City Mice go to the Country

Little Ripley Lake

   

     I’m in a writing group of five women, three from the DC area and two from Minneapolis. We met cute on a transatlantic crossing on the Queen Mary 2 for a writing workshop. One of the Minnesotans, Sandra, has a lake house in Wisconsin and invited us for a five-day writer’s retreat. The emphasis was on treat. 

     Katy picked us up at the Minneapolis St. Paul airport. We drove through the beautiful state of Wisconsin for more than two hours passing excessive swaths of green, endless trees, sparkling lakes. We saw farms with silos, barns, and tractors, we saw a sign reading “deer corn for sale” and we wondered if it was edible. (It is not, for humans.)

Little Ripley Lake

    I don’t want to say I am a complete idiot when it comes to Midwestern geography, but I think I have to. On the drive I was stunned to see that we crossed the Mississippi River. Really? It starts this far North? What’s up with that? Without naming names, there were other visitors in the car who were equally astounded. 

    

Sandra's house

    Sandra’s lake house in Sarona, Wisconsin is spacious and beautiful, we each had our own bedroom. Her magical black cat, Bader, eyed the city mice with suspicion. The house is filled with light and a has a gorgeous deck overlooking Little Ripley Lake which is so still that it looks like a mirror. 

Pontoon boat happy hour

    The first afternoon we had happy hour on a solar-powered pontoon boat. The first mateys had several onboard tasks, shoving off, putting up the canvas shade, serving the brie and crackers, and directing a smooth landing into the dock. My contribution was witty repartee. 

Loons and loonlet

    The pontoon lead us to the loons. My knowledge of loons is confined to the movie On Golden Pond. There was a baby loonlet on the back of one of its parents. Sandra explained that the loon survival rate is low, because of predators, and the fact that loons can’t really walk. They have to propel themselves onto the land with a sort of scootching motion. Like seals.

    “I’ll go make a fire,” Sandra said confidently on the night of our cookout.

     “I’ll go make a fire,” she said again this time heading to the property's sauna, built by her husband Barry.

Lisa, city mouse, advises Sandra, Brave Pioneer Woman

    I was already impressed by Sandra's fire making skills but my amazement was to grow. After a morning walk Katy reported a tree down across the only road to the lake house. What did Sandra do then, but get a chain saw, and cut the branch into light and moveable pieces so that we could clear the road. It was then I realized I was in the presence of a Brave Pioneer Woman. 

Stairs to the dock

    We found our favorite nooks and settled into our primary purpose of daily writing. I used to be an exhibitor at national medical conferences, and there was a daily promise of “unopposed time,” a period when the attendees weren’t conflicted by panels, seminars and keynotes. 

     The writing at the lake was “unopposed time.” 

Who could be opposed to this?

     On a rainy day we went to Spooner, WI to have dinner at a brew pub called Round Man Brewing Company. But that very day the ownership had changed and it was now Railhouse Junction. It was so new that there was no drink menu and even the question "what kind of beer do you have?" stumped the waiter.  We ordered native cheese curds and beer cheese dip, and entrées of pretzel coated whitefish with rice and sauteed vegetables. The fish was not pretzel coated and  there were no veggies. Until then we had exercised patience and pity for the new waiter, but we demanded our promised sides which were hastily served in soup bowls. 

A pie iron at work

    The next night we made pizzas with pie irons. "What the hell is a pie iron?" I asked. We used the pie irons to make individual "pizzas"—two slices of buttered white bread that fit in the square shaped end of the iron, filled with pizza sauce, cheese, pepperonis and olives. Once assembled, the pie iron is turned over hot coals until it becomes a golden toasted melty foodstuff.

Pie iron picnic

     As if the pie iron and pontoon boat weren't enough new learning for me, I was also stunned to learn that Sandra's husband Barry makes homemade syrup by tapping 40 Maple trees on their property. I saw tapped trees and long tubes. We were given a bottle of maple syrup as a parting gift. 

     The lake had a wonderful effect on all of us. We made our own breakfasts and lunches and had dinner together, we had quiet times and chatty times, we sat together in a wicked hot sauna, we had focused writing times and on the last night we read our work to each other. We got along flawlessly; there wasn’t a ripple of discord on Little Ripley Lake. 

    I think our exemplary behavior was driven by the fact that we secretly hope to be invited back.

Fearless host Sandra with Bader