atsgatlin

Did you miss me last week? I missed you. Here's where I was: at my in-laws' cabin, elbow deep in a garage that hadn't been touched in years, coming home every night too tired to string a sentence together, let alone write one. And then, a few days after we got home, while I was sitting on my bathroom counter slathering calamine lotion on a poison ivy rash that had taken over my forearms (souvenir of clearing brush along the shoreline, a decision I regret more every time I scratch), my phone...

If you grew up in Minnesota, you already know what "up north" means. You don't need coordinates. You don't need a town name. It's a feeling, a certain gravel road, a screen door that slams a specific way. Say the words "up north" to anyone from here and watch their shoulders drop an inch. For us, up north means the cabin. And the cabin means the girls fishing off the dock until their hands smelled like minnows, bonfires that ran too late on a school night, and turtle races that somehow became...

I didn't cook a single meal for eleven days and it might have been the best food I've had all year. My youngest and I hit the road from the Twin Cities and made our way to my sister and brother-in-law's in Oshkosh for the Fourth of July. They just got a new pontoon, so we spent most of the weekend cruising around instead of standing at a stove, which felt like exactly the right way to kick things off. Walleye Bites, a One-Pan Wonder, and a Bar You Can Best Reach by Boat One afternoon we...