Recently I published a short book with this title. I have not tried to advertise it nor do much marketing. Mostly the book is for my family and friends, and I have given out quite a number of free copies, and several people have commented on and said they enjoyed reading it. Mostly I haven’t gotten much feedback. I thought it might be time to put some information about the book on this blog, so here is the introduction to the book. It is available on Amazon, but also from me at a much cheaper cost – in fact pretty much at no cost.
Introduction to the book
When I was in (about) the fourth
grade in Dovre Country School in rural Kenyon, Minnesota, my teacher, Miss
Hjermstad, gave me an assignment to interview someone in my family. This was a pretty common grade school exercise;
one that gives a young student a chance to write their first story. Her instruction was to ask about interesting
experiences.
Years later I found this poorly
written “manuscript’ penned in the same pitiable hand writing I have had my
whole life. I was glad I had kept this
paper, but it is sort of embarrassing to look at now. I guess you have to start somewhere.
It brings pleasant images to mind
of my grandparents. I can picture this
conversation in their retirement home in Kenyon; grandpa sitting in his rocking
chair and grandma nearby, quietly chuckling and nodding affirmatively as he
responded to my questions. Alas, I
should have also asked her about her interesting experiences.
I doubt my grandparents would
have thought of their lives as interesting, but given the rare opportunity to
have a grandchild show some interest, he reminisced, and recalled some events
from his life that I would not have known except that I asked a few leading
questions. I now have many more
questions I wish I could ask, but my grandparents are long gone.
When oral historian Donna Grey
approached pioneer ranch women in Montana asking for interviews to record their
stories, she wrote:
“Almost every one of them protested that she
had ‘nothing to tell’, that her life had been unremarkable…. but in the end,
their stories all proved worthy of telling.” [1]
When I stretch my memory and
imagination to recall some of the interesting people and experiences in my
life, writing about them revives to some degree the feelings, relationships and
lessons of life I learned through those experiences and from those people.
The accounts in this short volume
vary widely, starting from childhood to reminiscences in old age. Included are several fictional stories drawn
from memories and based on true events.
As an Irish priest once told me, “All stories are true, and some of them
actually happened.”
Both joyful and challenging
experiences make up the substance of our lives, many of which we might not
think of as particularly interesting at the time. There was a time when my
future was more interesting to me then my past.
Now it is somewhat the opposite; I suspect my past is more interesting
than my future will be. In these stories
I am looking back at the past, but you never know, there may well be more
interesting experiences ahead. I remain
hopeful. My mantra in old age is, as it
has been for many years, to stay active and alive in mind, body and spirit.
I have a great nostalgia for the
community and church where I grew up and an appreciation for the simple values
transmitted to me and my generation by family, church and community. Later, in all the stages of adult life, I was
privileged to have interesting experiences with people and communities in many
countries and cultures, having lived in eight different countries and worked in
more than three dozen over the course of my forty-year career.
I have been a nomad most of my
life, but perhaps paradoxically, also one who cherishes the stability and
happiness that arises out of my roots.
As I learned from people around the world, the values forged in family,
community, faith and vocation are the foundational pillars that give meaning to
life.
