Now that’s a Minnesota winter!

I was beginning to think Minnesota was a victim state of global warming. Alas, winter finally arrived.

A storm moved into our neck of the woods last week and dumped a payload of the white stuff.

Here’s what the Weather Channel issued last Tuesday: “IMPACTS…Plan on slippery road conditions. The hazardous conditions will impact the Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning commutes. PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS…slow down and use caution while traveling.”

Those instructions were obviously made for newbies because most Minnesotans are expert winter drivers. Right? A few area drivers may have forgotten the skills needed to navigate icy roads, but most drivers were able to keep it between the ditches.

Kids were excited with the snowfall and took to the hills for sledding and a release from confinement.

As life returns to a normal winter on the Frozen Tundra, I’m aware of the kindness shown to Tricia (my wife who works with me at DCI) and me in this first year as publisher of the Dodge County Independent.

The first few months were a bit rocky. It’s never easy when a “foreigner” takes the helm at a weekly newspaper that’s owned by the community. As a stranger to Kasson, Mantorville, Byron, Dodge Center, Hayfield and points in between, I’ve had to adjust to your likes and dislikes. On top of all of that it was a national election year, when sensitivities by each side may have been stepped on as I clumsily tried to navigate the established political lines in this new community.

On top of all of that, we had the shutdowns of businesses, distance learning and a rather bumpy ride through 2020.

So as we close the book on 2020 and all of the changes that have come with it, let me say that I have enjoyed this first year at the DCI and look ahead with all of you to a better 2021.

To all of our well-established and new readers – Happy New Year!

NEW YEAR’S DAY

Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual. Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink, and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever. We shall also reflect pleasantly upon how we did the same old thing last year about this time. However, go in, community. New Year's is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls, and humbug resolutions, and we wish you to enjoy it with a looseness suited to the greatness of the occasion.

Mark Twain