March 2025 Recap!
‘March’ is no one's favorite word…has no comments yet, and is not a valid Scrabble word.
—from my new favorite website, Wordnik!
The first quarter of 2025 is in our rear-view, dear reader. True to form, our upper midwest March oscillated between blizzards and sunny 60-degree days. While one can never be too sure how the weather will change, I took a chance and drove up to Fargo the first weekend of the month, to celebrate the birthdays of my Mom and brother-in-law, Adam.
Mom and me early 1980. Seated left to right, Mom’s Grandpa Ed and Grandma Edna McGough, and her Grandpa Arthur Lemke (whose wife Sadie passed away mere hours before my birth on 1/7).
Dad and buddy Liberty Rose Sauvageau (aka Libbens)
As I’ve been researching and writing about family history lately, Mom shared several pictures and files that she’s collected over the years. Of particular note was a series of articles from the Seattle Star (dated April through September, 1945), detailing the shocking sexual assault and murder of my Grandma Dorothy’s 5-year-old cousin Irma Irene McGough.
from the April 27, 1945 Seattle Star. Grandma’s Uncle James McGough at right
Grandma’s cousin Irma Irene McGough, with her mother, Beulah May Simmons
In going through some old pictures, we also came across an article, which very well may be the genesis of my lifelong desire to write. From the Winter 1983 edition of North Dakota Bowhunters Association quarterly publication is a several-thousand word essay headlined “Manitoba Black, Our Way” — penned by my dad. An excerpt:
“With a single movement, Scott [Lang, Dad’s friend] drew and released a 2117 Gamegetter tipped with a four-bladed Satellite. The [bear] lurched with all the strength she could command, ran a short 60 yards and died peacefully in flight…We were awestruck at the beauty of this fallen animal: it happened so quickly and now it was over. We carefully dressed her with the reverence fitting a forest queen…”
Dad with his “Manitoba Black”
As a boy of 6 or 7, I remember feeling spellbound by this article. My parents encouraged reading from a young age: Mom would regularly take Lacey and me to storytime at the Lisbon Public Library, and Dad would read to us before bed. But seeing my father’s name in a print byline led to the youthful realization of the accessibility, and the potential reach of writing. I was happy to see that Mom and Dad had saved this article, tucked away in a musty photo bin in their garage.
Of course, one of the nicer niceties of living a few hours’ drive to the F-M Valley is getting to hang with my nephew Fischer and niece Selah. A few months ago, as Fischer and I were bonding about baseball cards, I gifted him one of my favorites: a 1988 Topps Tom Lawless card (which, great name, btw). It was a favorite because the 8-year-old me had cut out Tom’s face and replaced it with my own 4th grade school pic.
Well, as Fischer and I were looking through his cards, he handed one to me:
Obviously my heart melted. He told me to keep it, and I almost did, but thinking better of it, asked him to hang onto the card to give to his nephew one day.
Just as I was saying my goodbyes, Selah (age 3.5) came out wearing a beautiful sequined gown, and the morning sunlight streaming into the living room was too good to pass up:
Leah, Churro, and I flew to Arizona for a few days, though our trip was shortened somewhat due to an 8” snow dump in the Twin Cities. We got to see Leah’s Dad and Stepmom’s winter place in Gilbert, hiked a bit, ran (20 miles for her, 15 for me) in the area’s first rainstorm in six months, and spent a half day at the Musical Instrument Museum in Scottsdale. It felt great to get a little sunshine for a few days there.
Leah and I on a hike in Scottsdale (photo by Mike Eggers)
Back at work, I got to engineer the live Before Bach’s Birthday Bash broadcast on YourClassical MPR. You can hear the broadcast in its entirety on the web. As this is Blue Collar Fugue, the March Fugue of the Month is JS Bach’s Fugue in C Major, performed by Samuel Backman here (at 47:55). It also gave me a chance to wear my “I’ll be Bach” Terminator mash-up sweatshirt.
I’ve been reading more this month, and I’d like to highlight a few of my favorites:
I can’t quit thinking about this beautiful essay “Make Room for Space” (not only because Alysha is a dear friend). Read it, and then read it again. Follow/Subscribe to her Substack. You will not be disappointed.
As March is the “5-year Anniversary of Covid” (as if that’s something we’re supposed to celebrate) I re-read this poignant essay by Chef Gabrielle Hamilton, about one of the many tragedies that unfolded in those early days of the pandemic.
A dark, lyric essay by poet Tony Hoagland from the Winter 2019-2020 Ploughshares—“Bent Arrows: On Anticipation of My Approaching Disappearance.”
Low: Notes on Trash & Art by Jaydra Johnson, which I immediately ordered upon hearing Johnson’s interview with Brendan O’Meara on the Creative Nonfiction Podcast while out for a long run.
A lovely zine titled “Here’s to the Land: The NC State Toast Fanzine” by Erin J. Watson, from the Zine-A-Month Patreon
I took an informative two-hour workshop titled “Shaping Family History into Compelling Stories” by fellow Substacker Annette Gendler.
And I did some writing/revising/editing as well, adding the following pieces to my Substack and here:
A poem questioning the pursuit of “success,” starring Ariana Grande and a starling
A journal entry from March 2017, one month before Leah and I started dating
A piece inspired by a spreadsheet I found from the Pine City (MN) Press
A poem I wrote in 2nd grade, which was published in our school-wide chapbook. Kudos to the North Dakota Public School system, circa 1988, and to my Mom for holding onto everything I’ve ever written. I’ll leave you with that poem, which TBH might be one of the better poems I’ve written in 35 years:
