Up North is not just a direction. It’s an experience. It’s an attitude. If you come from the mid-west, I’d say most particularly Wisconsin, Minnesota, or Michigan, you know what I mean.

Up North is where you go hunting, fishing, camping, ATV’ing. (Yes! That’s a word.) Up North is where your cabin is located. Up North is where you go to have fun and get away from it all.

When I was growing up, Up North meant going to visit our grandparents. Now it’s where we have our family cabin. While we’re not far from “civilization” it can feel that way when we’re staying close to home. We don’t have internet service and our cell service is so spotty we have to have a landline in case of emergency. We do, however, have DISH TV. Without it, my husband and I would actually have to talk to each other. That’s a little too primitive for us. One of us might be tempted to bury the other out in the woods before our vacation was through. Just kidding!

When he’s not in the woods, my husband spends hours working on jigsaw puzzles. This trip he finally got brave and opened the one my mother gave him for Christmas a couple years back…all candy canes! He’s going to be working on that one for a while. Me, I like to work on my cross-stitch. We both spend a lot of time reading, and I, of course, write.

We have a favorite bar and grill just down the road from us. If you’re ever in the Laona/Cavour, Wisconsin area, check out Mudslingers on Hwy 8. My husband’s a fan of the one-pound slinger burger. I tease him that it’s basically a meatloaf on a split loaf of bread.

Yes, Up North does have its down side. In the summer we battle mosquitoes, deer and horse flies, and, of course, wood ticks. That’s what bug spray is for. But there are also the animals, wildflowers, and beautiful colored leaves in the fall. There’s the complete silence…most times. Holiday weekends like this one do tend to bring out the ATV’ers (yes, also a word), but they drive by onto the logging road and leave us alone.

We just returned from our 4^th of July trip to the cabin. The bugs were actually more moderate than some years, but definitely made their presence known. We stocked-up at the local winery. We had ice cream in town. We played a round of golf at the local course. It was one of my worst, but as they say, even a bad round of golf is better than a good day at the office. The big disappointment, though, was learning the fireworks are scheduled for the 8th so we’ll miss them this year. There’s always next year!