From as young as I remember, this is the time of year when I’d really get itchy for home.

When I was a youngster at St. Mike’s, the mud puddles, watching the ducks and geese around the slough, the smell of the fields and the green grass pushing up through the previously barren earthy always held some allure.  As good - no great - of teachers as Sister Rosella, Sister Baptist, Mrs. Slawson, Mrs. Speath, Mrs. Offerdahl, and Mrs. LaVoi were, they got short notice when the siren call of spring came around.

In high school, whether it was the crispness of the mornings, the sunshine - or refreshing showers - of mid day, or the warmth of the afternoon, it made it hard to sit through English, computers or band.

As a Bison at NDSU, it was even more of a challenge - for not only was spring truly in the air, but there was no going home each night and getting outside into the chill air of the barnyard every morning.  You were stuck amidst the buildings and were made to suffer for five days of the week until you could drive through the fields of spring, smelling the good earth as you drove down the roads.

Then it was on to Champaign, Illinois, where my brushes with the countryside in spring had to be regulated to Sunday morning drives after 7:30 am Mass.  I’d hop in my little red Pontiac and head out into the Illinois back roads to check on planting progress and catch a glimpse of spring.

From there, Wichita, Minneapolis, Sidney OH, and back to Minneapolis, I was far from home, and held down by the work week.  True, I could be outside, but with no cows to milk or fields to plow, the freshness of spring seemed frustratingly out of reach and my appetite was only wetted by trips through the Kansas, Ohio, or Southern Minnesota countryside as it turned from brown, to light green, to bursting with color.

But sometimes all you needed was a taste.

Living and working in the city, it was easy to get lost in the concrete and the steel.  It was easy to think that all the earth grew was row upon row of houses.  It took getting outside of the city - through the countryside - down through Wellington and down on the Oklahoma border in Kansas.  Out through Anna, Minster, and German towns of western Ohio, and down through New Prague (my ancestral home) and over through Owatonna, Rochester, and up through Red Wing and the river towns along the Mississippi I would drive - windows down, the warm spring breeze blowing in through the car, getting my fix on the freshness of spring.

But all too soon it was over.

Pulling back into the city, I would head back to the yard and pretend that I was working the ground like my ancestors, wondering at the mysteries of the birds migrating north overhead and enjoying the scene of the earthworms as I worked in my yard.

Spring comes, even in the city and I’d have to enjoy…and look forward to my next foray out into the countryside….

 I’m a homebody.  Regardless where I travel or what I do, I feel more at home among the flat fields and quiet woods of our farm in Mahnomen then I do in the black earth of Fargo, the corn fields of Illinois, the banks of the Ar-kansas River, the sprawling suburbs of Minneapolis, or the the high rises of Melbourne.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve enjoyed living in all of those places, some of them, like Australia, I’ve enjoyed imensely.  But they tucker me out.

I’m an introvert in an extroverted world.  I’m a guy that likes to think in a world that likes to make a decision and move forward.  My mind needs a rest from the razzle dazzle every once in a while.  And there is no place to feel calm and at peace with the world then our little slice of the northern plains in spring time, when spring rain has greened the grass and the black fields lay mellowing in the spring sun, letting off that earthy smell of spring with the tillage of the soil or the turning of the shovel.  It is a sign of spring, of new life, of rebirth.

It has been over five months since I’ve back home to the home on the prairie, or back to friends and family in Minneapolis and Fargo.  While I wouldn’t say that I’m homesick, I would say that, especially since I booked my tickets two weeks ago, there is a deep seeded desire to see the people and places again that I hold dear.

In my mind, these places have been arrested in time.  But I know that they’ve changed.  A winter has come and gone across the landscape.  New buildings will have been built and old ones ripped down throughout the countryside.  College and work friends will have aged - which when you see them daily and weekly and monthly, you can’t tell the difference, but when they are etched in your mind from six months ago, the slightest change will seem massive.

My neices and nephews and friends families will have aged too.  Nephew Parker is running around now - and has a younger brother.  Matthew and Nicholas will have grown a foot.  Abby and Sarah are going to be six months closer to being teenagers (which means they won’t want to see me for another ten years!), my Godson Tommy will not be able to be thrown in the air anymore, and his sister Katie will not be able to be spun around the kitchen floor on her blanket, my good friends son Kyle was a newborn when I left - he’s probably double in size.

