BLOWIN’ IN THE WIND (ONE MAN’S BLATHER REDUX)

APRIL 28, 2025 – Nothing takes your mind off other worries as completely as the weather can. Got work-related problems? Family problems? Upset with the wholesale unraveling of the United States of America? Go chase extreme weather—or let it come to you.

Here I am at the Red Cabin again, this time with my good friend, college roommate, and former campaign manager, Jeff O. (see my 4/6/25 post). Jeff flew out on Sunday to help me plant 300 white spruce and red pine seedlings in various clearings of the Björnholm Trädgård adjacent to the Red Cabin. The mission, however, has turned into a classic example of “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”

In the first place, delivery of the DNR seedlings scheduled for this morning has been delayed until Wednesday morning, possibly later in the day. I need to ferry Jeff back to the Twin Cities by Wednesday evening for a crack-of-dawn flight Thursday morning. In the scheme of things, however, this might well prove to be a minor setback, since the intended planting areas needed to be cleared of brush. We spent all day at this task. The actual planting can now be completed with much greater ease.

For several days forecasting models predicted severe weather over a large part of our region. I monitored these casually, somewhat skeptical that a weather bomb could affect such a widespread area. This morning I examined the reports a bit more closely. What caught my attention was the prospect of two-inch hailstones. We have no garage at the Red Cabin, so I thought to wander down the shore to the domains our neighbor John, who has multiple garages and machine sheds on this sprawling property. On our way to John’s main dwelling, however, Jeff and I noticed that all space in the sheds and garages was spoken for. Nevertheless, I wanted Jeff to meet John and John, Jeff, so on the way to John’s back door, I waved him out. As I’d anticipated, the two gentlemen (both being lawyers and cabin dwellers) would enjoy a good long conversation, but ahead of that, I took John’s measure of the weather forecast. He generally has his ear close to the ground when it comes to such things—the weather, I mean, but also the ground, for John is very much one with nature. He confirmed that extreme weather was headed our way, and that to protect his own vehicles from hail damage, he’d put them under cover. For me this meant “no room at the inn.”

I had but two options: risk hail damage to my car or park it in the garage at our family’s old cabin at the far end of Björnholm. “We’ll have to clear the garage of lots of stuff,” I told Jeff. He was willing and able to pitch in. The ensuing operation of driving around to the east end of Björnholm, rearranging a garden tractor trailer, wheelbarrows, yard and garden implements, and a mishmash of other objects in the garage, then backing my car into the tight remaining space, would consume the better part of an hour.

By this time, however, the weather had settled into a steady state: overcast skies coupled with a steady breeze out of the southeast at about 15 miles an hour. It was a perfect set up for identifying desirable planting areas in the tree garden, then trimming all brush within those parts. The operation took us the rest of the day up to the early evening, plus the time searching for (and finding) wood ticks on our layered clothing.

As we were preparing supper, we noticed an increase in wind power. White caps formed on the lake and rolled onto shore as if they were in full imitation of the great Gitche Gumee, which lies north only 65 miles as the gull flies. Not in a very long time had I noticed white caps of this magnitude on Grindstone.

Once we’d sat down to eat, I checked the forecast and weather radar again. A tornado watch was in effect for several more hours, and the radar showed a large cell clipping the east end of Grindstone. I grew slightly anxious. We would likely get smacked by severe winds, possible hail, heavy rains, if not an actual twister. I didn’t bother to check the news headlines, which I’d left undisturbed all day long.

Halfway through the chicken-with-couscous-and-broccoli-with-salad-on-the-side, the wind’s fury grew. We heard a crash and moments later saw the top third of a dead maple lying off to the side of the front yard. For several years I’d wanted to take down the tree, but I didn’t trust the accuracy of my geometry to ensure that the top of the tree wouldn’t strike the upper story of the cabin and smash windows. Now I didn’t have to worry: the top 12 feet of the tree had fallen off over our two overturned canoes.

