitchen painted in Sherwin Williams’ Whole Wheat.

Coincidence?

#

THANKS ALSO TO MY SISTER, Lanae, a floral designer and color expert, for the color suggestions she emailed. I wish I possessed half her decorating talent.

She reminds me many times that as a child I once picked a yellow dress with daisy adornments over a green sailor-style dress. I quickly regretted my choice. Lanae regretted it, too, because she had to wear my hand-me-downs, including that atrocious daisy dress.

Bottom line, my sister has excellent taste and I trust her recommendations.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

The Kletscher family legacy of public service

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:54 AM
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WE’RE NOT EXACTLY the Kennedys. But the Kletscher family, my family, has a long history of political, church and community involvement.

My uncle, Merlin Kletscher, writes in the family history booklet he compiled:

“Many of us (in this older generation) have, like our forefathers, been active in our community. We have served our country in the military, on church councils, city councils, township boards, ambulance squads, fire departments, and school boards. We’ve served on Legion auxiliaries, vocational school cooperatives, electric power cooperatives and grain elevator board cooperatives. Fire chiefs, mayors and county commissioners are among our family—and it makes me proud. The list for our family could go on and on. The point here is that our families have seen the need, as our forefathers did, to serve others to make someone else’s life a better life.”

For the Kletschers, that service to others traces back to my great grandfather, Rudolph Kletscher, a German immigrant. In 1890, he started a mission church at his home near Vesta in southwestern Minnesota. The families who met in his farmhouse would eventually organize St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, where I worshipped as a child and which my mother and many other relatives still attend today.

I never knew my great grandfather, who died three decades before I was born. But his legacy of community involvement continued when his son Henry, my grandfather, served for many years on the Vesta School Board. When I was attending Vesta Elementary School, I would walk by a plaque just inside the front door engraved with my grandpa’s name. I suppose, subconsciously, that made an impression upon me.

My Uncle Merlin, the family historian, like his father before him, became involved in education by serving on two school boards. His community involvement is too long to list. But suffice to say that Rudolph Kletscher would be impressed with his grandson.

He would also be proud of my Uncle Harold, who held public office for more than 30 years in Vesta. Two of Harold’s sons likewise were elected to office.

In my immediate family, my dad, Elvern, fought on the front lines in the Korean Conflict and was active locally in church and Legion organizations and probably other groups of which I am unaware. He once unsuccessfully ran for Redwood County commissioner.

One of my brothers served several terms as a county commissioner. My older brother was the Westbrook fire chief for many years and his son is currently a volunteer fireman.

My eldest daughter holds a political science degree and today works in the State Capitol complex.

Like my Uncle Merlin, I am proud to be part of a family that gives back via public service.

MY COUSIN JEFF KLETSCHER, who is current president of the Minnesota Association of Small Cities and who served on the Floodwood City Council for 10 years before being elected mayor in 2003—he’s in his fifth mayoral term—was a DFL candidate for the House District 5B seat in northeastern Minnesota.

Jeff finished fourth among five DFLers in Tuesday’s special primary election. It was hard, he says, to be from a small community (Floodwood, population 503) with two big communities (Chisholm, population 4,960, and Hibbing, population 17,071) in the district.

DFL-endorsed candidate and Iron Range attorney Carly Melin easily won the primary with 50 percent of the votes. The 25-year-old is from Hibbing.

I’m not going to pretend that I am informed about northeastern Minnesota politics or the DFL candidates (other than my cousin) who vied for the office vacated by Tony Sertich, the newly-appointed commissioner for the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board.

But I can tell you that Jeff, like his great grandfather, grandfather and father (my Uncle Harold) before him, is living a legacy of service. He cares about rural and small-town Minnesota. Jeff’s length of public service (nearly 20 years) speaks volumes to me about his dedication to making life better for Minnesotans.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

We don’t “need” new stadiums February 2, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:04 PM
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I’VE ABOUT HAD IT with Minnesota sports teams thinking taxpayers should help them finance construction of new stadiums.

First the University of Minnesota got their new TCF Stadium. Then the Twins got Target Field.

And, as we know, the Minnesota Vikings have been pushing for a new stadium for years.