Time waits for no man.

But I know that I’ve changed as well.  My mind has been changed.  Living in a foreign country changes a person, hopefully for the better, but certianly, I have different ideas, different images in my mind.  My perception, my sense of self and my place in the world has changed - the values that I hold haven’t and perhaps have only intensified.  My appreciatation for others - and especially for family and friends have been heightened - you don’t realize what you have until its gone.

So don’t say that I’m homesick, but I’m deeply anticipating the trip home.

 Hide the women folk and stash the ice cream, This Country Boy is making a mad dash around the world thanks to work and a conference in Geneva, then ten days at home….check your local listings!

Melbourne

Sydney

Singapore

Paris

Geneva

Amsterdam

Minneapolis

St. Louis Park

South St. Paul

St. Paul

Claremont

Falcon Heights

Fargo

Bismarck

West Fargo

Hawley

Bismarck

Mahnomen

Fertile

Moorhead

Los Angeles

Sydney

Melbourne

(Bet you’ve never seen that combination of towns on the same list before….)

 The prior week’s match up of my, now beloved, Western Bulldogs and the pitiable Richmond Tigers was a one sided match, with the Bulldogs firmly in control.

“We are going to have our hands full.” Mourned the few Bulldog supporters in the office.  We were after all, playing the up and coming Hawthorne Hawks.

“You guys are going to get the best of us,” lamented the Hawks fans around the office.  One of whom invited me to watch the game with he and some friends.

The game this week was going to be at the Docklands Stadium, or as some people may know it as the Telstra Dome…or as the name was recently changed to…Etihad Stadium.  Regardless, when you talked about the Docklands Stadium, everyone knows what you are talking about.

After six months, this would be my first adventure into Docklands Stadium, a large, domed stadium right at the heart of the old Docklands, where the ocean going ships would tie up in Melbourne.  It was and is, an impressive part of the city, where the history (a marker sits on the site of the first house in Melbourne and the start of the surveyors when they plotted out the city).  There is a couple of reasons that it is surprising that I hadn’t made it inside the stadium.  First, it is the home to much of Melbourne sports - soccer, rugby, and half of the footy teams call the Docklands Stadium home.  Second - most of the big concerts happen inside the stadium.  Finally, my apartment also looks directly into the retractable roof stadium, so it is literally outside my front door.

In short, it was about time that I visited Docklands Stadium, and I could think of no better reason then in supporting the Western Bulldogs.

The Hawthorne fans stopped up for a beverage before the game - and we had a good visit.  Then, it was on to the footy.

Docklands Stadium is impressive.  The low slung roof and round exterior belying the largeness of the field of play.  Like most Australian stadiums, it was built with a large oval in the middle, which means that the field is very large.  We were up in the air in the nose bleed sections, but the field was in almost full view.

There was a bit of history in the match up as well, with Hawthorne being a bigger (over fifty thousand members) and older club then the Western Bulldogs (thirty thousand members and started in the 1970’s).  So there was a bit of pride on the line.

The game opened with the teams running onto the field and running underneath their banners (they don’t bust through the paper banners like they would in the US - they don’t want to risk injury Sam, one of the Hawthorne fans I was with deadpanned to me).  And their theme songs spoke to the age of their clubs - Hawthorne’s theme was a variation of George M Cohen’s “Yankee Doodle” and the Western Bulldog’s was a 1960’s inspired ditty.

It was a good match.  It was a physical game with players pushing and roughing each other up before the opening siren, there were four players helped off the field throughout the game - including one that was literally knocked unconscious - his right arm stretching up towards the roof of the stadium long after his body was frozen on the ground.

The game was neck and neck for the first three quarters, with the Bulldogs getting in more one point goals, but the Hawks refusing to back down and getting in some well placed six pointers.

By the fourth quarter, the Hawks were just tired.  Three of the four players knocked out where theirs…and with only four reserves, meant that the player that went out with a concusion was back playing two quarters later…a bit slower, but out there anyway…

And though the Doggies were leading for most of the game, they pulled into a ten point lead early in the fourth quarter with much teeth gnashing by the Hawks fans, who thought it was some curse that had fallen on them and were quick to blame the umpires (though they seemed to side with Hawthorne most of the game - “you have more money to pay the umpires I intoned to the not amused Hawks fans around me.”)

