Passing the Squirt Gun

In a phone reply to my question about caring for Savage Lake, candidate Christian Torkelson reminded me that there is a candidates’ forum tonight at City Hall at 7PM. He invited me to be there to ask my question regarding the lake at the forum. I thought about it and my wife, Elvy, and I decided it would be inappropriate for us to carry the lake’s torch much further.

You might know that we have had our house for sale (by owner) for much of this summer. We’ve bought a house in Red Wing and will begin moving there as soon as next week. We have lived in Little Canada for 17 years and love this place. However, I retired last fall and we decided to slow down our pace of life, reduce the real estate we have to care for (1.4 acres and 2600 square feet of living space), and pursue travel and other interests on a considerably downsized scale. We have had the best neighbors possible on Lake Shore Ave (or Lakeshore Ave or Lakeshore Street, whichever it is called at the moment). This is a wonderful community, a beautiful neighborhood, and an amazing place to life, work, and raise a family.

One of the great disappointments I’ve had living here has been my inability to generate any interest in a lakeshore homeowners’ group. If you look at the header for this website, you’ll see I optimistically subtitled it “This blogsite is intended for lakeshore owners in Little Canada, Minnesota who have property on the shores of the much-abused Savage Lake. Your help is needed to protect this historic small lake.” My first entry in 2008 was a brief announcement, “Savage Lake has received the short shrift from the Little Canada city government and the state of Minnesota for so long that the lake is practically dead and gone. The long history of this body of water deserves more respect and this website is an attempt to begin a process of organizing lake shore property owners to begin the process of restoring the lake to recreational and scenic beauty.” I think we’ve made some solid steps toward preventing the lake from getting worse, but we haven’t done much toward making it better.

If anyone wants to take over this blog, for whatever purpose, I’d be glad to transfer Admin rights to any lake shore property owner. If not, It will sit here until Google decides it’s inactive.

I’d say “Thanks for the fish,” but Roseville Middle School pretty much wiped them out with a maintenance department chemical spill almost a decade ago. So, we’ll just stick with thanks for being our friends, neighbors, and fellow treehuggers. I think the noise barriers and other improvements we’ve battled for in the past will continue to rebuild Savage Lake and I hope the city continues to prosper.