Fresh Eye 5/5/98

The Wild Women of Minnesota

  It wasn’t about children. It wasn’t about your job or your husband, or the life you live everyday. In fact, hardly any of that was really even mentioned. The only thing I knew about it was to bring food to share, bedding in case the beds ran out, and anything else to make the weekend fun. Aside from that, leave your worries, egos, image and men at the door.

  Every once in awhile there comes an opportunity to learn volumes about a place and it’s people, to catch a glimpse, and become a part of the spirit that connects them. I had been invited to a “Wild Woman’s Weekend”, and had not a clue what to expect. But I figured... what the heck? Where else could I meet 20+ females my own age from Minnesota in close and intimate surroundings? So off we went to a hunting lodge near Mille Lacs Lake to relax and reinvigorate. (But don’t ask me where it is, because we got lost getting there and I haven’t the faintest idea where I was for two days). And believe me when I tell you, it was something!!! It was about real women!! And they were women like I have never known before.

  It was the girls from Big Falls, family and friends converging. They grew up in large families in small living spaces, and took the outdoors as their playground. These were women who grew up in and around the logging industry, women who were as comfortable using a gun or a fishing pole as a mop or a computer. A sister from one family had recently won a motorcycle and brought it along for some fun. We all took turns, in our shades, in the sparkling sun, posing for a picture, sittin’ on the back of that Harley. One sister found a cocoon on a morning hike, brought it back and explained to me how you could feel the “heartbeat” of the insect through the cocoon and sometimes even down through the branch. Too cool. These were women who knew that the big machine in the driveway at the lodge was a SPADE used for digging up and replanting trees, because they had USED one before. I was impressed.

  Then there were the metro sisters. One mother, of a 16 year old who hangs out with Jonny Lang, was still tingling from the excitement of grabbing an autograph on her “Don’t Lie to Me” CD from the 17 year old singer, IN the driveway of her HOME that day. That made it for some vicarious fantasy fulfillment. The younger sister, free, traveled and unattached, was keenly on a discovery of life beyond the Minnesota experience. We talked about the east, New York and New England and down the coast. She wants to see the ocean. And I wish I could be there when she does.

  A trucker, a programmer, a party consultant, a nurse, a graphics designer, a cashier. They were mothers and sisters and comrades of a generation. All so different, yet all the ultimate in what it is to be fantastically female, all the same, and done in a regional brush.

  We played volleyball, horseshoes, pool, played cards, hiked, rode four wheelers, sat by the fire. I watched women being there for each other, reaching out to help with the little things we often face in solitude... moving a chair in the way, holding the door, offering to carry part of the load. Two or three joining together to cook, followed by two or three others doing clean-up, an unspoken agreement in the world of women.

  And we ate FOOD (confession time) almost all day... strawberries, chips and salsa, Dove chocolates (the ones with the little messages inside the wrapper), red licorice, coffeecake, cornbread, chili, salads and, of course, hot dish. (Hey, I wouldn’t know I was in Minnesota if there wasn’t any hot dish.) And you know, everyone brings enough to feed EVERYONE!

  Yes, there was champagne, wine, beer, bloody marys, coffee, vodka, bourbon, tequila, coffee, and it seemed as though the poor blender never got a break. And the smoker’s even behaved themselves by smoking outside (no smoking lodge), although not without some healthy discussions about legislating morality, discrimination, and quitting.

  It was about celebration in music and dancing and dancing and more dancing... Tom Petty, The Mavericks, Bonnie Raitt, Jonny Lang, The Hoopsnakes (anybody remember them?), Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton. There were wild women rocking to Honky Tonk Woman and Wild Angel, and then swaying together through “We All Need Someone We Can Lean On”. And, yes, there was the Macarena, the Electric Slide, and even an insane moment or two of square dancing.

  There was laughter from deck to stove-side, and peace that washed over you in the gental breezes of the clearest starlit night. It was an experience of love and respect, and a reaffirmation of the value of all we are. We CELEBRATED women.... their energy, power, spirit and soul, rain, sun, wind and earth mothers all. It was a bond of freedom, truth and a whole lot of fun and it felt REALLY good.

  So what did I learn from the “wild women” of Minnesota ? Three things stand out.

1. Girls, the world over, DO just want to have fun.
2. Women are the HEART of this world
3. I really, really, REALLY hope I get invited back. :-)

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