What I did have to worry about was the increase in wind velocity. Now it was wreaking havoc with everything on the porch that wasn’t nailed down, including the furniture. Candle pots rolling down the length of the porch floor, knocking into things on the way, sounded like bowling balls gone rogue. I opened the cabin door to the porch, and Jeff followed right behind me as I stepped into the howling gale. The last time I’d heard such commotion was on the promenade deck of a cruise ship pitching in the froth of the North Sea. I grabbed my hat before it could sail off my head and into the screen at the north end of the porch.

I now worried about the dock—or more precisely, the two-thirds that had survived the ice floe from two weeks ago. How could what remained of the dock withstand the onslaught of this furious blow? I was not about to go outside to look.

We repaired to the dining room table to resume our meal—and to monitor the radar map on my laptop screen. The lake surface, meanwhile, was now as surly as I’d ever seen it. The trees along the shore in front of the Red Cabin bent and swayed like willows. Dead twigs whipped through the air and struck the side of the cabin. How long before flying debris would shatter a window—or two?

“Where would we go to shelter?” Jeff asked calmly. “Under the [log] staircase, probably?” Over dinner he had told me stories of harrowing weather encounters he’d had back in his days of camping and exploring in the wooly mountains of New England.

By the time we were chasing around our plates the last morsels of a satisfying meal, the skies to the west began to brighten. Eventually the light spread farther south, then opened up and bathed the southeast lakeshore in the last rays of the sun in repose. This signaled that the system was moving off the northeast. A few minutes later the wind lowered its voice. After another 10 minutes the whitecaps disappeared from the lake. It was now safe to go outside.

The sun sank away, whereupon I told Jeff that before nightfall, I wanted to take a quick look at the dock to see if it had survived the horrendous windstorm. I exited the cabin and walked to the opening in the berm straight ahead of the Red Cabin. From that place on the shore I’d be able to view the dock at the landing 150 away. Or so I thought.

I walked down the path in the direction of the landing, but through the trees I couldn’t see the dock. Soon I was on the curve that opens to an unobstructed view of the shore just below the berm. There in the water, resting on the wet stones where lake meets land, I saw sections of the dock bobbing like flotsam.

I chased back to the cabin to put on more suitable footgear (rubber boots) and clothing. Jeff was in the middle of washing up the supper dishes. “Do you need help?” he asked.

“No, I’ve got it,” I said. But I didn’t.

Back on the shoreline path, I slid my way down the berm to the stones below and moved toward the floating dock sections. I pulled the largest, heaviest section up out of the water and attempted to push it up the side of the berm. Initially, it stayed put but looked insecure. I tried to shove it higher, but this proved that it wasn’t tight with the ground. It slid straight back down to the rocks. I tried pushing it up again, though now I couldn’t get it stick at all. It wanted only to slide back down at me. Yet again, I grabbed it and wrangled it up the steep berm. I tried to give it an extra heave, but this proved to be a dangerous mistake. Having a will of its own, the section slid into my chest, bending me nearly into a backward fall onto the rocks. In that moment, I thought, How did you manage to get yourself into this precarious position so fast . . . for the second time in two weeks?

And how long would I have been lying on the wet rocks before Jeff would’ve checked on my status?

I picked up other parts of the dock that were all along the shore and chucked them up over the berm. A minute later Jeff appeared—to my overwhelming relief. I handed him some of the heavier elements, then tackled the sections of decking. By nightfall all parts of the dock were accounted for, and I was out of the water. The mighty wind—loud, strong, boisterous—was no longer roaring in our ears and blowing trees this way and that. This invisible force had moved on. Tomorrow we will learn if it toppled any trees across the drives and roads between here and the garage at the old cabin.

With Jeff’s help, I’ll restore the dock to its proud state as of exactly two weeks ago before the ice floe. We can then turn our attention back to the bigger mission: expanding the woods of Björnholm.

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© 2025 by Eric Nilsson