Apples: a favorite fruit and fragrance ~ October 7, 1993

David Heiller

The apple tree has been good to us this year. It’s half-dead and gnarly the way old apple trees look, like a bent old man. But it keeps on giving good fruit year after year. It gives us other pleasures too.

I don’t know what kind of tree it is. It starts bearing fruit by mid-August. A lot of apples go to waste on the ground then. We aren’t ready for them, and they are tart.

But by mid-September the ones that have survived the thunderstorms and climbing kids are big and sweet. The insides are very white. They start to turn brown within a few minutes after you cut them or take a bite.

Tyson and Malika

My daughter Mollie and her friend and I picked the tree three weeks ago. I got out the step ladder, which is old and shaky. One of the kids would climb as high as she could, while I held the ladder, and passed the apples down to the other kid, who put them in a bucket.

It wasn’t the most efficient way to pick apples, but it was fun, especially for the kid on top of the ladder, all stretched out, reaching that extra inch to get chubby fingers around a big red ap­ple. Sometimes I would shake the ladder just a little then, and they would jerk and laugh. We filled two five-gallon buckets. I put them in the sauna, where they stay cool most of the time. They’re just the right temperature. Not so cold they freeze your teeth, like from the refrigerator. And they fill the sauna with the smell of apples, which is a pleasant smell indeed.

Every day we grab a couple apples from the sauna. We take them to work. We eat them while we work in the garden, or on bike rides and walks. They taste real good in the woods on the tractor too, with a sore back and a trailer full of firewood.

It froze hard Friday night, October first: 23 degrees, our thermometer said.
The apples still left on the tree didn’t take it too kindly. Their skin blotched. The insides were no longer such a perfect white. But they were still sweet. So my son Noah and I borrowed an apple picker from a friend on Sunday and picked the few that we couldn’t reach from the ground or the shaky ladder.

Brooks, Noah, Ida and APPLES! 

An apple picker is an interesting invention. It has a wire basket on one end that is half open, with wires over half that stick up like crooked fingers. You hook the apple with these fingers, and the apple falls into the basket. It’s on a handle that has three parts. When you put them together, you can reach up about 12 feet.

I picked the apples from the top of the tree, then lowered the basket to Noah, who put them in a bucket. Some of them weren’t as good as they looked. They had sores and scrapes. They , almost filled a five gallon bucket. I stood in the back of the pickup to get the highest ones. A few we couldn’t reach at all. It’s good to leave some for the birds.

I was pretty proud until I backed the truck over the bucket. Then quite a few of them had even more bumps and bruises. I carried them inside, and set them on the kitchen floor with a sheepish look. Cindy was making bread. She didn’t have a sheepish look. Making apple sauce had been added to her list of Sunday chores. Gee, thanks, Dave.

I spent the next couple hours in the woods, cutting firewood and keeping out of Cindy’s way. It was safer to be around a chainsaw. When I came in the house, the apple sauce was on the stove. Cindy asked me to taste it. She didn’t have to ask twice. I smiled. It was delicious, red and smooth and sweet.

After supper, the kids wanted apple sauce and ice cream for a treat, so Cindy made another batch. This kind was clear and chunky—and delicious. Cindy smiled this time. Hot apple sauce and ice cream is a hard treat to beat. I had a bowl too.

Then Mollie asked for an apple after she had brushed her teeth. Cindy said yes. She figures you can’t go wrong with apples, even after you brush your teeth.

That reminded me of when I was a kid. We always had apples in the house. We kept them in the root cellar. It had a dirt floor and stone walls. Apples seemed to stay fresh there for months. Their smell would hang in the air like perfume, like in the sauna and in our lives.

I’m grateful for the simple pleasures that an apple tree can bring.

I’ll take fall in Minnesota, thank you ~ September 26, 2002

David Heiller

I saw a cousin this summer that I hadn’t seen in many years. She is a couple years younger than me, yet she is already retired after a successful career in the military.

Early Autumn 2004 at the Spillway on the Mississippi, 
in Houston County, Minnesota

To top this off, she lives in Hawaii.

We got to talking about the weather there. No bugs, lots of sunshine, temperatures almost always in the 70s and 80s. Paradise, in other words.

I told her that I could never live in Hawaii.