The St. Paul Saints have now hopped on the gotta-have-a-new-stadium bandwagon and are proposing a $45 million facility in downtown St. Paul, subsidized, of course, by taxpayer dollars.

Over at Target Center in Minneapolis, a proposal is now on the table to make $150 million in renovations to that building, home to the Timberwolves.

Come on, team owners, athletes, government officials, lobbyists, etc., have you heard of budget shortfalls, the bad economy, unemployment, struggling to make ends meet, high healthcare costs, high gas prices, high food prices, etc.?

I have no time, none, to listen to your list of so-called “needs.” You might “want” a new stadium, but in these difficult economic times, when the average Minnesotan is struggling, you don’t “need” a new stadium.

Here are some real needs:

  • Jobs (and pu….lease don’t tell me stadium projects will create new jobs; those are temporary)
  • Affordable healthcare
  • A decent wage for those who work long, hard hours to provide for themselves and their families (no multi-million dollar contracts here)
  • Lower gas prices
  • Better highways in outstate Minnesota (ever drive Minnesota Highway 3 between Faribault and Northfield or U.S. Highway 14 between Mankato and New Ulm?)

Readers, what’s your opinion on the whole gotta-have-a-new-stadium issue? Choose to agree or disagree with me, but you better have a really, really good reason for supporting a new stadium if that’s your stance.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Stressing over a home improvement project

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:08 AM
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I DON’T LIKE CHANGE.

I dislike chaos and disorder.

I delay making decisions when I’m not confident about the topic that needs deciding.

So you might rightfully guess that a home improvement project would throw me for a loop. It has. It is.

For some time now, we’ve been dealing with a project that put five new windows and a new door into our aging home. Of course, in an old house like ours, issues arise. New windows didn’t fit quite like the old ones, necessitating lumber and sheetrock patching. That means I’ll need to repaint. More decisions. More work.

There are issues with the new door, which are in the process of being resolved.

I am stressed and I really shouldn’t be. I mean, it’s not like we’re building a house.

But all of the decisions, the upheaval, the time away from writing, are wearing on me.

Every day for nearly two weeks I’ve pulled on my old faded blue jeans, one of my husband’s discarded t-shirts and headed upstairs to a spare bedroom to stain and varnish wood trim. Foot upon foot upon foot of wood. Sand and stain and varnish. Sand between coats and varnish each piece of wood three times.

Here's just a sampling of the wood trim I've stained and varnished during the past two weeks.

After about the third day of breathing stain and varnish fumes, and, honestly, “tasting” the toxins, I began wearing a dusk mask. I also left an upstairs window open. Yes, even on 20-degree days.

Yesterday I finished varnishing the last eight pieces of wood, until the carpenter brings me more wood for the door threshold. Oh, joy, more trim to prepare for installation.

I'm into my second quart of varnish. Every piece of wood gets three coats of polyurethane varnish.

But I keep telling myself I am saving us hundreds of dollars by staining the 75 pieces of wood and varnishing each three times. Hundreds. Of dollars.

That’s good because the money goes fast when you’re house-improving. For a frugal person like me, such spending doesn’t come easily.

I’m struggling, too, with choosing a color for the living room walls, which need to be painted before the carpenters nail the window and door trim in place. This is causing me great angst as evidenced in the endless paint swatches I’ve plucked from displays in three stores. I think now that I’ve narrowed the color down to two choices. I need to decide because once the sheetrock mudding is done, we’re ready to paint.

I've picked up way too many paint cards, further confusing me. I'm leaning toward "Whole Wheat," a warm color from Sherwin Williams with a golden tint. Anybody have that color on their walls?

My living room is a mess with wood piled in front of the TV, our bed headboard in the corner next to a bucket of sheetrock mud. A canvas covers the carpet in front of the new picture window and cardboard leans against the wall. Two white showers curtains serve as temporary window drapes…

I don’t even bother to put away the vacuum cleaners any more.

A corner of my living room. I'm not showing you any other rooms, some of which are also in disarray due to this "project."

P.S. To those of you who drive by our house daily, yes, we are getting new siding on the front. It’s tough living on a fish bowl busy street where “everyone” sees what you’re doing.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

The numbers are in at Minnesota Prairie Roots February 1, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:46 AM
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DEAR MINNESOTA PRAIRIE ROOTS READERS:

Today, if I possessed excess cash, I would send you all a dozen roses or the best chocolate in the world or…, well, you get the point.

