Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Closing up the cabin, connecting & creating memories October 10, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
The Horseshoe Lake cabin where we stay once or twice yearly. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

CLOSING UP THE CABIN (not ours) proved more than a work weekend. Beyond pulling in the dock, mowing, raking, trimming trees, gathering sticks, cleaning rain gutters, scrubbing rust stains from the shower, draining the water heater and more, this was about family.

September sunrise on Horseshoe Lake. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

A spirit of teamwork, of gratitude, of enjoying this place along Horseshoe Lake in Mission Township in the Brainerd lakes area, prevailed. And it was all because of family. I love the Helbling family, which I’ve been part of for 42 years by way of marrying into it.

Gnomes were recently hidden in Mission Park, which is located several miles from the cabin. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

Randy and I joined three of his sisters, their husbands, and a niece and her family last weekend on this property his youngest sister and husband so graciously share. What a gift this has been to us. I love spending time in the quiet northwoods, immersed in nature, creating memories not only with Randy, but also with our eldest daughter, her husband and our two grandchildren. Campfires with s’mores, always s’mores. Walks in Mission Park. Lakeside dining. Fishing and swimming. Ice cream from Lake Country Crafts & Cones. Pizza from Rafferty’s. Great beer and conversation at 14 Lakes Craft Brewing. Day trips into nearby small towns. Lounging on the beach reading a book. Lying in the hammock. Watching loons and eagles. Doing nothing.

This visit we stayed in the main house, a section of which is shown here. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

And now, on this first weekend in October, we trekked three hours north to the cabin for the sole purpose of preparing the property for winter. An added bonus came in time with family. We worked together. Ate together. Laughed. Shared stories and memories and updates. We also built memories.

On a September cabin stay, three deer crossed the driveway. And we discovered bear scat, as did Randy this visit. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

Homemade caramel rolls baked by Vivian reminded us of Mom Helbling, who died unexpectedly 31 years ago at the age of 59. Much too soon. Jon’s smash burgers reminded me of my mom, prompting me to share a story about the hamburgers she fried to hockey puck doneness, the reason I didn’t eat burgers up until several years ago. Jon’s were nothing like hers. He’s quite the cook, I discovered, as I enjoyed his stir fry, his scrambled eggs, his smash burgers.

September moonrise over Horseshoe Lake. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

I also enjoyed getting to know four of my great nieces and nephews. We played Hi Ho Cherry-O!, Go Fish and some panda bear game I never fully understood despite 8-year-old Emmett’s patience in explaining it to me. Autumn insisted I work on a princess puzzle with her, even though I insisted I do not do puzzles. I should note here that the Helbling family loves puzzles. Autumn insisted I help her, also insisting that I not quit. The first grader has a strong personality, a strength as I see it.

Squirrels were busy, too, as winter approaches. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

Three-year-old Quentin checked my heart several times as he did most family members after finding a stethoscope among the dress-up clothes. I also formed a firefighting crew, enlisting Emmett as acting fire chief when I had to step away to do some actual work. And sweet little redhead Annika, almost one and who looks a lot like a Who from Whoville, pretty much had her great aunt doing whatever she wished. That included jumping on my lap. My arms got quite the work-out.

Acorns, leaves and pine needles continued to fall as our crew headed home. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

And so these are the memories I gathered on this work weekend while squirrels scampered, acorns pelted roofs, the night wind howled, dust swirled, and pine needles and branches fell. Up north at the cabin is as much about place as it is about family and the memories we make there.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Autumn searches for water, at least in Minnesota September 30, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:51 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Parched, cracked earth by the Turtle Pond, River Bend Nature Center. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo August 2021, used for illustration only)

IN AN AUTUMN WHEN RAIN REMAINS elusive and drought once again settles upon Minnesota, I am reminded of a poem I penned 14 years ago for a competition. “In which Autumn searches for Water” was among 28 pieces of prose and poetry published in “It’s All One Water,” a collaboration between the Zumbro Watershed Partnership and Crossings at Carnegie in Zumbrota.

The invitation to the 2012 “It’s All One Water” reception and group show in Zumbrota.

The winning entries were printed in a beautiful 55-page booklet that paired the writing with submitted photos, all themed to water. I opted to pen a poem personifying Autumn as a woman searching for water upon the parched land. To this day I still love that strong visual, inspired by my long ago observations at River Bend Nature Center in Faribault.