Claire and me in Wright County
 in the fall of 2002. 
I like the oak leaf ears.

She looked a bit surprised at that. I explained that I enjoy the changing of the seasons too much, and what it brings out in me. That’s a hard thing to describe on a muggy summer night when Hawaii did seem like paradise. I don’t think Barb understood.

In fact, it’s hard to describe any time. It’s more something you feel, and it^’s happening right now. Chances are you know what I’m talking about.

Leaves are coming down in earnest. Their colors mix with the dwindling sunlight to give hue to the air that you can’t find at any other time of year. They bring on that crisp scent of autumn that you don’t experience any other time, an aroma of dried leaves and football games and shotgun shells.

The days cool down fast. The evenings are chilly. The weatherman talks about frost, but you don’t need a weatherman to know that.

You get out to the garden, make sure everything that is vulnerable to frost gets picked or covered. The house fills up with buckets and bowls of onions and tomatoes. The fridge bulge with peppers and cucumbers.

Hillside Road, Houston County Minnesota

You start looking at the old home-place with an eye toward cold weather. What needs to be done? Paint, caulk. Fix a broken step. A lot of little chores, and maybe some big ones.

But the funny thing is you don’t mind doing, them. Split wood? Clean up the greenhouse? Organize the workbench? No problem. The changing season puts a spring in your step. That’s because something new is just around, the corner.

No doubt, Morocco is beautiful. 
David's heart was always in Minnesota

We like change, and we like to suffer a bit, too. Monday was as dreary; cold, and rainy a day as you could ask for, and a co-worker exclaimed out of the blue, “I love this weather!” He was ready for the change, ready to suffer a bit; because then he’ll get to prove that he can hold his own against Mother Nature.

My love for the four seasons was cemented when I spent two years in Morocco. I remember one Christmas Eve, walking under a full moon in my shirt sleeves in a dry, warm world, and. thinking, “I never want to miss winter again.”

Yes, the seasons changed in Morocco. Summers were very hot, and spring brought lush growth, and winter was wet and cold. I’m sure people got used to that. The same is probably true in Hawaii. I tip my hat to Cousin Barb for adapting to that. But I^’ll take fall in Minnesota.

The freedom to do nothing ~ September 28, 1995

David Heiller

Our 10-year-old daughter informed us at supper last week that she wanted to quit piano lessons. She is too busy, she told us.

Piano days are done.

She has homework every night. She has joined fifth grade choir at Willow River, and is going to start taking clarinet lessons for the school band.

Then there’s Girl Scouts every other Monday, and piano lessons every Thursday after school.

And I know parents whose children are even busier, for example, who play hockey.

If you look up the word “busy” in a dictionary, it will say: “See hockey parent.” I get confused just listening to their schedules.

It doesn’t get any easier as the children get older, from what I’ve seen. There are sports, and pep band, and marching band, and National Honor Society and annual staff, and maybe a part-time job at the Dairy Queen.

Malika doing some wonderful "nothing"

We said no to Mollie’s request. We think piano lessons are important. But I couldn’t stop myself from asking this question: When do kids get to be kids anymore?

Yes, I know I sound old when I say something like that. And yes, when I was my daughter’s age, my friends and I were busy enough.

But we didn’t have organized activities like today. We had a Boy Scout meeting once a month, with a hike or camping trip every so often. That was about the extent of our adult-led activities.

Our football games were organized by a telephone call or two. Or else everyone would just congregate at the playground for a game. There was always a game going on, either football or softball or basketball, depending on the season.

We would explore by the river, or hunt squirrels, or go fishing, or walk along the railroad tracks looking for fossils. We would ride our bikes around town, or play at the school grounds.

David exercising his freedom to do nothing too!

You probably have your own list of carefree childhood memories. I bet they bring a smile to your face. You can learn a lot from things like that, from just acting your age and having the freedom to do nothing.

My daughter and one of her friends are building a playhouse now in their spare time. They have needed some help from me, but I’ve kept it to a minimum. Mostly it is their fort, and it shows by the crooked siding and bent nails. Sometimes they argue over who should do what, but the importance of the playhouse soon smoothes any ruffled feathers.

They are learning some carpentry skills. They are learning not to be afraid to try something new. They are learning how to work together. All very important lessons.