But I am not rich in the monetary sense, so you will have to settle for words to express my gratitude.

I am thankful to you, dear readers, for pushing my monthly blog readership to a new high. During January, I had exactly 10,334 views, surpassing my previous record of 9,976 views in November.

And, no, the extra day in January did not skew figures. I had already reached 10,000 views on January 30.

 

This bar graph shows my views for the past eight months at Minnesota Prairie Roots. The horizontal graph lines indicate increments of 2,500, beginning with zero at the bottom and progressing here to 10,000.

I’ve been watching my stats, waiting for the month when I would reach 10,000 views. Don’t ask me why. It simply seems like an impressive number.

The past five months, in fact, my readership has consistently been at 9,500 views and higher, but just under 10,000.

So today I am celebrating. I am celebrating you, my readers, wherever you are—whether in Finland or Germany, Washington state or Washington D.C., up north or down south, in Minneapolis or St. Paul, in Appleton, Minnesota, or Appleton, Wisconsin, in my community of Faribault…

Whether you know me personally or know me only through my blogging, I appreciate the connection.

I hope that through my writing and photography I’ve made you smile, made you think, made you laugh and even made you cry. I hope I’ve taken you to places you may not otherwise have seen. I hope I’ve entertained and informed.

Please continue to share your reactions to my writing. I value your input. If you’ve never commented, do.

I pledge to continue bringing you stories from my life, from my world, from my heart, from my thoughts.

Writing is my passion.

My dusty, dirty and well-used computer keyboard.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Nettie January 31, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:48 AM
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I WANTED TO BELIEVE HER—that her husband died eight months ago in a car accident, that she has cancer, that she has two teens at home, that she believed God led her to my church.

But I didn’t quite know what to think of the woman who walked into Trinity Lutheran Church between services Sunday morning. She was dressed nicely, although her light-weight coat didn’t seem warm enough for winter weather. Her fingers felt ice-cold as she extended her hand to shake mine and introduced herself as Nettie.

I offered her some coffee and orange juice, some doughnuts.

She declined and, instead, through lips lined with plum lipstick that matched her scarf, asked to speak with a pastor.

While my husband went to find a pastor, Nettie volunteered her story. I hadn’t probed, hadn’t asked, she simply told me about her dead husband, her cancer, the kids back home in Minneapolis, her need for money, the direction from God.

She spoke politely, warmly and with ease, her voice smooth as honey. I could easily imagine her praising God in a southern Baptist church choir.

All the while she spoke, I wondered. Was she telling the truth?

Had she really gone to the Salvation Army and the Red Cross and had those organizations turned down her requests for help?

Had she really, as she told me, just hopped in her car that morning and started driving, ending up in Faribault, at my church?

About that time, the pastor arrived and I introduced the two. They walked to a quiet area of the narthex, to talk, and, I could see, to pray.

A short while later Nettie walked out the door, into the cold.

I knew she hadn’t gotten the money she requested.

Today, more than 24 hours later, the entire scene replays in my mind. Should I have asked more questions? Could I, should I, have done more for Nettie?

Was she being truthful?

Did I fail Nettie?

And why am I so bothered by this encounter?

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Obsessed with oranges January 29, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 9:41 AM
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Ever since my friend Kathy told me about orange "smiles," I've eaten oranges this way. No struggling to remove the peeling. Just slice and eat. The fruit easily separates from the rind.

EVER CRAVE A SPECIFIC food for days, even weeks?

Lately, I’ve craved oranges.

Now that’s a healthy alternative to the chips and chocolate I sometimes often desire.

While I can’t pinpoint the exact reasons for my orange obsession, I can theorize. This has been a long and snowy winter in Minnesota. When I see and feel and taste an orange, I temporarily escape to a warm, sunny climate like Florida or California. Seriously. If you live in Minnesota, you know exactly what I mean.

Keep sliced oranges handy in the fridge for a quick and healthy snack.

And then there’s the color. Orange. It’s sunny, bright, uplifting. After way too many wake-up-in-the-dark and dark-by-five-o’clock days, I need an orb of cheerfulness to stave off a potential case of Seasonal Affective Disorder. Orange is, after all, opposite blue the blues on the color wheel.