And if I were to tap further into my visual memory, I would also see a semi trailer full of hay parked in a southwestern Minnesota farmyard in the summer of 1976. That was a year of severe drought, when my dad bought a boxcar full of hay from Montana so he could feed his cows and livestock. It was the year that nearly broke him as a farmer.

A REALLY DRY & WARM SEPTEMBER IN MINNESOTA

Here we are, 48 years later, settling once again into drought/abnormally dry weather conditions in Minnesota after a winter of minimal snow followed by an excessively wet spring, a dry-ish summer and now a record warm and dry September. This September, the Twin Cities recorded only 0.06 inches of rain and the most days of 80-degree or warmer high temps in any September. It doesn’t feel like fall in Minnesota, more like summer. But at least temperatures cool overnight.

Areas of western and central Minnesota are under a Red Flag Warning today, code words for a high fire danger, due to dry, windy conditions and dropping relative humidity. We are experiencing “near critical fire weather conditions” here in the southern part of the state.

AND THEN THERE’S TOO MUCH WATER

Contrast this with the weather my friends in western North Carolina and other areas affected by Hurricane Helene are experiencing. One is OK (as is her house). But she expects to be without power for a week and is relying on limited cell service at the local firehall. Another friend, a native Minnesotan, lost his car and may lose his home in Hendersonville after a creek swelled, flooding his garage (with four feet of water) and house (30 inches of floodwaters). A foundation wall “blew out” of his home. He is currently staying with family in Florida.

So, yes, even though the lack of rain and abnormally warm weather in Minnesota concern me, I feel a deeper concern for the folks dealing with loss of homes, businesses, infrastructures and, especially, deaths of loved ones. The devastation is horrific. It will take months, if not years, to recover.

RESPECT FOR WATER & MY POEM

In 2012, the following statement published in the intro to “It’s All One Water”: It is our hope to inspire respect, protection, preservation and awe in honor of water, our most precious of Natural Resources. How one views water right now depends on where they live. But I think we can all agree that water is “our most precious of Natural Resources.”

Autumn leaves in the Cannon River, Cannon River Wilderness Park. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo 2021)

In which Autumn searches for Water

Water. The wayward word rises in a faint rasp,

barely a whisper above the drone of buzzing bees

weaving among glorious goldenrods.

I strain to hear as Autumn swishes through tall swaying grass,

strides toward the pond, yearning to quench her thirst

in this season when Sky has remained mostly silent.

But she finds there, at the pond site, the absence of Water,

only thin reeds of cattails and defiant weeds in cracked soil,

deep varicose veins crisscrossing Earth.

She pauses, squats low to the parched ground and murmurs

of an incessant chorus of frogs in the spring,

of Water which once nourished this marshland.

Autumn heaves herself up, considers her options

in a brittle landscape too early withered by lack of rain.

Defeat marks her face. Her shoulders slump. She trudges away, in search of Water.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

© Copyright 2012 “In which Autumn searches for Water” by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Reminiscing about, & with, Rabbits at 50th class reunion September 11, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
First up upon arriving in Wabasso for my 50th class reunion, a photo with the roadside white rabbit sculpture. (Photo credit: Randy Helbling)

WE MAY NEVER PASS this way again. Ah, but we have. On a recent Saturday, I gathered with some 30 of my Wabasso High School classmates to celebrate our 50th class reunion. In Wabasso, a small farming community 45 miles west of New Ulm on the southwestern Minnesota prairie.

The front entrance to Wabasso Public Schools. The overhang with pillars was added after my days there. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
The cover of my WHS yearbook. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
Signage at the front of the school blends the old and the new. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

I’ve attended many reunions through the decades since 89 of us graduated in May of 1974. I’ve enjoyed every gathering, especially those in latter years when no one cared any more about who was a jock or an academic achiever or a wild one or any label we may have carried through our high school days. Today we are simply individuals who share a history of attending school together. Learning. Having fun. Making memories.

The 1973 – 1974 Wabasso High School FFA chapter consisted of mostly male students. I am among the few females featured in this photo. I’m seated in the second row, third girl on the right. (Photo credit: WHS yearbook)

Coming of age in the 1970s during the Vietnam War, we were a bit of a rebellious bunch testing our teachers’ patience. I was among those who wore a prisoner of war bracelet, embraced the peace symbol, wrote anti-war poetry. Mostly, though, I was quiet, studious, a rule follower. But I did blaze the way for young women at my high school by becoming the first girl to join the WHS Future Farmers of America Chapter. Decades later, a niece would become the state FFA president.

We were given a lengthy tour of the school. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

No one cared about any of that when we got together 50 years later, first touring the halls of our former school. Home of the Rabbits. Yes, Rabbits. Wabasso, meaning “white rabbit,” comes from the Dakota language. I’m proud of our school mascot, which is unique and connects to the history of the region. It honors the town name and the Dakota people who were the original inhabitants of this land and still live in the nearby Upper and Lower Sioux Indian communities.

This Rabbit mosaic once hung on the side of the front office counter. It now hangs in a school hallway. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
The original Rabbit mascot on a gym wall. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
Rabbit pride showcased in the gym. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

As the superintendent of schools led us through the school, I found myself drawn to the many artistic renditions of Thumper, our rabbit mascot. I don’t care for the updated, fierce version that now graces a wall in the new gymnasium. It’s not that I oppose change. I just don’t like the mean look on the rabbit’s face, his appearance of being on steroids. No thank you. I much prefer the old rabbit, the one that appears gentle and friendly. Thankfully, plenty of the original Thumpers remain in a school building I barely recognize.

Oversized photos, including this one of the 1973 homecoming court, are displayed in a hallway of images. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

Building additions, removal of the storied stack, shuffling and changing of classrooms altered the school significantly. The home economics room is now the art room. The shop a classroom. The cafeteria is new, spacious, bright and beautiful. And the new library, although much brighter and modern in appearance, holds far fewer books than the library of my high school years, something several of us noticed and mentioned to the superintendent.

The Roadhouse Bar & Grill sits on a corner along Wabasso’s main street. It’s an especially popular summertime spot with weekly roll-ins. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
The reunion committee set up this mannequin wearing a Class of 1974 graduation gown. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)
This shows just a part of Meadowland Farmers Cooperative, which anchors the business community. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

What I did notice, too, was a closeness I felt among classmates as we walked hallways and classrooms and even the old locker rooms. That feeling remained after the tour, down at the Roadhouse Bar & Grill. There we perused photos and memorabilia. Hugged. Laughed. Mourned the loss of 15 classmates. Built burgers at the burger bar. Gathered outside for a group photo. Clustered around patio tables for conversation as the sun set, brushing the sky in a subtle pink hue. All the while the ventilation fans from the grain bins across the street roared in a steady din.

Wabasso’s school song, printed on a gym wall. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo September 2024)

“We May Never Pass This Way Again.” That titled the Seals & Croft tune we chose as our class song. It was our second choice. The administration nixed “Dead Skunk in the Middle of the Road.” There was no mention of skunks—at least that I heard—at our 50th reunion. But Rabbits, oh, yes, Rabbits. We are forever and always Rabbit proud.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Rural living history & threshing memories September 3, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
A wagonload of oats awaits threshing at the Rice County Steam & Gas Engines Fall Show. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

MEMORIES. A HISTORY LESSON. A step back in time. The Rice County Steam & Gas Engines Fall Show is that and more. It’s also entertainment, a coming together of friends and families and neighbors. A reason to focus on farming of yesteryear.

Oats drape over the edge of the wagon. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

I was among the crowds gathered over the Labor Day weekend at the showgrounds south of Dundas. This show features demos, rows and rows and rows of vintage tractors and aged farm machinery, a tractor pull, flea market, music, petting zoo, mini train rides and a whole lot more.

The scene is set to resume threshing with thresher, tractor, baler and manpower. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

For me, a highlight was watching a crew of men threshing oats. The work is hard, labor intensive, even dangerous with exposed belts and pullies. It’s no wonder farmers lost digits and limbs back in the day.

This part of the threshing crew pitches oats bundles into the threshing machine. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

While my observations are not connected to memories, my husband’s are as he recalls threshing on his childhood farm in rural Buckman, Morrison County, Minnesota. After Randy moved with his family from rural St. Anthony, North Dakota (southwest of Mandan), his dad returned to threshing oats. In North Dakota, he used a combine. But his father before him, Randy’s grandfather Alfred, threshed small grains.

Hard at work forking bundles into the thresher. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)
Lots of exposed pullies and belts line the threshing machine. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)
The workhorse of the operation, the threshing machine. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

As I watched in Dundas, men forked bundles of oats into a McCormick-Deering thresher. The threshing machine separated the grain from the stalk, the oats shooting one direction into a wagon, the straw the other way into a growing pile. I stood mostly clear of the threshing operation with dust and chafe thick in the air.

Feeding the loose straw into the baler. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

From the straw pile, a volunteer stuffed the stalks into the shoot of an aged baler. An arm tamped the straw, feeding it into the baler. Another guy stood nearby, feeding wire into the baler to wrap the rectangular bales. A slow, tedious process that requires attentiveness and caution.

Watching and waiting for the straw to compact in the baler. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

The entire time I watched, I thought how easy it would be to lose focus, to look away for a moment, to get distracted and then, in an instant, to experience the unthinkable. Farming is, and always has been, a dangerous occupation.

Carefully guiding wire into the baler to wrap each bale. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Randy understands that firsthand as he witnessed his father get his hand caught in a corn chopper. Tom lost his left hand and part of his forearm. But Randy saved his life, running across fields and pasture to summon help. It is a traumatic memory he still carries with him 57 years later.

Threshing at Sunnybrook Farm, St. Anthony, North Dakota, as painted by Tom Helbling. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

But memories of threshing are good memories, preserved today in an oil painting from the farm in North Dakota, Sunnybrook Farm. My father-in-law took up painting later in life. Among the art he created was a circa 1920s threshing scene. We have that painting, currently displayed in our living room. I treasure it not only for the hands that painted it, but also for the history held in each brush stroke.

Threshing grain, living history in 2024. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

The painted scene differs some from the threshing scene I saw in Dundas. In North Dakota, horses were part of the work team, the tractor steam powered. In Dundas, there were no horses, no steam engine at the threshing site. Still, the threshing machine is the star, performing the same work. And men are still there, laboring under the sun on a late summer afternoon.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

A mouse in the house August 26, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:51 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Mouse art displayed in a show at the Owatonna Arts Center many years ago. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

I AWAKENED HOPEFUL this morning. Hoping the mouse that ran into the living room Sunday evening, scurrying into a corner behind a floor lamp when I screamed, was trapped. Dead. That did not happen.

We awakened Monday morning to two unsprung traps still baited with fresh peanut butter. One in the basement, the other between the stove and cupboard.

Have I mentioned that mice terrify me? Or maybe, more accurately, that I am terrified of mice. I detest, hate, abhor them. Always have. I recognize it’s rather ridiculous to be afraid of mice given my size compared to theirs. But they are quick and creepy and varmints I do not want inside my space.

(Book cover source: lindsaystarck.com)

So there I was Sunday evening, feet up in the recliner, semi-watching the 9 pm news between reading Minnesota author Lindsay Starck’s terrifying novel, Monsters We Have Made, when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. A mouse. Eeeek! I screamed, grabbed my phone, shot to the bedroom, slammed the door and climbed onto the bed. Rats. I forgot my book.

But at least I could Google “why mice come into your house in the summer” while Randy tracked the mouse. Apparently when the temps are as hot as they are now, they, too, want to cool off. Just as in winter, they want to be warm. I can’t fault them for that thinking. Do mice even think?

Mouse and rat killer spotted in The Watkins Museum in Winona during a visit years ago. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

As I hunkered atop the bed, I felt hopeful that Randy would find and kill the mouse. I didn’t think that through. How? With his bare hands? Randy observed the mouse hurry behind the fridge. So he moved the fridge. We haven’t seen it since. But he did catch a mouse in the garage overnight. Same mouse? Highly unlikely.

We live in an old house, next to a wooded hillside, with lots of entry points for mice. So I expect mice and we have caught many in our 40 years living here. Typically, though, they stay in the dark basement. I never invited them onto the main floor. The neighborhood mice apparently did not get the warning memo to stay out. They are risking their lives.

Now why do I detest mice? It started with the scritch-scratch of mice running inside the bedroom walls of my childhood farmhouse. Mice in the house. Mice in the barn. Mice in the hay and straw bales. Mice in the granary. Even with a passel of roaming cats.

In college, I opened a silverware drawer to see a mouse staring up at me.

When I was nearly third trimester pregnant with my youngest, I awakened to pee in the middle of the night at my in-law’s farmhouse. There, in that tiny closed bathroom, a mouse circled. Screaming drew no one to my rescue. Eventually, I climbed onto the edge of the bathtub, tossed a pile of wet towels on the mouse and fled upstairs to my sleeping husband. True story.

Years later, I reached into the sink one morning to empty water from a crockpot left soaking there overnight. Atop the water floated a dead mouse. Enough to scare anyone, especially me. At least it was dead, the sole consolation. I slammed the lid on the crockpot, carried it outside and Randy dealt with it after work. That crockpot never cooked another meal.

Yes, I have experienced mouse trauma. Too often. Traps are set. Should I see the mouse again this evening, I will be sure to grab Monsters We Have Made before sequestering myself in my bedroom to read before dreaming nightmares of monstrous, uncaught mice.

TELL ME: Are you afraid of mice? Any mouse stories to share? Or cats to share?

 

Spotlight shines on Minnesota, specifically Mankato (once my home) August 23, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
“The Thrill of Vertical,” posted on a sign in Spring Lake Park as part of the 2013 Mankato Poetry Walk & Ride, was inspired by my college years in Mankato. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo 2013)

I ARRIVED IN MANKATO with a canary yellow 10-speed bike, a simple orange backpack, my Sears portable manual typewriter, a clock radio, a quilt stitched by Grandma Ida and a suitcase filled with clothes. The year was 1974, the beginning of my freshman year at Bethany Lutheran College, high atop a hill in this southern Minnesota city.

The Ardent Mills grain silos, a massive public art project, dominate the skyline along the Minnesota River in the heart of Mankato. The art depicts the diversity of the area. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo November 2023)

I was only 17, nervous, but ready to leave my childhood farm home some 85 miles to the west. I met my roommate, Rhonda, a beautiful high school cheerleader from western Wisconsin. She was well-traveled, outgoing, vastly different than me, quiet and shy. And she had a stereo for our cozy fourth floor corner dorm room. We were set. Despite our differences, we got along splendidly.

This shows the base of a place sculpture along the Minnesota River in Riverfront Park. The words for Mankato and Minnesota are written in the Dakota language and translated. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo November 2023)

As I settled into the big city (Mankato’s current population numbers around 45,000), big for me when you come from a town of 362, I began to feel at home. Not only on campus, but also in the community. Happy Chef became a go-to destination for conversation and for warm loaves of bread glazed with powdered sugar frosting. A Christian coffee house also drew me off campus. I wasn’t in to the bar scene.

My poem, “River Stories,” highlights the Minnesota River, which winds through Mankato. It was posted along the river as part of the 2019 Mankato Poetry Walk & Ride. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo 2019)

For nearly four years, Mankato became my home away from home. The place that grew me educationally and as a person. I earned an associate of arts degree from Bethany, then only a two-year college, before moving on to Minnesota State University, Mankato, to study journalism. I worked at the college newspaper, “The Reporter.” In the winter of 1978, I earned a mass communications degree with an emphasis in news/editorial. Soon thereafter, I started my career as a newspaper reporter and photographer. Years later I returned to work for “The Mankato Free Press,” heading up the paper’s St. James-based news bureau (me living and working from my apartment long before working remotely became a thing).

I am rooted in Minnesota. This art hangs in my home office. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

Why am I sharing this with you today? Because of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, now the vice presidential candidate on the DFL ticket. He lived in Mankato, where he worked as a social studies teacher and football coach at Mankato West High School. Walz, likely unfamiliar to most Americans up until recently, has put our state, specifically Mankato, on the map. As a life-long Minnesotan, I am proud to see my state, considered by many to be fly-over land, in the spotlight. No matter your political leanings, such publicity is good for Minnesota.

I’ve only attended the Minnesota State Fair a few times in my life. This mug came from my father-in-law’s collection. The State Fair started yesterday. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

Like Walz, flannel shirts hang in my closet. I am wearing one as I write on this cool August morning. Flannel truly is a Minnesota thing, no matter political affiliations. We like our hotdishes (not “casseroles”) and the Minnesota State Fair (although not me; too many people), our cabins Up North. We claim musicians Bob Dylan and Prince, the Coen Brothers (of “Fargo” movie fame) and other notables like vice presidents Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale.