In the end, my Dogs won by 24.  Another good day to be a Bulldog fan.

 ”You need to come with us on Easter to watch the footy.” I was told solemnly by one of the few Western Bulldog fans in the office.  “After all, our Western Bulldogs are playing at the G.”

Two things that people outside of Australia may never understand…the Victorians love affair with Aussie rules football (‘footy’) and the Melbourne Cricket Grounds, or the MCG, or, as it is hallowedly referred too, ‘The G.’

Both are sacred traditions in Melbourne and the state of Victoria.  Melbourne was once the capital of Australia, and it still maintains that it is the sporting capital of the country, with these two icons firmly placed at the top of the witness list.

How could I say no to Easter footy at the ‘G’ especially with my adopted Footscray Bulldogs taking on the pitiable Richmond Tigers.

The ‘G,’ build and designed for cricket, is impressive.  Watching the game with two big Footscray fans, and the husband of one of the Footscray fans…who happened to be a Richmond fan was entertaining to say the least, and another American on short term assignment who had decided to cheer for Richmond, it was going to be an interesting game.

There was a lot of learning for me that first game.  You can’t watch the fight on the field, you might miss a goal being scored.  Don’t mind the water carriers out there during play, that is just part of the game.  Why would they stop play to help the injured player off the field?  He’s limping back just fine.

With my Bulldogs up two to one in the second quarter, the other American, the Richmond supporter, decided that he ‘needed a walk.’  Going to call his wife I suspected.  After about thirty minutes, the Footscray fans that I was with were laughing.

“What is so funny?” I asked.

“The other American is just like the other Richmond fans.” They replied. “They always expect them to do well, then either walk away or call for their players heads on a platter!”

“We do have a habit of eating our own young.” The local Richmond supporter sighed, seemingly resigned to his fate of being a Richmond fan.

Richmond didn’t look much better towards the end of the game…and when the score was 114 to 42, I suspected that voracity of the fans might be subdued.  But they cheered as loudly as before - on both sides.  One hoping for a smashing defeat (”Can we really outscore them three to one!”), the other hoping for a little less embarrassing defeat (”You know, if we fire our coach now, we can pin the blame on him and hope for a better showing next week.”)

As the fellow Richmond supporter complained about the draft and put on his Richmond scarf, I looked at him and said, “Putting on your Richmond attire now?  Down 114 to 42?  Counting on the shame to keep you warm?”

The Footscray fans loved it.

The Richmond fans respected it.

The other American was a bit horrified.  “Don’t tell me you are getting into this sport?” He asked a bit worriedly.

“My team is winning.” I said with a smile.  That is a language that is universal.

Basketball has been described by some distracters as chaos in motion which obviously means that they have never seen Aussie rules football.In some ways, Aussie rules football is a combination of multiple sports.  It is played on an oval, similar to cricket.  It uses a football similar to American football or rugby.  Players have to pass with a bump of the hand or kicking it only.  And you have to kick the ball through the goal posts…like a field goal in American football…only there is the center goal and a side goal on each side - the center is six points, the side is only worth one.  There is fighting like ice hockey, though it’s not on ice, and there are no pads.  You can’t run with the ball without either passing or dribbling it like basketball.  Like American football, there is a lot of players on the field - but a lot more, like eighteen.  Unlike some sports, where there is the gentleman’s mercy agreement - where you try not to run up the scores on your opponents, in Aussie rules, they go for the jugular. 

I’ve actually tried to imagine when they invented the game.  Some blokes sitting around a cricket pitch throwing back a tinny or two.  They are trying to figure out a game to throw some punts on.  One is advocating rugby, one football, one basketball, one hockey.  They get into a shoving match and eventually a fight starts, the next thing you know, an Aussie Rules Football game started.

In short, the game is a complete cluster.  It is confusing.  It is hard to follow.  It is messy.  It is violent.  It is bloody at times. And most importantly, it is a lot of fun.

Imagine if you will a large grassy oval.  Thirty six men are running around with about ten officials (make sure you call them referees, that will annoy the footy fans around you) known as umpires - so a total of almost fifty men.