Juicy oranges quench thirst and provide Vitamin C.

Oranges also quench my seemingly endless thirst. That thirst, I concluded, is related to my dried out skin which is caused by the furnace running too much and drying out the air during these endless winter days. True or not, a juicy orange hits the spot.

About now you’re probably thinking, what the heck, is this an advertisement for the California Citrus Growers Association or the Florida Orange Growers?

No, rather these are the musings of a winter-weary Minnesotan who tastes summer in an orange.

P.S. I will accept any and all free shipments of oranges to my snow-encased Faribault home. Thank you.

 

Yes, I became obsessed also with photographing oranges. But this fruit photographs so well, don't you think?

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

As good as chocolate January 28, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:21 AM
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WHEN MY SECOND ELDEST daughter lived in Argentina, she discovered a sinfully delicious treat that ranks right up there with chocolate.

Really.

Yesterday I found a container of this creamy sweet treat tucked in the back of the cupboard. My daughter brought it home from Buenos Aires in October and left it behind when she recently moved to Wisconsin.

Lucky me, because I really, absolutely love…

 

Dulce de Leche from Argentina

I opened the lid, dipped my spoon into the dulce de leche and savored the thick creamy caramel.

 

Dulce de leche comes in several styles, including this colonial style. The more expensive artisan style is lighter in color and even thicker. There are many brands on the market.

Then I slathered more onto two scoops of ice cream.

 

A perfect ice cream topping.

I didn’t even need to add chocolate.

FYI: You can find dulce de leche in the ethnic food section of your local supermarket, although I have not found a brand as tasty as the one my daughter toted home from Argentina.

Or, you can create your own dulce de leche from sweetened condensed milk, which my second eldest learned to make while working in the Concordia Spanish Language Village kitchen near Bemidji. Go online and find a recipe.

Argentines eat dulce de leche on alfajor cookies, pancakes, toast, crackers, ice cream, crepes, tortillas (like biscuits, not “tortillas” as we think of them) and more.

Have you ever eaten dulce de leche? If yes, what do you think? As good as chocolate?

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Thanks for the Sputnik memories, Mr. President January 27, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:56 AM
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GROWING UP on a southwestern Minnesota dairy farm back in the 1950s and 60s, in the middle of the Cold War, I didn’t know all that much about the Soviet Union, except to fear “the Russians.”

Then along came Sputnik, the Russian satellite, which made quite an impression on my impressionable young mind.

So when President Barack Obama worked Sputnik into his Tuesday night State of the Union address and stated, “This is our generation’s Sputnik moment,” something niggled in my memory.

That something would be a cat.

Just to make sure I was remembering correctly, I phoned my mom, who quickly assured me that I was right. During my childhood, we had a black-and-brown mixed barn cat called Sputnik.

“I think you kids named it after the Russian satellite,” my mom said.

She was right. My oldest brother and I, enamored with the whole space thing, had named the barn cat with the stump tail (likely sliced off by a mower in the alfalfa field) Sputnik.

I hadn’t thought about that feline in decades, until the President tripped my memory Tuesday evening while referencing Sputnik in his call for American innovation.

Then Wednesday I got caught up even more in the Russian satellite memory when I learned that the President was visiting Manitowoc in eastern Wisconsin. On September 6, 1962, a 20-pound chunk of glowing debris from Sputnik IV plummeted to earth, landing on 8th Street in Manitowoc.

This Wisconsin city celebrates that monumental event every September at Sputnikfest, complete with a Miss Space Debris Pageant, Cosmic Cake Contest, Cosmic Costume Contest, a Sputnik Re-enactment and more.

How space-age cool is that?

The President’s trip to Manitowoc was clearly well-planned and orchestrated to tie in with his Sputnik speech reference. Otherwise why would he have chosen to visit this city of 32,520 southeast of Green Bay? It’s not like he’s a Packers fan, although he received a yellow and green jersey upon his arrival.

This town on the shores of Lake Michigan is also home to several green energy plants, which Obama toured, thus reemphasizing his State of the Union directive to move forward in developing clean energy alternatives.

That all said, thank you, Mr. President, for mentioning Sputnik in your speech. I hadn’t thought about that barn cat in decades.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling