I am learning more about my adoptive home. The COVID-19 pandemic has us all sheltering in. We are learning old and new ways to keep busy. One of mine is walking to the post office instead of driving. The temporary demise of pickleball has pushed me out the door onto the Grand Marais streets. What use to be a 10-15 minute drive is now an hour’s walk.
Like my Dad, I avoid going the same way anywhere twice in a row if possible. Except that ‘61 is the only route at all direct to Duluth, which is why the route started me wondering. Many Grand Marais streets are unpaved. I infer the city council waits until the residents want paving so badly that they will accept the assessments. The city feels more like St. Paul than South Minneapolis. I knew some streets didn’t go through, but there is more to experience in wandering around town.
Last week, the path that connects Eighth Avenue West with Sixth Avenue along Second Street was blocked with snow piles. Now the piles are low enough that crampons are not needed to get to the Congregational Church which is now doing virus-free virtual services anyway.
Yesterday, I went uphill to Fourth Avenue West and learned it is an unpaved road for the block between Seventh and Eighth. Then it becomes an alley-like path to Sixth with an apparent dead end. Go back or forward. To the right was a hill down so steep I would not try it in dry, warm weather. To the left was a gentler but still challenging path downhill through the woods. At my virus-sheltering age, the path was challenging but doable. Three deer watched my dilemma without apparent concern, so I plunged down the slope. Trees for handholds and deer trails gave some guidance. The plunging became literal when I varied from the deer trail into deep, unpacked snow. The diagonal route took me through someone’s back yard to Fifth Avenue West, emerging just northwest of the Courthouse.
These walks give more insight to the nature of our rural community. Raised a South Minneapolis city kid, I had to adjust to a somewhat slower pace of life. Errands that took four hours in the Cities take 30 minutes here with time to stop and talk about six feet apart. People here, both walking and driving, are more polite than city folk. When going by pedestrians, drivers give us a wide birth. Many of us walk facing traffic, as the law says when there is no sidewalk on about half of the streets. During this virus time, oncoming walkers give each other more than six feet of space, and say “hello” and admire from afar dogs walking their owners. No stranger petting…
More discoveries, I had already noted how much of Highway 61 traffic is RVs or involves a trailer or equipment of some kind. Snowmobiles, firewood, boats of all kinds, skis, and bikes are frequently seen. Walking through our small but elegant city, it seemed like I saw one or more trailers in one of three or four yards. No snooty suburban rules about not storing such things on the property and ruining the million-dollar views.
Boat trailers are common. So are flatbeds for all kinds of hauling. Some closed trailers are here and there, some with commercial ads. There is much evidence of varied trailers used to haul firewood for those who heat their homes that way. One yard had a large sailboat on a trailer, a flat bed trailer, another empty boat trailer, and a closed box trailer, like a U-Haul.
My favorite trailer was purple and about 20 feet long with some kind of heating device on it. I have no idea what that trailer is for.
Our community has always had a live and let live style. Being at the end of Native American trails and John Beargrease routes made that easy. Fishing, hunting, canoeing, skiing, and snowmobiling are common outdoor life style activities. There are sled dogs and yurts as well. Some people live with no running water, electricity, or other modern conveniences and come to town only for showers at the Y, recycling and the Coop food store. Some have solar arrays and live completely off-grid. Others sell their excess solar power to Arrowhead Electric Coop. At least one home has an outdoor system that feeds wood fired heat to the house, complete with a keypad lock on the front. Others live with smartphones on a path between the schools, YMCA, churches, stores, restaurants, golf courses, and Arrowhead Center for the Arts, and do not miss the Cities’ culture much at all.
We do not have to smoke tobacco to achieve sufficient social distance. And we do not have to use deer trails marked with little black things; wondering on the beaten deer path has its rewards.
Steve Aldrich is a retired Hennepin County lawyer, mediator, and Judge, serving from 1997-2010. He and Myrna moved here in 2016. He likes to remember that he was a Minnesota Super Family lawyer before being elected to the bench. Steve really enjoys doing weddings, the one thing a retired judge can do without appointment by the Chief Justice.
Leave a Reply