The grain silos are a massive work of public art. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo November 2023)

I cannot imagine living elsewhere, even if I don’t especially like the frigid cold and snow of a Minnesota winter. I loved winter as a Redwood County farm girl. Minnesota is home. I live 40 miles northeast of Mankato, a city originally inhabited by the Dakota. Mankato is a river town, a college town, a regional shopping hub, a community with a rich (but not always “good”) history. It is home to many creatives. I’ve been part of that with poetry showcased on signs through the Mankato Poetry Walk and Ride.

My latest poem, “The Mighty Tatanka,” posted along the West Mankato Trail near West Mankato High School. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo November 2023)

My connection with, and appreciation of, Mankato all started in that fourth floor dorm room with a roommate who was nothing like me. Despite our differences, we connected, forged a strong friendship, together grew and matured. We were on the cusp of our lives. Young. Open to new ideas and learning. The future held endless possibilities. For me, the 17-year-old with the canary yellow bike. And for Rhonda with her stereo system.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Give me a daisy a day, or maybe a zinnia August 22, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , ,
A patch of daisies. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

RECENTLY, MY SISTER-IN-LAW Rena asked me to name my favorite flower. I immediately responded, “Daisy.” But that’s not really true, I realized the more I considered the flowers I especially like.

A time existed when my response to Rena was accurate. For a long time, daisies assuredly were my personal pick for most beloved floral. Daisies, like me, are simple, uncomplicated, down-to-earth. There’s nothing pretentious about a daisy with its circle of white petals and yellow center.

Daisies, too, were the flower of my teen years. The age of flower children and peace symbols and rebellion. Daisies, prolific, strong, reseeding on their own, spreading and blanketing the landscape.

At my 1982 wedding, daisies graced bouquets and corsages. “I’ll give you a daisy a day,” wrote songwriter Jud Strunk in the 1973 hit, “Daisy a Day.” A love story in lyrics if I’ve ever heard one.

I still like daisies a lot. The way they bend in the wind. The way they remind me of my youth. And young love.

Zinnias sourced at the Faribault Farmers’ Market. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

But, after pondering Rena’s question, I would answer differently. Zinnias. Yes, vivid, bold zinnias are my favorite flower today. Like daisies, they trace to my youth. Mom seeded rows of zinnias in her vegetable garden. They jolted color into the greenery, later adding color to our farmhouse in bouquets gathered.

Zinnias and cosmos can be easily grown by direct seeding into the soil. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

Zinnias grow easily from seed. They are hardy and prolific and colorful, coming in varying sizes from small to “giant.” They make excellent, long-lasting cut flowers.

My friend Al, left, sells flowers and produce at the farmers’ market. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)
I transferred the zinnia bouquet from Solo cup to vase at home. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)
Al and Char’s zinnias up close. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

As I write, a bouquet of zinnias purchased at the Faribault Farmers’ Market graces a vintage chest of drawers in my living room. My friend Al grew them. His wife, Char, artistically arranged the stems of red, pink, orange and yellow with one green-tinted flower tossed in the colorful mix.

Daisies thrive. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

Randy bought them for me. For no reason. I love when he does that—spur of the moment gives me flowers. Just because. I was chatting with our friend Duane while Randy paid for sweetcorn purchased from Al along with those unexpected zinnias arranged in a red Solo cup. It was a moment when I felt loved, so loved, as if Randy had given me my daisy a day.

TELL ME: What’s your favorite flower and why?

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Milkweeds, monarchs & memories in Minnesota August 20, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:01 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Monarch on the common milkweed flower. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo 2023)

I’VE ALWAYS HELD a fascination with milkweeds. Their clusters of vanilla-scented dusty pink flowers draw me to a plant that seems more flower than weed. Unless you were my dad, who wanted the common milkweed removed from his acres of soybeans. Yes, I hoed or pulled plenty of milkweeds from the fields on my southwestern Minnesota childhood farm.

Milkweeds grow next to the conservation building at the Rice County Fairgrounds against a backdrop of identifying milkweed photos. Those include six types: common, poke, purple, butterfly, whorled and swamp. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

My thinking has shifted since then. Today I plant, rather than eradicate, milkweeds. Dad, if he was still alive, might wonder how his farm-raised daughter strayed so far from hoeing to growing.

