2025 - Worst. Year. Ever. I will get the terrible out of the way. Karen has had multiple hospitalizations for congestive heart failure and she is very weak. She broke her foot. My knee hurts. My cousin Mary Lou died. A postal truck ran a stop sign in front of Matthew as he was driving home at 59 mph. Our tomato crop was measly. The speed on my turntable has turned wobbly. My friend and former partner in civil rights work, Melissa Hortman, and her husband Mark, were assassinated. Tree experts had to cut down a lot of trees on our street. The traitorous, obscene, anti-constitutional, thieving cowards who run the federal government (all three branches at the moment) and everything they have tried to do.
On the other hand Karen remains positive and determined. Medical care is now more comprehensive and we’re getting some at home. Volunteers with Rebuild Together Minnesota built us a lovely ramp; ours was the Honeywell volunteers’ 89th ramp. My knee pain doesn’t stop my cycling. Matthew is recovering even though his Mach E hardly needs the crusher at the junk yard. Tomatoes from farmers markets are pretty good. Sometimes I don’t hear the wobble and I have other music sources. We still have trees and new ones have been planted and the Tree Trust nonprofit did some good arborist work for us.
Karen and I spent most of Minnesota’s 2025’s mid-winter in New Zealand and enjoyed that lovely country, our family and their summer time.
Sara, Don, Lily and Lachlann visited us briefly this summer and they gave the kids a Minnesota treat - a week at a northern Minnesota lake. Our first grandson, Lachlann (6 years old), said at the remembrance program for our brother-in-law, Tom Novak,: “I wish Tom was here to hear them say those things.” Me too. Say it when people are alive.
Best of all, Oliver Brian Wilkinson was born in Duluth in June. He is a happy, robust boy, well-loved by all and cared for by Matthew while Courtney and the girls are at North Shore Community School. They have developed some really great relationships with people at that school.
I saw this in action when I happened to be up there at the time of the car crash. They really pulled together. I was so proud of the family as the girls heard about the crash as Matthew called while crawling from the wreck and Courtney relayed the news to me. We all understood their Daddy was hurt and we didn’t know how badly or what was happening. When I asked them to help with Ollie and everyone by just calming as much as they could, they did just that. We settled back to read more about Sacagawea while Courtney called one of those friends to come over to help. Their composure in these circumstances was amazing and so helpful as we figured out what we had to do. Grateful credit to Courtney and Matthew for developing their girls’ feeling of security which must be a big part of the explanation for how they reacted to this trauma.
It was disturbing to read the Star Tribune Pro Publica story of a Duluth church’s cover up of child abuse, written by Sara’s long-ago school mate, Jessica Lussenhop. Many of the children from this misogynist cult attend that same school that does so much for our family. Proud to read Jessica’s work and also that of Joe Peters (Matt’s classmate) in Sahan Journal.
I gave up my license to practice law this fall because I didn’t keep up my continuing education credits and because I didn’t want to create more record keeping obligations. So I volunteer with Neighborhood Network for Seniors which, using many volunteers and a visiting nurse, is about Empowering St. Paul Seniors to Stay Active, Healthy and Living At Home .
I skipped being an election judge at the recent November election. I think the Roseville precinct where I have headed the team for some years was somehow able to scrape by without me. Did I tell you about the time the clown appeared asking to be paid in the middle of Election Day? Or when the electricity failed 7 minutes before the polls were, by law, obliged to open?
I continue to write. What a pleasure it can be! Much to at least one person’s dismay, the Star Tribune published my letter to the editor suggesting that people opposed to closing of homeless encampments should invite unhoused people to pitch tents in their backyards. I think of the very personal disasters that might have occurred had such a “choice” been available to my very ill and very incompetent brother.
I wrote an appreciation of a dance performance at The Northrup sponsored by our friend, Emily Maltz: Shamel Pitts, TRIBE, Touch of RED. Pitts, the choreographer and dancer, read it and wrote: “Reading the appreciation/kinda review brought many tears to my eyes, still rolling down my face as I write this.” Wow!
I wrote another one after hearing Milo Fine (piano) and Anthony Cox (bass) improvise for ninety minutes at Fine’s studio. I wrote: “I can just about guarantee that you will hate it if you wander into listening without careful attention.” Fine insisted it was 100% improvised on the spot and Cox said they’ve been practicing improvisation since 1978. Exactly! Fine was very complimentary of my appreciation. He’s that kind of guy. Proudly uncompromised and “unsuccessful” within his narrow niche of free jazz and improvised music. Do read about Fine’s Bosendorpher piano, nine and a half feet in length with nine notes/keys lower than a standard 88 key concert grand and the Fine and Cox music on my blog.
And most recently I extolled the finest sounding music I’ve heard in my listening room, Bill Evans, The Complete The Village Vanguard Recordings, 1961. (Riverside/Concord reissue.) “Each instrument sounds in organic authenticity and Evans, Motian and LaFaro play with and against each other with power and delicacy.” These and other writings (almost all short) are on my blog: https://jaywwrote.blogspot.com. I would really like to see any response you have if you give them a read, so leave a comment please.