It makes me happy to see them do this, or to see them jump on the trampoline or explore the old house next door.

When they are my age, I bet they remember their free time more than all those other things that are making their life hectic.

A perfect book club outing ~ September 9, 1998

David Heiller

Our book club read Canoeing with the Cree, by Eric Sevareid, for our September discussion.

But instead of meeting at someone’s house in the evening, like we usually do, we held this book club on the Kettle River.

This is what bookclub usually looked like.
This was at our house.

We canoed from County Road 52 to Rutledge, about an eight mile stretch, on September 6.

There were eight canoes and 18 people. Usu­ally we have about 10 people at book club, but a fun outing on a gorgeous day attracted extra spouses and kids.

Cindy and I canoed the first half with a 16-year-old boy, Matt, in the middle. We hit a lot of shallow spots. The Kettle River is low, because of the dry summer. We had to get out of the ca­noe to pull it over rocks and sand many, many times.

At some places trees lay over the river. Sometimes we were able to float underneath them. One tree was about three feet above the river. Cindy bent low enough to slip under it. But I’m a lot bigger than her, so I climbed out of the canoe and onto the tree trunk while the canoe floated underneath. Then I got back in the canoe.

It wasn’t exactly the kind of challenge that Eric Sevareid and Walter Port faced on their ca­noe trip from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay.

At about the half way point, we stopped on a sandy shore and had a picnic lunch and dis­cussed the book. Everybody brought some food to share. Pat Ring laid a tarp down on the sand. People set out salads and fresh vegetables and fruit, most of it home grown.

Deane and Katherine Hillbrand on the Kettle River

There were breads and meat and cheese and sandwiches. I bet it was the fanciest picnic the Kettle River has ever seen. That’s one thing I like about Book Club. There’s always great food.

The discussion was good too, although it took Pat, who serves as the unofficial moderator, some hollering to bring us all together. The set­ting on the river was just right for the discus­sion, which was what we had in mind in the first place.           

We talked about how lucky Severeid and Port, who were both teenagers, had been on their trip, which started in Minneapolis and ended at Hud­son Bay. So many things could have gone wrong.

But their courage and strength played an equally big part. They tackled a huge wilder­ness, in awful weather, on dangerous rivers.

How many of us standing there would have turned back? Eric Severeid put it well in his author’s note: “Our journey was an example of what very young men can do—once in their lives—but never again!”

It’s important to do something like that when you are young and have the chance several people said. After the discussion, one of the college kids said the discussion made hint a little sad, because he didn’t know if he would be able to ever have an adventure like that.

He already had college loans piling up. He was feeling the pressure of having to get a job right after college. I think he wished he could head out to Hudson Bay instead of Duluth.

That made me think that young people today face more stress than people like Severeid and Port did in 1930.

We packed up the food and headed down the mighty Kettle River. Joel and Daina Rosen pulled their canoe up to ours. Joel wanted to sing songs. That was the perfect ending for the trip. Singing and canoeing go together like a paddle and water, But often I don’t do it. I get self-conscious. Joel doesn’t know what self-conscious is, at least when it comes to singing. His rich baritone voice carried over the river, and it sounded great.

Just like our book club trip down the river.

The first day of school ~ September 6, 1990

David Heiller

Monday night, Sept. 3, 9:15. Mollie can’t sleep. She creaks down the steps for about the fourth time tonight. That’s not unusual. She’s a great staller.

She crawls onto my lap at the kitchen table, and I hug her like a warm blanket. No yelling tonight. It’s a special night for us all.

“I still can’t sleep,” she says.

“Are you thinking about school?^” She nods, then raises her hand. “You have to raise your hand in school,” she says. “But not at nap time. You can’t raise your hand at nap time.” Noah has been teaching her the kindergarten ropes.

Up a tree, where Noah and Malika liked to be.

“I’m sad because I want to graduate,” she con­tinues, her eyes focused on a batch of fresh peanut butter cookies behind me.

“You can’t graduate until the end of the year,” I say. “First you have to go to school and learn a lot of things and be a good girl.” She nods duti­fully, still eyeing the cookies. She’s not worried about school at all, I suddenly realize. She’s worried about not getting to eat a fresh cookie.

“Would you like a cookie?” She nods again; I break one in half and send her upstairs.