A monarch caterpillar. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

The answer is easy. Long ago I learned the value of milkweeds to our monarch butterfly population. The butterfly lays its eggs on milkweed leaves. And milkweed is the sole source of food for monarch caterpillars. If we want the monarch population to grow, thrive and survive, we need milkweed plants. It’s that simple.

A sign at Hy-Vee grocery store explains the importance of milkweed to monarchs. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

More and more I’ve spotted milkweeds growing in public places in and around Faribault. River Bend Nature Center. Falls Creek County Park. The Rice County Master Gardeners’ Teaching Gardens. Beside the conservation building at the Rice County Fairgrounds. Even in flowerbeds at Hy-Vee grocery store.

Milkweeds grow among phlox. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

If you walk by my house, you’ll see stray milkweeds popping up here and there. Along a retaining wall. Among the prolific phlox in my messy flowerbeds. The husband has orders not to mow, pull or otherwise remove milkweed plants.

An unripened milkweed pod. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

This time of year, seed pods are forming on milkweeds. Perhaps it’s the writer, the poet, in me that loves the shape of those fat green pods that will eventually dry, burst open and spread seeds on wisps of white fluff carried by the wind.

Milkweeds flourish among prairie flowers in the Rice County Master Gardeners Teaching Gardens, Faribault, (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Seeds wing across the landscape, just like monarchs. I remember a time when monarchs were prolific. Yes, even in rural Minnesota where I labored to get rid of milkweed plants.

I discovered milkweeds planted outside Hy-Vee. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Naturalists, gardeners and others are working hard now to bring back the monarch population. It’s taken time, effort and education to convince people to plant milkweeds for monarchs. I don’t expect butterfly numbers will be what they once were—when monarchs flitted everywhere. But we have to start somewhere, do something. And that begins with each of us. Educating ourselves. Caring. And then deciding that milkweeds really aren’t weeds after all. They are vital to the survival of the monarch butterfly. It’s OK to plant milkweed seeds or allow nature to plant them.

Monarch on a thistle flower. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

I, for one, delight in watching monarchs flit about my yard. They are magical as only a butterfly can be. Delicate, yet strong. Poetically beautiful. Carrying memories and grace on their wings.

An educational sign among the flowers at the Rice County Master Gardeners Teaching Gardens. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

FYI: Nerstrand Big Woods State Park is hosting a “Monarchs and Milkweeds” presentation at 10 a.m. Saturday, August 24, in the park’s amphitheater. Kathy Gillispie, who raises monarchs from eggs, caterpillars and chrysalises, will speak about her experiences with monarchs. The program is free, but a state park parking pass is needed to enter the rural Nerstrand park.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Peaches, beyond simply a fruit to eat August 15, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:44 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Peaches fill a box and now my fridge. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

PEACHES PACK my refrigerator. Several ripen in a brown paper bag on the kitchen counter. Big, beautiful Colorado peaches.

Signs directed people into the peach pick up spot in the basement. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Earlier this week, Randy and I picked up a 20-pound case of peaches in the basement of First English Lutheran Church. That’s a lot of peaches—around 40—for two people to eat. But I love peaches. And we’ll share some with our eldest daughter and her family.

People wait in line for their peaches at First English Lutheran Church. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

A steady stream of people flowed into the cold church basement late Tuesday afternoon for their pre-ordered peaches, sold as a fundraiser by the youth group. We paid $37 for our full box. That’s $1.85/pound. I have no idea if that’s a “good” price. It doesn’t matter. I prefer peaches shipped directly from the grower. I also like supporting local church youth, because I was once that mom of kids raising monies for mission trips and youth gatherings.

Peaches no longer come in wooden crates, but in cardboard boxes. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Peaches, though, mean more to me than simply supporting a good cause and eating one of my favorite fruits. Peaches take me back to summer on the farm, into the kitchen. There my mom pried open a wooden crate of peaches wrapped in pinkish tissue paper (saved for later use in the outhouse). Then she dropped the peaches into a large kettle of boiling water to remove the skins. Next, she halved or sliced the peaches into Mason and Ball quart jars. Topped with lids and ringed, the jars went into the pressure cooker. Once removed, the jars cooled and sealed. Then we carried the jars to the cellar.

