Berg’s Gas Station, 1960
I grew up in a gas station, with living quarters. My Grandpa Berg built the station in 1931 to look like an Old-timey Wild West Saloon. In Minnesota. Daddy loved the false-front saloon look.
Berg’s Swiss Chalet
Mama hated the false-front saloon look, and resolved to slowly, ingeniously transform the station into a Swiss Chalet.
Mama won.
Me with backyard junkyard
Our back yard was a junkyard, and my own personal Treasure Island. We were poor, but in the trunks of those junk cars, I found treasures I didn’t even know I needed. My first set of dishes, a little Minolta camera, and even sticky coins, if I were brave enough to poke my hands down the cracks between busted up, spring-riddled seats. Even today I hesitate to buy anything brand new. I always think to myself, “I’m sure I can find this free somewhere.”
Daddy, his dad, Clifford, and playboy brother, Marvin
Instead of a family room, we had a greasy, black pit where Daddy worked on cars, listened to country music, and told stories to everyone in earshot.
Mama’s Library
Mama was the town librarian. On Sundays, when the library was closed, Mama gave me the key, and I slipped through the back door, where I read adventure books like Pippi in the South Seas, and Little House in the Big Woods, and looked up Horse and Dog Breeds in the encyclopedias.
At Grandma’s house pampered by a boarding nurse
I read and dreamed about adventure, but I come from a long line of scaredy cats. As a little girl, and even as a teen, I was afraid to sleepover anywhere except my grandma and grandpa’s house where I was pampered by Grandma and by the many nurses who rented the bedrooms.
Me and Katie in Germany
Against all the odds in my family of the fearful, since graduating from Spring Valley High School in 1977 and the University of Minnesota in 1980 and the University of Illinois in 1993, I married, had three daughters, taught college courses in computer applications and business etiquette, and moved more times than some people change their socks— twenty-some times across the country, and even to Germany. While most people keep their things in dressers, cabinets, and china hutches, I mostly leave my things in blue plastic storage tubs. With wheels.
After twenty years of marriage and moving, my husband told me he wanted a divorce—my daughters swore it wasn’t my cooking, but I had my doubts.
My truck and trailer
I’ve always believed that finding a home—a capital H Home—and having a good horse are what life’s all about. So after my divorce, for the next nine years, my daughters and I set out on a quest to find an honest-to-goodness, joy-filled, capital H Home. Crisscrossing the country in a rusty, old Ford F150 and pulling a 3-ton horse trailer filled our beloved critters, we settled, unsettled, and re-settled again and again around North Carolina, Minnesota, Texas, and Vermont.
Finding a good horse
All along the way we found a lot of good horses.
Galloping…er…walking across open fields
I hoped that having horses would entice my daughters to spend more time galloping across open fields and less time looking in the mirror. And I hoped that having horses would give them such confidence that when they did look in the mirror, they’d see what I saw—beautiful, kind, strong, young women with the willpower, intelligence, and just plain grit to do whatever in this world they wanted to do.
Megan holding baby Phoenix
By some convoluted and mostly seat-of-the-pants logic, I decided to simplify my entire parenting philosophy by saying yes to everything my daughters wanted as long as it wasn’t dangerous (drugs and alcohol) or unhealthy (too much TV). What actually happened was that our home and hearts became wide open to a furry, hoofed menagerie of all creatures great and small.
After nine years of searching, I didn’t find that perfect home, but I did find and marry a good, good man. And what I learned is that capital H Home is wherever my daughters and my man are. And I found Jesus simply everywhere. Every other important thing I needed to know, I learned, and still learn, from books.
Our capital H Home…for now!
Now, forty years and hundreds of mostly mis-adventures later, I’ve finally settled into a log cabin in Vermont, surrounded by piney woods, maple trees, rolling foothills, horse pastures, and a Taj Mahal-like chicken coop. Two of my daughters are “grown ups” now, as my youngest daughter, Celina, once described them. Sharing my woodsy home are Celina and my handsome, mustachioed hero and husband, Brett.
Oh, and four horses, two cats, two bunnies, twenty-one hens, and one dog. We’ve cut back. We used to have twenty-six hermit crabs.
From my youngest daughter I learned that even hermit crabs have personalities
Me and my blue tubs
I’m about half done sorting the contents of my now rickety storage tubs, pulling out memory after memory, story after story. I hope that you will feel right at home, and that my recollections and stories make you smile, and bring back memories you didn’t even know you had.
Yale Writers Workshop
Etcetera:
Education
1977-1980
University of Minnesota, B.S. Technical Communication
1990-1993
University of Illinois, Ed. M. Adult Education
2011
The Emily Post Institute’s Business Etiquette Train the Trainer Program
2015
Memoir Workshop with Betsy Rapoport retired Executive Editor Random House
2016
Cheryl Strayed Writers Camp, Esalen, Big Sur, California
2016-present
Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA candidate in Writing
2017
Yale Writers Workshop
Work Experience
1982-2017
Adjunct Professor at Community College of Vermont teaching:
Microsoft Office Computer Applications
Career Readiness
Professional Skills for Healthcare Professionals
Career Readiness Pro: Health and Human Services
1989
Adjunct Professor at St. Michael’s College teaching:
Microsoft Office Computer Applications
Me and Jackson