And that doesn’t include the people that are running on the field to provide water and to help the injured off the field.

Play doesn’t stop for water and injured players (unless they have to be carted off on a stretcher).

Let me repeat, play doesn’t stop.

So while you may have a brawl of four people happening in one section of the field, another player rolling around in agony on another, and two players drinking water in a third area of the field, the ball continues to try and make its way towards the goal.

When this is described to people that have never seen a game, myself included, I sat there in disbelief.  It sounds like a complete mess.

Watching it on television is even worse.  You can only see a small section of the field where the ball is moving.  It looks like one long continuous NFL bloopers tape with the ball rolling along the ground, people fighting for it, trying to jump on it, kicking it forward.  In reality, that is the nature of the game.

You see, when a player is tackled, he must throw the ball away.  That’s right - no hand offs, no giving it to the other team, no breaks and huddles, he merely ‘disposes’ of it by throwing it out into the melee around him.

I enjoy watching most all sports live, but I thought I was going to have a hard time with footy.

In fact, it was fantastic.

Live in front of you, you can see the teamwork and the strategy of trying to get the ball down field.  You can see the players trying to work their way down the field, you could see the swings in the defense and the offence reacting.  You could see the fast pace and the impact of no time outs.

I’ll admit, I’m missing my Wild and my Twins.  When tailgating season starts at the Fargodome, I’ll miss my Bison gridiron, but for now, footy will do just fine.

 In a sports mad world, Melbourne may be the capital of sports madness.  If they don’t have a sport, give them time, I’m sure they will invent one.  From the Australian Open tennis and golf tournaments to rugby (union and league), American football (or as it is known here - grid iron), soccer, cricket, baseball, basketball, hockey (field and ice), but by far the most popular is Australian Rules (Aussie Rules) Football.

Or as it is better know, simply as “Footy.”

And people are loyal to their footy teams.  As an American, there was a lot of lobbying on which team I should support.  Some people trying to coerce.  Some people trying to bully.  Some people trying to intimidate.  Some people just trying to provide good useful information (perhaps with a slant towards their own team).  Some people said to just pick a team by the colors.

It doesn’t help that over ten of the twenty teams call Melbourne home.

And the news, even in the off season, is filled with footy news - the latest updates on players. The latest scandal.  The latest team outlooks.  Seemingly half of the front page stories on the Melbourne newspapers include some story that links back to footy.

After a couple of months on the ground, I had a pretty good representation of all of the clubs.

I couldn’t cheer for the Geelong Cats, they are drug dealers.  I couldn’t cheer for St. Kilda Saints; they have rapists on their team.  I couldn’t cheer for the Collingwood magpies, they are thugs.  I couldn’t cheer for Hawthorn Hawks, they are uppity.  I couldn’t cheer for the Richmond tigers or Melbourne demons, they are just bad.  Essendon and Carlton are both hated and have a reputation for playing dirty.  North Melbourne always plays well, but can never quite make it past the first round or two of the tournament.

Don’t worry about all of that - just pick a team by the colors one person advised.  But I just couldn’t come to a point where I could pick a team by color.

There was only one team left in the Melbourne area that I hadn’t ruled out, or that I hadn’t ruled out for myself - the Western Bulldogs, or as the true fans call them, the Footscray Bulldogs.  Footscray is the working-class heart of Melbourne, where the poor, but hard working people of Melbourne have traditionally lived.  It is close to the docks, it houses a lot of plants and industries, but the city itself has a reputation for being scrappy.

How could I not cheer for Footscray?

As word leaked out about my pick for Footy team, the final round of lobbying started.

“Are you sure I can’t get you to cheer for Richmond?  They are due for a win..at least one game this season…  Wish I could convince you, but if I wasn’t a Richmond supporter, I reckon I’d cheer for the Bulldogs.”

“You know tea and crumpets at the Hawthorne games are quite exquisite - monocles are recommended but not required…but you know, if I wasn’t a Hawks fan, I reckon I’d cheer for Footscray.”

“You know, if I didn’t already have money poured into the (insert St. Kilda or Geelong here) legal defense fund, I reckon the Western Bulldogs would be my team.”

So as much as everyone hated all of the other teams, there was some grudging respect for my Western (i.e. Footscray) Bulldogs.

