64 Comments

I was honestly mulling over why rhubarb/strawberry pie was such a thing to my grandparents…you clarified it, because there’s no one to ask. I like this piece. ☺️

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Thank you. So beautiful and honest and lovely. The spaces between your words about your family then and now stirred my soul. Even though it is challenging, gratitude for the journey. The best is yet to be.

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Here in Wellington, New Zealand, my mother and sisters and I adore rhubarb. We often cook it, with sugar, and eat it, just like that, for dessert, or for breakfast with muesli. Delish.

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That old Prairie Home Companion lump in my throat is back. I did not live in Lake Woebegone--and leave for the bright lights, big city... On the other hand, maybe I did.

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We have always made rhubarb pie without a top crust- God willing we have enough rhubarb in our patch by the attached garage each May 4th so we can have one for my birthday- but in late springs we have to have cherry- I love cherry pie- but my birthday is rhubarb pie to me.

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Cheerfulness arrived in my letterbox yesterday. Would that it could do so every day of the week. Despite the hefty postage, (I live on the other side of the Atlantic) and customs charges, it is worth every cent. I shall continue to delve into its pearls of wisdom and be grateful for the privilege of getting to the age of eighty, too, to enjoy the sheer pleasure of it all. Thank you.

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Have you tried Rhubarb and apple, Garrison?

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I'm curious about which part of Manhattan gets this old Minnesotan. As a native of Michigan farmland, I adamantly recommend The Village or SoHo. Even more specifically, a co-op at 2 Charlton St., opposite end of the block from WNYC studio.

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I always wondered where you got your material for your Lake Wobegon stories; the people who had no trouble getting a slice of rhubarb pie with their coffee and conversation at The Chatterbox, pancake breakfasts, people who worked hard and braved everything from too much snow but didn’t complain, to a ridiculous abundance of tomatoes. I didn’t know your history. I just listened faithfully to your radio program and read your books. I had no trouble believing you were reminiscing about your life. Now you’ve ruined everything, because I believed all of it as gospel truth. And some of it was in fact. But you intertwined truth and fiction with your stellar mind, and what was what and who was whom doesn’t matter, really. It’s all good.

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Currently staying in Brooklyn, visiting from rural northern AZ. Everyone seems pretty mellow. Lots of police and EMS around for protection. Not sure why Republicans criticize NYC as crime filled.

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Strawberries are wonderful but they don't cook up sweet. Rhubarb is wonderful too but it does require a ton of sugar. Worth it!

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Jun 2, 2023·edited Jun 2, 2023

It's a fine piece here, today, GK. An old, down-home recollection that salves the soul and the body too, when the rhubarb pie is mentioned. What I like about your recalls is that, like our own, we all have good, bad and ugly events in life. But we can acknowledge them, and many of us pray for all in need. One day will come soon enough, since time flies, and we will find ourselves being clucked and chucked by those who have known us, and who say a prayer for our final days. As for your Minnesota home being sold, there's always the St. Paul Hotel and the Bar and Grill on demand. There's a skyway to walk in the winter that interlaces downtown in a way that F. Scott Fitzgerald never saw. You've still got the tales of then and now, and a way of telling them in a sonorous way. Bless you and keep passing it on, just like our Aunt Bridget did.

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I am 83 and remember our family having an outhouse, my mother cooking on a wood stove, and taking a bath in a big metal tub in a corner of the kitchen. And I certainly wish I had talked more often to my parents and many aunts and uncles — “there’s nobody to ask anymore.” Thank you for the lovely writing. I am glad you visited the cemetery on Memorial Day.

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“I spent time in homes with outhouses where cooking was done on a woodstove and you took a bath in a tin tub of hot water on the kitchen floor. A glimpse of the 19th century.”

Me too, on Prince Edward Island where my parents took me every summer. Driving, in a Crosley, all the way up from CT on roads, once past Bangor, that turned to dirt between cities. We stayed with farmers they had met on the P.E.I. ferry boat in ‘49. And I took a liking to working right beside them from early morning milking until after the evening (manual) milking of the cows. No phone, no electricity, and the water came from the pump room just off the kitchen. Baths were held in in a galvanized tub in front of the cast iron wood stove on which the water was heated. Oh, yes, the outhouse was still there, but our friends had something very stylish. An upstairs gravity driven toilet fed by the water you brought up in a milk bucket. I was, as a child, terrified of falling into the cesspool out back of the house that was covered only by flimsy plywood, and, you know, dying a horrible death that would still be told to the family. The impact of this experience has influenced my life in a way that’s hard to describe other than to say that it’s genuineness installed something special in me.

I was born in NYC and spent some formative years there. Periodically I return from my home right next to New Orleans for a dose of the flip side of P.E.I. Something I find equally attractive.

I’ll be in NYC in August. Wanna have lunch?

Middleton O’Malley

Host of Jazz From Mid-City

Mondays 2-5:PM Central

whivfm.org/listen

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Jun 2, 2023·edited Jun 2, 2023

New York.... You can have it. In fact, you can have any and every big city. Back when I lived in New Jersey, I would proclaimed the following: "I go into New York City at least once a year to remind myself why I don't go to New York City". I don't need hustle and bustle, I don't need high-end stores that I can't even afford to window shop in, I don't need the grime, the congestion and the smells. Ah yes, the smells. The ones that emanate from every nook and cranny whose stench varies from burnt street pretzels to urine. So lovely.

The only time I would go into NYC is if I was attending the International Motorcycle Show at the Javits Center. I would take the train in from Jersey and then walk from GSS to the Javits. I will say I did get quite a few chuckles along the way, mostly from the ridiculousness of it all. And not for anything, but the burnt street pretzels are pretty darn good. Of course, one cannot pass up a dirty water dog either. One with mustard, ketchup, relish and then wash it all down with a $15 bottle of coke.

Okay, you can have it all except for the pretzels and DWD's.

PS - The title of the blog had me thinking it was something about Germany, my father's place of birth. So naturally, with great enthusiasm I dove in only to be..... not disappointed..... but.... mildly unenthused?

PSS - Don't sell your place in Minneapolis. We always need that string that leads us home. Rent it out as a AirBnB or VRBO. That way you'll have some cash coming in and you'll still have someplace to go. It's always good to go home.

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I recall Rhubarb being "sweetened" with strawberries, but I think it was more the half pound of sugar that went into the batch....and now you have to deal with realtors and the real estate cartel. Stock up on pie, you'll need it. Which reminds me...."Save Your Fork, There's Pie!".

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