 Something’s wrong. Normally Mollie would not get a hug and a cookie on Monday night at 9:15. But the first day of school does strange things to people.

Even to Mollie. Mollie the Youngest. Mollie the Staller. Mollie the Wild. Mollie the Paint-Orange-Paint-All-Over-Your-Body.

That was only three years age. I could have shipped her out to kindergarten that night, one at a boarding school very far away. There’s still orange paint on the floor by her bed.

There were other times too. All parents know what I mean. Times when you want to cut wood, or roof the shed, or bake bread or hang out clothes. Things that HAVE to get done, and a lit­tle kid keeps asking questions or wanting juice or wanting to share a favorite book or Sesame Street episode. You sigh and make time and like an idiot, you begrudge it a bit.

This all ends tomorrow, the first day of school. Mollie’s sad because she can’t graduate yet, and sadder still because she wants a cookie. She doesn’t realize the sticky mess called school—and growing up—that she is about to run into, and she’s lucky for that.

Noah is explaining the bus ride to Malika, 
meanwhile Queen Ida is nervous about them being gone.

Moms and Dads realize it, and it takes on more meaning for them. Like adults, they make a big deal about it. They’ve been bracing for it for a while, mentioning it while hanging up the clothes. “Won’t it be strange having Mollie in school?” Answering, “Yeah, wow.” but not really knowing that your gut feels like an empty house, echoing with stillness. Until now.

I’ve felt it a few times before. It comes at times of departure: a broken romance, the end of summer camp, the first day in college. I remember when I was leaving for the Peace Corps in 1977. Mom drove me to the airport in La Crosse. I felt nervous, excited, starting a great two-year adventure. I thought Mom shared those feelings, and maybe she did. But she cried as we hugged at the airport, like I hadn’t seen her cry in years.

Those tears surprised me then, but I understand them better now.

Tuesday morning, Sept. 4, 7:10: Mollie and Noah wait for Dave Nyrud’s school bus to pull into the driveway. They both wear back-packs big enough to carry a pup tent. These are children of the ‘90s.

We hear the bus down-shifting at Williams' to pick up April and Rosie. Mollie holds her arms out for me to pick her up. I hug her tight. “Why don’t you stay home?” I tell her. “We can watch The Little Mermaid all day.”

She laughs. She knows I’m joking. But she says “No” anyway, and she means it. She wouldn’t miss the first day of school for anything.

Getting control of the Firewood Supply ~ November 2, 1995

David Heiller

We’ve had a lot of wet weather lately, which has me worried about our Firewood Supply.

Firewood Supply is capitalized because it is a serious subject when you heat with wood.

Most people have their Firewood Supply under control at this point in the year. In fact the true old timer is working on his Firewood Supply for next year, or even 1997, right about now. Maybe someday I’ll be at that point. But things always seem to get in the way, like football games and gardening and an emergency or two.

"Argg"!

So I’m crossing my fingers that we’ll get a cold snap and the rain will cease and the ground will harden and everything will work out fine, like it always does.

In preparation for those perfect conditions, I spent part of Saturday and Sunday in the woods wearing knee-high rubber boots, cutting and splitting several cords of basswood, maple, and red oak.

Two companions helped the time go faster.

On Saturday I worked with the company of our Australian shepherd, Mackenzie. She is a faithful dog. She and our other dog, Ida, walked out with me. Ida split for home after a few minutes, but Mac sat down about 30 feet away and for four hours watched me work.

Kenzie patiently waits,
always alert to any change of plans.

When I would stop for a break and shut off the saw, I would call her over and she would gratefully come, her whole hind end wagging, and we would talk and hug for a few seconds. It’s a good feeling, having a loyal dog like that. It puts a bright spot on what is often a cold and dreary job.

So does working with your son. I asked Noah to help me on Sunday. He came reluctantly. He would rather have spent his time strutting around the yard wearing his football shoulder pads and flexing his muscles and pretending he was John Randle.

His job was to stand the stove-length logs upright, and to split them if he could. If he couldn’t, then at least the logs would be ready for me to split. That saves some bending for me. His 12-year-old back has a few more bends in it than mine. If there is one job that will give you a stiff back, it is splitting wood.

