Ecumen Pathstone Living

On Wednesday Nancy and I enjoyed the scenic drive down Highway 169 to Pathstone Living in Mankato.
Recreation Director Linda McDonald had invited me to do a program for the Kiwanis Club meeting, and although Linda was not present, many kind people welcomed us and helped us get settled, including Miranda, Megan, Diana, and Leah, who introduced me to the group before I spoke.

Ecumen Pathstone Living is a really fine facility, and the residents I talked to praised the care and the care givers.

Rex told me stories of farm life.

Ken and LaVerne came early and chatted with us.

Bernie, who farmed near Henska, MN,  told me that when she heard the program was about farming, she had to come to see if I told the truth. After the show, she told me with a smile, "You got it right."

Many in the group stayed after the show to tell Nancy and me their farm stories, including Donald and Myrtle Frederickson (not a relative) and Rachel Wellmann. 

Most of the stories told by residents revealed a childhood on the farm that was filled with hard work and some difficult times mixed with some positive experiences. They all could easily relate to the hard work of the family in my story A Farm Country Picnic and to the cows getting out when the family was about to take few hours off to go fishing after a rainstorm.

Nancy and I thank Linda McDonald for inviting us to visit Pathstone and all the care-givers who helped us set up. We especially thank the residents who so kindly took time to chat with us and share their stories. We enjoyed listening to them so very much.

We wish you all the best.

Photographs by Nancy A. Fredrickson 

Tweeten Health Care, Spring Grove, MN

Instead of driving home after the Sunday afternoon show at Spring Valley, Nancy and I decided to stay overnight at Preston because we had scheduled two shows nearby on Monday, April 18, one in Spring Grove and another at Mabel-Canton School.

On Monday afternoon we arrived early at Tweeten Health Care, Spring Grove, and set up in a large room. Palma (right) and Rollie (left) visited us. Rollie talked about his hometown in South Dakota and Palma talked about farming. "It was hard work but we had fun too," she said. 

As in many nursing homes where almost everyone in the audience is immobile and limited in movement of hands and even facial expressions, I work extra hard to elicit reactions. Although they seldom clap or laugh loudly, their subtle smiles and nodding heads spark my desire to do my best. 

Rollie is seated up front and to my right so he can tilt his head up and view my show from his left side.

Many stayed to chat after the show and after most had left, Rollie wheeled himself over to me. I knelt  down to make eye contact, and he talked more about farming and explained the layout of the businesses in the small town he where he was raised. "The town had a population of about 20, including the dogs," he said. Rollie had a keen sense of humor. He decided to buy his nieces the Halloween book instead of the Christmas or Thanksgiving stories because "...they have lots of books about those holidays."

Palma's three-year-old great grand daughter, Olivia, enjoyed the company of everyone and checked out our poster and the books.

The staff and residents at Tweeten Health Care treated us warmly and we had fun doing the show. I want to thank Gloria Oakes-Speltz for inviting us and we hope we can return soon.

Photographs by Nancy A. Fredrickson

St. John's Grandkids, Springfield, MN

"We used to all stand when we played,"she says as she grins. "Now we like to sit down."

Trinity Care Center

Pictures removed 11-25-12

To know me is to know I love an audience, and as Nancy and I drive the short distance to Farmington to perform at Trinity Care Center, I speculate on the audience and the attendance.
"It's a big place and when we delivered the posters a couple weeks ago, it looked like a really nice place too."

"They'll probably have a big area so people in wheel chairs can park easily, " Nancy adds.

Susan, the activities director, said most of the audience members will be in the 80's and some in the 90's. I told her I would bring my small sound system so I could adjust volume as necessary. When we've done that at other senior care centers, they've really appreciated being able to hear the show clearly."

"And some of the seniors have stopped by after shows to tell us that they appreciate the sound system," Nancy says.

Nancy and I set up in the inside garden area where the units are constructed to look like cabins that open onto a spacious garden with a waterfall and plants.



As people come in I have a chance to talk to them and find out where they are from, and they thank us for coming (even before they've seen the show) and talk about their experiences growing up on a farm.

As I turn the page to begin the show, the audience numbers about 25.





The enthusiasm they've expressed before the show helps inspire me to do my best and throw in a few stories that make the program run 45 minutes long.

Their expressions are often limited by
oxygen tubes or by how much they can move in the wheel chair, but as I see them smile and nod their heads, I know they are enjoying the show.





I know the "golden years" may not appear to be so great sometimes, but we must never forget that the people living those years are golden, for they are precious to us.  

After I end the show they applaud warmly several times and stay around to tell me their stories.

Several people buy books and talk to Nancy and me as I sign them.

My job as a performer is to make people laugh, smile, cry, and, in general, respond with feeling, and whenever I feel an audience responding, I become more emotionally involved in my stories. Audience and performer build on the responses of each other.

At this performance of A Farm Country Christmas Eve, a story which holds many dear memories for me, the audience gave back every thing I gave them and more.