Still working on my piece on Legal Aid and my career. And on my novel touching on jazz, crime, race, gender, politics, law, love and history. Thelonious Monk, Joseph Kennedy, Bill Evans, Roy Cohn, Baroness Koenigswarter, and Harry Belafonte all play roles in that one.
My pretty regular writing group helps me keep going and they have become valued friends. I took a couple of classes at The Loft this fall and learned a lot.
I sold the 1999 Accord that I bought from our friend Betty for $2300 about 15 years ago, for $2900 last month. Upped our charitable contributions and reduced our insurance premiums slightly. Under 80,000 miles still. So now I have room in the garage for more bikes! Just kidding Karen! (A few of you may already know the cyclist’s answer to the question “How many bikes do you need?” “Plus one.”)
A few words on politics, here aimed at allies and friends. I stay informed, communicate with representatives and neighbors on some matters of public concern, go to demonstrations, work elections, endorse some candidates. I hope you will do so. And donate to causes, especially to resist the push into, what is it, despotic, oligarchic-totalitarianism?
I am dismayed when people whose policies I often favor seem intent on creating a deep and narrow self-reflective and exclusive cadre, when we need to pull in as many people as possible to oppose what is happening. It's like they are fighting to be the victorious leaders of a faction of the 1000 remaining Trotskyites in the U.S.. So what if you drive all the middle away and win over the remainder of an ever smaller field? And then also fail at basic governance? If MAGA succeeds because your potential allies are alienated and you cannot do the basics, what have you won? We should be willing to debate and democratically decide all the issues out there, short of what used to be constitutional principles. Immigration. Taxes. Role in international disputes. Debate it all. I know, we gotta get big money out of politics. But if we only accept what is agreed amongst our closest allies, we will have too few allies.
Melissa Hortman understood this, her last vote in a 50/50 divided House was with the GOP for a compromise bill to keep the government functioning for all of us, even though it was horribly vindictive towards immigrants on heath care policy. She cried after doing this. Rolling Stone just published this heart-wrenching, personal and political piece : https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/melissa-hortman-minnesota-speaker-political-violence-1235486292.
My architect/artist friend Peter recalls the story that the King of Denmark asked all Danes to wear the yellow star of David when the Nazis took over. Peter is producing armbands saying “We’re All Immigrants” to proclaim resistance to our brown shirts. The story may be legend but it is true that Danes saved almost all their Jewish neighbors through illegal resistance, conspiracy and subterfuge.
As I wrote long ago in my essay “Refugees All” such tragedies are common for us all if we can look closely at family histories. I cycled 2711 miles in 2025 and get to the gym regularly during unrideable times.
Lower cycling distances and except for a few kilometers in Auckland and miles in Lakeville, all of the rides are 15-40 miles from and back to home. And usually on my own. Thinking maybe my short list of Centuries (100 miles in a day rides) is now complete. My total since 2008 is about 79,000 miles, I find that hard to believe and will have to check my math. I remember as a Scout going on a ten mile ride in Proctor and sensing a huge achievement. Heck, I remember that biking seven miles in 2003 was a challenge. Of course back then I did not have brightly colored form fitting Lycra. (Sorry for the image, folks.)
My “little” brother Jon retired and he and Deb came here for a visit this fall. They had a couple of days here and also up north with Matthew’s family. We also had a wonderful quick visit from our Belgian friend, Lieven, and his family this summer.
Which gets me back on my pulpit. Among the absolutely best things our family has done is to welcome people from other nations into our home. We’ve come to know brave, smart, dedicated, kind, insightful and interesting people from all parts of the globe. Only one troublesome experience, but even that was a good thing for our teenagers to witness. I wish everyone would have some international experience. AFS is tops for students and we had good experiences with Amity International. Sara and family host AFS students in NZ and their kids love their new sisters. I look forward to receiving an annual holiday card from the Furuya family in Tokyo who took me into their home while I studied at Waseda University in 1973-74. Must get mine into the mail to them today. Not that I do holiday cards….
We are lucky to have great friends and neighbors. Especially while travel has been hard for Karen, Julie and Deb often come over for lunch (Dick, Dave and I head out on our own.) Becky, Eleanor, Gail and now others from the neighborhood come over to socialize with and assist Karen. Her sister LuAnne and our long time friend and helper Bonnie help out too, mainly so I can go out for exercise, errands and get-aways.
Also it is very good to have merlins nesting in the neighborhood. I wish there were more of them and hawks as we have too many rabbits and bushy-tailed rats (squirrels). When I bike, there are a half dozen bald eagle nests that I monitor. And we see them overhead in the neighborhood, though the closest nest is maybe 3 miles away. Glorious! Coyotes and foxes are also among our welcome neighbors. Cannot say the same for possums, but there they are. Download the Merlin app from Cornell and ID birds around the world by recording them on your pocket computer.
Which reminds me of the set of 10 bright red 78 rpm records of bird calls from Cornell University that we had as children….. Mom’s or Dad’s?
Oh, nostalgia, now that’s a thing. Well, until next time.
Do visit, call, write, email, text, etc.
Jay and Karen
jewilkinsoniii@gmail.com
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