Noah had trouble splitting the green maple. The axe got tangled in the underbrush more than once, and I heard him grumble about it. He is discovering that underbrush is the mortal enemy of making firewood. It nicks your cheeks, catches your saw, steals your hat, and trips your feet.

Dad's worthy assistant.

He did better splitting the oak. When he got tired of standing the wood upright and splitting, he did some tossing.

Tossing a piece of wood gives you a good feeling, especially when you are frustrated with the underbrush. You give a grunt and toss that hunk with an “Aargh!” and you feel better. Don’t ask me why.

At first Noah worked quietly, and when he is quiet, he is not happy. I watched his frustration with trying to split some tough logs. But as the jobs progressed, as he split and tossed and stacked and patiently fought the underbrush, his attitude changed.

He started to feel his body work, his back, his forearms, his triceps and biceps and all those other muscles that he knows by name.

You get a workout making firewood. It’s a hard job. But once you get into the rhythm of the job, you start to feel pretty good.

Then he started talking about the Vikings, and about how this work was helping his muscles and I knew he was doing fine. He talked and I listened. Once in a while I would say “Yeah?” or “Right!” and that was all I needed to say.

He’s going to help me again next Saturday. Mackenzie will too. Then we’ll get the Firewood Supply under control, if the good Lord’s willing and the creek don’t rise.

In a fog no longer ~ September 15, 2004

David Heiller

It’s interesting what a change in perspective can do to something as simple as fog.

The view from our home in southeastern Minnesota.
Under that cloud is the Mississippi River. 
On the horizon is Wisconsin.

When I was a kid growing up in Brownsville, fog would roll in almost every morning at this time of year. I never gave it much thought.

It meant Dale Besse would drive the school bus a little more slowly up the mile grade. When I went to Fruit Acres to pick apples, the drive would take a little longer, until the old 1964 Chevy broke through the clouds above La Crescent.

Then I would see the river bathed in clouds and I would pull off at the scenic overlook, and something would tug inside of me.

Beauty like that is a gift, and I have carried that vision in the back of my mind for decades since.

Now the vision is here to stay, and it hasn’t lost its luster.

It snuck up on me a couple weeks ago, at our ridge overlooking Heiller Valley. (Hey, it used to be filled with Heillers, so Heiller Valley it shall be.)

Clouds on the river.

Sometimes they lie low like a fat wide snake. Sometimes they billow up like cotton candy. Always different, always moving, but more slowly than the eye can see.

Sometimes Wisconsin hills peek over the top, sometimes the clouds cover the whole horizon.

The Wisconsin hills turn mauve in the
right conditions in the afternoon.
My friend Sara sent me this photo.

At first, when the alarm clock rings, the river valley is a dull gray. But If I can’t see the yard lights three miles to the east in Wisconsin, I know the clouds are waiting.

Then the sun rises from behind, setting the edges glowing pink and orange. Fringes of color appear, and finally the good old sun, like a red neon ball.

For a few minutes, seconds really, you can look at the sun, and that’s fascinating too. Then it breaks free of the mist, and you have to avert your eyes to the brilliant light. That’s when the clouds jump out in all their glory.

It’s hard to describe. If you’ve ever looked down on clouds from an airplane, that’s what it’s like. Too beautiful for anything but a “Wow” or a “Geez” or a “Cindy, look at this.” Or often just silent wonder.

Then the sun breaks up the party. The fog lifts. Sometimes we can watch it slink toward us, up past the spirit of all those Heiller kids, from Dad on down. Then we are in the clouds, and it’s just dull old fog again, so thick that all we can see is the cottonwood tree below the house.

The road to the Reno Quarry.

The clouds on the river are sheer beauty, and they are something more, a reminder of the good old days on the way to Fruit Acres, and the good old days that are here to stay.

I think of that often in our new home. The beauty of the valley, the sunsets over the old Oesterle farm across the road, the Reno quarry catching the last golden light.

Moonlight bouncing off the roof of the barn, so bright you almost have to put on sunglasses. The Milky Way straight overhead.

Owls calling back and forth. Coyotes yipping. Flocks of blackbirds that blot out the sun. Tree swallows lining the electric wires.

The list is almost endless.

And the fog. That’s what I used to call it. But one man’s fog is another man’s cloud, and one lady’s mist is another lady’s majesty.