“Their colors are red, white and blue!  Just like your home country!”

While not the reason I jumped on the bandwagon, certainly a reason to be both a Bulldogs supporter and Patriotic.

Go Dogs!

 Sir Walter Raliegh.  Pizzarro, De Soto, Cortez, and perhaps most tragic - Francisco Cornado.  All explorers, all searching for that mythical city of gold, Eldorado.

Ah, that most sought after of all cities.  That place of legend.  The place of dreams.

In the end, we all have these sought after places.  We all have our own Eldorado.

I had heard legends of my Eldorado.  Whispers of its existence.  There is one in New York, right off 42^nd street it was whispered.  But it didn’t exist.  In Chicago I searched, but to no avail.  Even in Minneapolis, there was rumors of it existing, but only between the hours of ten and two on Sundays…but it was closed every time I visited…if it was ever really open to beging with.  Even in London at the height of spring…there was talk, rumors really, that it existed…but nothing.

In the lobby of a building in Melbourne right off Collins street, I heard that it existed, that it was there, that it had been seen and experienced.

But I doubted.

Making my way through the busy streets to the lobby of the building, I walked through the doors….

“Cheers mate.  Here for a cut?” The man asked, scissors in hand.

“Yes sir.” I replied, taking in the sight of the three young barbers cutting the hair of the customers in their chairs.

“Put your name on the board.” He said pointing the list of names on the chaulkboard hanging on the wall next to the door.

As I put my name on the door and turned around, he said with a cheerful air, still cutting the hair of the man in the chair: “Grab a seat.  And grab a beer.  Its in the cooler.”

A tear welled up in my eye…it did exist!  The place of legend, where barbers serve beer and give you a good haircut to boot.  The myth, the place of shadows and dreams, the place chased for ages - Eldorado…the legend was real.

Walking up the cooler and grabbing a beer, I sat in the big leather chains and looked at the faces of the men in the chairs. Bliss.  Pure bliss.  Some said contently with beer in hand.  Others merely chatted, but you could sense the look of happiness.

I just sat there, holding the beer for a minute or two - then standing back up, I used the opener on the wall to open the generic beer in my hand.  It was cold.  Taking a swing, it was good.

Quietly I sat, reading the newspaper, drinking a beer, and getting swept up in the moment.  I was going to get a haircut.  With a beer in hand.  Off a busy street on Melbourne I had found it, this place called Eldorado.

Well, ‘Rockit’ to be more precise - the name of the barbershop was ‘Rockit.’

But it could have been Eldorado.

Getting called into the barber chair and greeting the barber, he said, “Canada?”

“No, United States.  But close to the border with Canada.  They throw the grenades and we pull the pins and throw them back.” I replied.

Turned out his wife was from the United States.  Milwaukee.  He had been to Minnesota and South Dakota.

The haircut was good.  The haircut was very good.  I only had one beer, but that was enough.  I’m not that big of a beer drinker, but the taste of the victory, of finding this legendary place still tastes cool and sweet.  Eldorado…

Gaily bedight,
A gallant knight,
In sunshine and in shadow,
Had journeyed long,
Singing a song,
In search of Eldorado.

• - Edgar Allen Poe

 Like any good country boy, I like beets.  My Dad makes a mean pickled beet, and cut with little waves in them, they look and taste almost like a work or art - sweet, but not too sweet, and a good, deep red.

Mom used to cook up beet roots.  Chopped into little cubes, she would boil them and serve them with generous amounts of butter.  There was very little better on the dinner plate then the beet root.

Moving to Australia, I was excited to see beet root salad in the first restaurant that I came too.  I had to order it, I mean, how often can you get beet root?  It was good, not great, but good.

The next day, there was that beet root salad again.

The first hamburger that I had in Australia came out looking fantastic, but it had a big slice of beet root on the top of it.  Dark red with the dark red dripping down and making the bun soggy, it seemed, well, just a little out of place.

“What is this on my burger?” I asked the natives around me. “Beet root!  You can’t have a hamburger without beet root!”

Yes.  Yes you can.

This experience opened my eyes.  Soon, I found there was beet root everywhere.  Like some big rootish plague that sweeps the landscape, beet salad, beet puree, beet juice, fried beet.  Hamburgers and steak sandwiches, all served with beet root.

