River Ramblings.....

    The column I wrote last week about the wedding in our family was certainly one from the heart. Thinking about my walk with our daughter Laurel still causes my feet to lift a bit.  It is all part of an amazing day.
    There were a few other highlights that day as you might expect. Seeing those little boys in their tuxedos was pretty special as was having so many friends and well wishers join the fun. Gaining a son-in-law is pretty nice too. So is building a bigger connection with his family.
     We all experience many of the same milestones as we make our way through life. The wedding of one of your children sure is one of those special events. Now we know first-hand what so many of you have seen and experienced. It’s amazing.

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    Our son Cody had an interesting trip home for the wedding. His aging but always reliable Geo Prism has always been available for any challenge and the 1200 mile trip from central Texas to Minnesota has been a trip it has never been afraid of. This time however, multiple car-related issues came to light an hour north of Austin in Temple, Texas. First it was brakes locking up and then it was the transmission locking up. This all happened during the few days that he was planning to spend with friends back in Minnesota.
    The realization that the old Geo had probably rolled its final mile began to set in and we were forced to find a place to park it and look for other means of travel. Last-minute air fares with only high priced first class seats available made that a problem, especially when we were going to have to find him some wheels to drive back to Texas.
    The answer came in the form of a old fashioned long bus trip from Austin to Dallas to Kansas City to Minneapolis. 27 hours worth of care-free travel. That was the economical solution. A true character building experience, indeed. He could have taken the bus directly to Granite with a transfer at Sioux Falls but instead headed to the Twin Cities to see those friends first and then got back to his hometown with his brother Seth.
  That bus trip didn’t sound too fun but he said it got better north of Kansas City on the Jefferson Lines bus when it felt a bit more like the good old Midwest. Still, a bus trip that far is a tough grind. Sleeping on the bus is a bit spotty at best so arriving refreshed is as likely as arriving refreshed while driving straight through non-stop by yourself.
    We were glad when he finally got back home for the wedding. We rounded up a car for him to drive back south – one that had fully functioning air conditioning, which, in the daily 100 degree humid weather in central Texas, is essential. His trip back to Texas was  not nearly as adventuresome nor as interesting as his trip here. I think he’ll remember that bus trip for a while.

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   Friends of Cory converged on the Granite Run Golf Course last Saturday for a day of golf and fun and all for a very good cause.
     The memory of Cory Hegna has been well served with the committee’s tireless efforts. The crowd was large and the donations flowed for the silent auction as well as the live auction. Don Fitzner rattled off the generously donated items and every sale raised more money for college scholarships for deserving area students. The Friends of Cory has raised enough money to help a good number of deserving area students. What a nice way to keep alive the memory of a good young man.
     Good for all of the folks who work so hard to make this fun event a part of life in this community. It makes us all a little better.

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     Minnesota Appeals Court Judge Dave Minge and his wife Karen stopped by last Friday. They were on their way back to St. Paul after driving out for the swearing in ceremony for new Yellow Medicine County District Court Judge Dwayne Knutsen.
    Karen was on the hunt for a brochure about the upcoming Meander which takes place on October 1, 2 and 3. We handed her one from the newspaper office and that led to some conversation about tourism and trails and what all was happening with the effort to attract folks to the beautiful Minnesota River Valley. Dave was an organizer of CURE and sponsored the CREP program for the Minnesota River.
    He has some roots here. He was born in Clarkfield, practiced law in Monte for several years and his dad was a doctor in Granite for a few years. Dave was appointed to the Appeals Court by Gov. Jesse Ventura in 2002. Before that he represented our area in Congress for four terms. While I’m glad that he is on the Appeals Court I always thought we could stand about 300 more representatives in Congress like Dave Minge. That may be more true now than ever. It was a lot of fun to visit and catch up a bit.