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Love, in-love or both

Just about everyone | know has told me that love was the reason they married their spouse. Whether you are married or divorced, love was in there somewhere. Since love is the most often stated reason for marriage, it would be good to know what that is. What follows is what psychologists generally have said that love is all about. One way that you might characterize the stages in a relationship is in three steps. First comes the Romantic stage. In this stage, we put our best foot forward and do everything we can to ensure that the other person wants to keep seeing us. The second ...

Walking on eggshells

Dear Annie: I am 60 years old and the mother of five grown children. I raised them mostly on my own after my divorce, and those years were not easy. There were slammed doors, late nights waiting up and more than a few tearful arguments. My daughters, especially during their teenage years, could be painfully cruel with their words. But somehow, we all made it through. These days, I am close to one of my daughters in particular. She calls often, leans on me for advice and turns to me whenever life throws her a curveball. I am always there with a listening ear, a home-cooked meal or a ...

Going antiquing

My wife and I recently took a business trip to St. Cloud. She suggested that we leave early so that we could go antiquing. I learned long ago that “antiquing” is a code word for “shopping.” I used to think that “antiquing” meant making something new appear to be old. This is the opposite of what I’ve always been trying to accomplish. I’ve forever been striving to make my worn old farm equipment, cars, and face look like they are nearly new. But there’s only so much that can be done to conceal rust and wrinkles. As we motored along, we encountered a mercantile outlet ...

NU Film Society to screen ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’

NEW ULM — The New Ulm Film Society will taken a closer looks at the works of director Steven Spielberg with a screening of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” The screening will begin 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov 4 at the New Ulm Public Library. This is the first film in the film society’s Spielberg series. “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” was released in 1977 and was Spielberg’s follow-up to “Jaws,” which had set the all-time box office record in 1975. After the success of “Jaws,” Spielberg was in a position to make any type of movie he wanted. He chose to make ...

I need my polka fix

I spend an ungodly amount of time in a tractor cab during the fall. Outside of sleeping, eating at odd intervals, and doing maintenance, my life is lived in a cab. The tractor radio is my steady companion. Every spring and fall, I spend a lot more time listening to the radio than Pam. The rest of the year, I listen to my wife because that’s what a successful husband does. I listen to a lot of news. (Spoiler alert, it’s bad.) Weather reports are must-listen radio when everything you do depends on weather. I follow the markets. Following the markets means following the mind of ...

Still striving for peace and freedom

I noticed this week that Marshall’s Adult Community Center sponsored a presentation about the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. It involved a tense two weeks when the world came close to nuclear war. The missile crisis was a major event in a much longer situation known as the Cold War, which lasted for more than 40 years. It began in the late 1940s, when the Soviet Union had developed the atomic bomb and when it prevented Eastern Europeans from moving to the West. It was still in full swing when I was a child in the 1970s. I remember being part of civil defense drills at Holy ...