The Northview
By Brenda Winter, columnistFebruary 21, 2023Many of you may recall elderly goofball sisters of the stage Marlene and Darlene from Leota, Minnesota. Over the years, the pair have attempted to save the Luverne Senior Citizens Center (now Generations) from certain demise. Always the pessimist, Marlene believes the end of the senior center is at hand and it’s her job to keep the doors open. Darlene thinks there are simply not enough single men…
By Brenda Winter, columnistJanuary 10, 2023The frost on the trees bordering the cemetery Monday morning was spectacular. Blazing white branches sparkling against a brilliantly blue winter sky created a stunning scene worthy of the cemetery’s name, “Pleasant View.” My sister and I drove past the cemetery on our way to spend some time with Dad at the farm. We’ve driven by this cemetery thousands of times. With Mom at the wheel of a ’66…
By Brenda Winter, columnistNovember 29, 2022First Snow has arrived replacing the garden’s fading colors of fall with a twinkling coat of brilliance. It covers the brown, lost remnants of summer with a blanket of hope. First Snow gives mortals a hint of the new creation described by John in the book of Revelation. “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, … And I heard a loud voice…
By Brenda Winter, columnistSeptember 27, 2022Rock County voters have a difficult decision to make on Election Day, Nov. 8, 2022. Two really nice guys are running to represent Minnesota District 21A. The Republican incumbent Joe Schomacker and the Democratic-Farmer Labor challenger Pat Baustian are both really nice guys. Both live in Luverne. Both are graduates of Luverne High School. Joe has held the office of state representative since…
By Brenda Winter, columnistSeptember 06, 2022Last week I saw a young woman with a flat, tan tummy wearing a cropped top. As I observed her exposed tummy, I reflected on why my tummy is not exposed. A long time ago my stomach, too, was flat and tan, but in 1988 the last weeks of pregnancy sent stretch marks like lightning bolts across that fruited plain. It was ’99 or maybe 2000 when I had my first abdominal surgery. The scar runs eight…
By Brenda Winter, columnistJune 28, 2022As you know, when I write these columns, I usually take a humorous look at an everyday situation. I start with the premise, “The column must be about something funny.” Sometimes, what’s funny is that I wait until the very last minute to write my column and turn it in to the dear editor at Tollefson Publishing. She has an obsessive focus on something she calls “deadlines.” After waiting too long…
By Brenda Winter, columnistMay 17, 2022My mom is quiet, reserved and a bit on the shy side. Lots of folks like crowds and gatherings and spectacles. Mom doesn’t. Which is why it was a bit of a challenge to throw her a proper 80th birthday party. Her idea of a good time is reading a book in her sunroom or maybe mowing the lawn. So, we decided to have several smaller gatherings. The first was a breakfast tea party at my sister Sarah’s…
By Brenda Winter, columnistApril 26, 2022Dingbat sisters Marlene and Darlene from Leota, Minnesota, are creations of my imagination. DJ Luethje and I will bring the sisters to life on stage Thursday, April 28, for a dessert auction fundraiser for Generations in Luverne. We will play the roles of two hapless, elderly sisters trying their best to recover from the Covid lockdown. The funny thing about older sister Marlene is that much of…
By Brenda Winter, columnistApril 05, 2022Both of my grandmas had fat arms. As youngsters growing up in St. John Lutheran Church in Luverne, my siblings and I would occasionally sit with either set of grandparents during the church service instead of with our parents. When the morning grew exceptionally long, our grandmothers’ large, pillowy arms served as lovely headrests. I recalled those moments as my six-year-old granddaughter,…
By Brenda Winter, columnistFebruary 22, 2022You may remember actresses and sisters Marlene and Darlene from Leota, Minnesota. (They drive to Luverne in their Toyota.) DJ Luethje and I created the elderly characters who performed a show, “Marlene and Darlene Present the Nutcracker,” at Luverne’s Palace Theatre in December of 2018. It was a fundraiser for the construction of a new senior citizens building. The show raised $15,000 in spite of…
By Brenda Winter, columnistJanuary 11, 2022I’m not a fashion diva, and never has that been made more clear than last week when I – like many in Rock County – slogged through the first week of 2022 with a case of the flu. I felt fine Sunday morning, but I opted not to attend church because my husband had been feeling poorly for a few days. Our community’s new-found sense of health caution made me decide against sharing the germs from our…
By Brenda Winter, columnistDecember 14, 2021My dear husband has spent the past 35 years listening to me ask, “What is that smell?!” But then, in late November, I got Covid 19 and lost my sense of smell. Along with the rest of the state of Minnesota, I came down with Covid 19 last month and, like 80 percent of Covid sufferers, my case was mild. I used (prescribed) ivermectin (for humans) and was symptom-free in three days. The weird part…
By Brenda Winter, columnistNovember 23, 2021It was with great delight and joy that we welcomed our long-lost daughter, Kate, home from Vietnam a few weeks ago. I was more than thrilled to have her return home from a two-year Covid exile in a foreign country. But also, because Kate had used her lockdown to become a fitness buff, I was thrilled to now have access to my very own personal trainer. I hired her on the spot. I gave Kate a brief…
By Brenda Winter, columnistNovember 02, 2021For more than a year, Luverne Minnesota Veterans Home staff kept the killer of the elderly, COVID-19, at bay. For more than a year they wore masks and shields. They got vaccinated and washed their hands. And then it came anyway. On Tuesday morning, Nov. 2, the Minnesota Veterans Home COVID-19 information line reported (47 on Sunday)_____ cases among staff and residents. As you and I have noted…
By Brenda Winter, columnistSeptember 20, 2021Our homeschool, 1994-2012, was not without its shortcomings. We had a school shooting the day a rabid raccoon climbed a tree outside our son’s bedroom during math class. Blam. We had a stabbing the day one student became so blazing furious with her brother that she plunged the tip of her pencil into his arm. Strife among the staff (Mom), the administration (Dad), and the student body (the…- By Brenda Winter, columnistJune 29, 2021For the past four years, teams of Christian kids from the Luverne area have served on a weeklong, in-town mission trip doing the things locally that youth groups often travel hundreds of miles to do in other places. Under the supervision of two or three adults, the teens paint houses, replace siding, build ramps, landscape, pull weeds, move furniture … and even change light bulbs. Yes, change…
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