Beautiful (and delicious) Colorado peaches sold at First English. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

I admire farm women like my mom who labored to preserve fruits and vegetables to feed their families during the winter months ahead. And winters on the prairie were long and harsh. Many a cold, snowy evening, Mom would pull open the kitchen floor trap door and send me down the open wooden steps into the depths of the dank, dark, dirt-floored cellar lit by a single light bulb. There I selected a quart jar from the wooden shelves. Whatever fruit Mom wanted. Pears, cherries, plums, apples, peaches. The preserved fruit would complete our meal of meat, boiled potatoes with gravy, a side vegetable (pulled from the freezer) and homemade bread.

We ate well. Good food without preservatives. Beef from our cattle. Vegetables from our garden. Apples from local trees. And then all those fruits, purchased in crates and preserved. No additives. Just simple, good food.

Fruit-themed banners add a festive flair to peach pick up. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

I always thought I would follow my mom’s example of planting a big garden and preserving food. But I never did. I live on a mostly shady lot in town. I raised only three children, not six like her. I have easy access to multiple grocery stores, unlike her. Fresh fruit is readily available. I prefer fresh. And, if I’m really honest with myself, I never wanted to labor in the kitchen for hours during the hot summer putting up fruits and vegetables.

Carts were ready for volunteers to wheel peach cases to vehicles. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo August 2024)

Still, I buy that case of peaches from First English. All those peaches, minus the tissue paper wrappings reused in the outhouse. In many ways, I am honoring my mom, hardworking farm woman of the Minnesota prairie. As I pull ripened peaches from a brown paper bag to slice into my morning oatmeal, to eat with a meal or to incorporate into a crisp, pie or galette, I think of Mom. She, who showed her love for family not in words or hugs, but rather in rows and rows of quart jars filled with fruit. Jars shelved on planks in the dank, dark depths of the dirt-floored cellar.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Looking for farm work & remembering my work on the farm August 1, 2024

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
A farm site west of New Ulm. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

WOULD YOU PICK rock, walk beans, clean up pig or cow muck? Joe and his crew will.

I can, too, as I’m experienced. But I have no desire to return to those farm tasks that are now only long ago youthful memories.

The sign I spotted in a Redwood Falls convenience store. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo July 2024)

Recently, I saw a sign, more like a note, posted by Joe on a convenience store bulletin board in Redwood Falls, deep in the heart of southwestern Minnesota farm country. I grew up in that area, on a crop and dairy farm.

Rocks picked and piled at field’s edge. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo June 2014)

Like Joe, I worked the land and labored in the barn. I picked rock, which is exactly as it sounds—walking fields to pick rocks from the soil and toss them onto a wagon or loader. Rock removal is necessary so farm equipment isn’t damaged during crop prep, planting and harvesting. It’s hard, dirty work when done by hand.

Likewise, walking beans is hard, dirty, hot work. That job involves walking down rows of soybeans to remove weeds and stray corn plants, either by hand or by hoe. At least that’s how I walked beans back in the day. Today that may involve spot spraying herbicides.

A tasseling Rice County corn field. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

And when I worked corn fields, it was to detassel corn for the Dekalb seed company. I arose early, boarded a school bus with a bunch of other teens, arrived at a corn field and proceeded to walk the corn rows pulling tassels from corn plants. Dew ran down my arms, corn leaves sliced my skin, sweat poured off my body as the day progressed under a hot July sun. Of all the jobs I’ve had, detasseling corn rates as the most miserable, awful, horrible, labor intense work I’ve ever done.

Inside a Rice County dairy barn. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo)

I’d rather shovel cow manure. And I did plenty of that along with other animal-related farm chores.

If Joe and his team are willing to take on tasks that are labor intensive, hot and smelly, then I applaud them. We need hands-on folks who are not afraid to get their hands dirty, to break a sweat, to do those jobs that place them close to the land. Jobs many other people would not do.

An abandoned barn and silo along a backroad in the Sogn Valley of southeastern Minnesota. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo 2021)

I don’t regret my farm work experiences. I learned the value of hard physical labor, of working together, of understanding that what I did was necessary. Certainly farming has changed, modernized in the 50 years since I left the land. Machines and computers make life easier.

But sometimes it still takes people like Joe and his crew to plant their soles on the earth, their feet in the barn, to make a farming operation work, even in 2024.

© Copyright 2024 Audrey Kletscher Helbling