Uncle Joe

I have an uncle who lives in rural Minnesota. He lives on land that has been in the family for well over a century. As a matter of fact, I have *lots* of relatives in rural Minnesota. I think I'm related to just about everybody in that part of the state. It's kind of weird when walking into a store to buy milk and complete strangers (who are really relatives) know your life story and they recite it to you, asking eagerly, "So, when are you going to come home to stay? Have you had enough of California yet?"

I'm getting off track... This is supposed to be about Uncle Joe.

This land my Uncle lives on is a little slice of heaven on earth. As a child I used to wander the woods, fish and swim in the nearby lake in the summertime, tobaggon down the hill in the wintertime, find Native American arrowheads and painted pottery in the fields, and I would also find remnants from a log cabin medicine shack from the 1860's hidden in the woods along with small medicine glass bottles of all shapes and sizes still intact. It was like going on a treasure hunt. Of course, I'm blocking the helicopter-sized mosquitoes that sucked more blood than Dracula out of my memory, but there has to be some reminder that we're still on earth.

Uncle Joe's house is a small-ish cabin that reminds me so much of something Laura Ingalls would have lived in, but it does have plumbing. It does have electricity. However, it is heated with an old-fashioned wood stove. The kitchen counter tops are nothing more than plywood.
Cable TV? Not on your life. Internet connection? Forget it. Uncle Joe does have a telephone, but no answering machine. Want to use your cell phone at Uncle Joe's? I don't think so.

What's happening is that now people from the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and St. Paul) have discovered the area where Uncle Joe lives and they're snapping up the surrounding land. The men in fancy suits come to visit Uncle Joe regularly to make generous offers on the land for development. They want to build McMansions and create a resort-type facility on Uncle Joe's land.

Uncle Joe holds the key to this area's future development -- or not. He's the most influential person around, but you would never know it. He is humble and gracious. He is generous and curteous. He's the multi-millionaire who lives like a pauper. I love him and respect him because he won't be sold.

One day I heard him say to my father that he doesn't feel he should have to sell off the land to get lots of money. He said he would just be living the way he is now. God Bless him.