I’ve been recapping my 2020 accomplishments, including a new book and a sculpture in our art park. But today I want to talk about an accomplishment that’s less of an accomplishment and more of something that happened this year. But it’s still big, so it seems worth including.
We got a new dog. Her name is Kat, short for Katarina. (Yes, we are the best at naming things.)
She’s a three-legged rescue dog, originally from Texas, and came to us by way of Wisconsin. She’s maybe two years old (we’re not sure), she’s most likely a pit bull, and she’s great.
We got her on Mother’s Day, which is fitting because Abby is the dog person, and Kat came to us shortly after we lost Nick and a few months before we lost Mazie (yeah, 2020 sucks).
With 2020 nearly behind us (yay!), I’m looking back on some positive accomplishments during this pandemic year. Last time I looked at my book Better Politics, Please. This time I wanted to look at the “Community Cairn” public art project in West St. Paul.
Since 2020 has been such a dumpster fire, I thought it might help to recap a few accomplishments. One of the big ones is my latest book: Better Politics, Please.
The Idea
I came up with this idea before the pandemic struck, but really fleshing it out and making it happen was a total pandemic project. I needed that. I needed something to focus on in the midst of all the chaos.
A project I worked on for 15 years came to an end at the close of 2019. I went into 2020 not knowing what was next (whoa, boy howdy!). Better Politics, Please was a fun way to try something different. It gave me a lot of hope, despite a real lack of hope in the rest of the world.
I’m grateful for all the help that made this project a reality. I couldn’t have done it without the many people who supported it.
I haven’t given a coronavirus update in a while, mainly because it’s frustrating and foolish and hard to write about. But I think it’s important to document.
I last left off in the middle of summer. Late summer continued in relative safety, as many things opened up again and restrictions relaxed as we headed into school. Many of us were cautiously optimistic. While normal summer things like vacation and the state fair were cancelled, being able to get outside and eat in restaurants felt like a return to normal.
