Nose for News by Sarah Stultz

 

Being that the newspaper business is a 24/7 industry, it always feels a little weird when I go off the grid, so to speak, to take a vacation.

Sometimes I keep up a little with what’s going on in the community, the state and the country while I’m on vacation; other times, I completely check out and wait to get up to speed on what I’ve missed when I come back.

This week I’m taking a staycation while my parents, who live in the state of Virginia, have traveled here to Albert Lea to visit.

In between working on a few home projects that have already been delayed for too long, we hope to finally get my garden planted this week and take part in a few day trips and activities that make Minnesota a great place to live — as long as the weather holds out.

It’s nice to be able to sleep in a little and be able to move at a slower pace than the typical hustle and bustle of our normal day-to-day lives.

My parents live in a much larger city than Albert Lea, but they have always been impressed with our community.

Though it does not have all of the shopping or restaurant opportunities that they have where they live, they’ve commented before about the beauty of the lakes and, more importantly, the kindness of the people who live here. It’s also nice that Albert Lea is about an hour or so away from larger communities on all sides if you want to do something that isn’t available here.

On Sunday, we went on a drive throughout the community and around Fountain Lake. It was a busy day out on the lake, and my mom commented on how many people were out fishing, boating and swimming. It was fun to see all the excitement. “Was the water warm yet?” my father asked.

On Monday as I write this, it has been raining most of the day, which is delaying some of our plans —  including getting together for a cookout with my husband’s family — but hopefully we can move those plans to another day.

It seems like Mother Nature got confused on what month it is, and the showers that typically come in April are now coming in May. The weather forecast has some chance of rain all week.

For anyone following what is happening with my garden situation, I think the final verdict is I’ll have to stick to a community garden plot, and we’re going to put grass seed back where we attempted the garden last year. If we ever decide again to have a garden here at the house, it’s going to have to be in a raised bed.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day and remembered the reason for the holiday. We so often take for granted all of the freedoms and opportunities we have in the United States, which are in large part thanks to our veterans and those soldiers who paid the ultimate price to protect our country.

Thank you.

Sarah Stultz is the managing editor of the Tribune. Her column appears every Tuesday.