And the issue is - some them just don’t taste that good.

“Why do I taste dirt and grit in this?” I’ll ask a waitress.

“Oh, that would be the beet root!” She’ll answer perkily back, as if it was just the most natural, pleasing thing to have on your food. 

It would be asking, “Why am I sick to my stomach?”And getting the reply back, “Oh, that is just the E Coli that we make sure is packed inside of every meal!”

Beet root beet root beet root - I swear I heard a ‘Men at Work’ song singing about the wonders of the beet root on the radio the other day (something about making men chunder).

It’s like some type of biblical plague hit Australia and they turned the proverbial lemons into lemonade:

“And behold, and the streets were filled with beet roots, and their rivers ran red with the blood of the beets, and the Australians chopped them up and put them on hamburgers, and declared it good.”

Like the infamous plague of rabbits, they might have run rampant through the countryside (”Look, there is another mob of feral beets!”) and just decided that the best way to eradicate the beet was to put in on the menu.

If Star Trek was filmed in Australia, they would be fighting off hordes of beets with their phasors set on “cooked thoroughly.”

OK, to be fair, I still like beets.  I’ll eat them on my burger, I’ll eat them on my steak, I’ll even have a beet salad every now and then….

But I’d much rather prefer the occasional pickled beet of home, or the memories of cooked beets from Mom.

 As we rounded the tip of Phillip Island, far from the closest signs of man, we were struck by the baroness of the landscape - there were a few abandoned houses scattered through the bush, but the rest of it was habitat for the penguins, and the random wallaby, that called this tip of the island home.

Throughout the cliffs and steep ravines, you could see the paths carved into the mud by the daily trekking of thousands of penguins making their way back to their nests.  Every day, for thousands of years, these “littlest penguins” had called this island home.  While a good chunk of them came up onto the beach with the special tourist viewing platform, the bulk of them came up via these nameless, faceless cliffs and beaches.

As the bus rounded the last corner, the driver stopped and pointed out several rafts (groups of penguins gathering to come in to shore) and informed us that once they got on shore, the raft would then turn into a mob (in name only…literally at sea, they were known as a raft, on shore a mob - credit the Aussies for creative naming).

We had strict instructions from our friendly and comedic bus driver: “You must be back to the bus by 10:30.  If not, it is $150 cab ride back to Melbourne.”

We had no intention of being late.

But we did splurge and get the good tickets at the reserved premium seating viewing platform to watch the little penguins come back to their nests at Phillip Island.

First we walked around the interpretive center a little bit, looking at the exhibits, reading the displays, and generally soaking in the sights.

Then we proceeded out to the “premium viewing platform.”

Everyone said that it was a good idea.  Everyone was right.

As we made our way to the viewing platform, small penguins, the young waiting for their parents or those molting and sitting uncomfortably in the heat of summer, were squawking and carrying on, waiting for their evening meal to be regurgitated by their loved ones….yum!

They were cute.

As darkness fell, we looked towards the sandy beach, then the rocky part of the beach - some saying, if they were the penguins, they would take the sandy beach route.

Which means they would probably been eaten.

We didn’t see the first penguins hit the shore.  Like stealthy black ops, they came in amongst the rocks and made their way to the underbrush - we not seeing them until they made the run, er waddle towards the bush across the narrow strip of sand.

The penguins were in the game of survival - they weren’t in the game to be seen.

Gradually, we saw more and more rafts turn into mobs as they hit the beach and made their way up onto the rocks and beaches and head back into the underbrush to their load crying young.

It was not as expected, in some massive assault on the beach, but more groups of five to thirty hitting the beach in groups.  Regardless, it was impressive.

All too soon, we looked at our watches - and realized we were going too late unless we hurried.

We were the last ones back to the bus, but we shouldn’t have worried, the bus driver was waiting for us.  And we got back just in time to catch a penguin right in front of our bus.  Along with the driver, we watch the penguin scurry off into the bush, keeping it safe from erratic drivers and careless smokers, and chuckling at the sign that said to watch for penguins under cars.

As we drove back to Melbourne, we were given advice by the driver on things to see and do in our stay in Melbourne, but very happy with our sight of the second most viewed natural wonder in Australia.