Le Déjeuner sur l'Herbe, Minnesota-style

Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party or Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l'Herbe offer us an appealing vision of relaxation and conviviality in a semi-rural setting. These scenes look idyllic, but of course, we sometimes find ourselves in a similarly leisurely and delightful situation.

Take last weekend. The weather was near perfect, sunny and cool in the mornings, sunny and warm in the afternoons. The trees were in bloom, and anyone who went outdoors was likely to be assaulted unexpectedly by a waft of perfumed air. I was, several times. Chokecherries? Crabapples? Lilacs?

How did we spend our time? Mostly outdoors. That’s the key.

We drove up to Wild River State Park on Friday morning and took a hike along the river. The birds were sparse, though we saw our first kingbird of the year and heard a blue-winged warbler and several rose-breasted grosbeaks.

From there we drove a few miles up the river to the Will Swanson/Janel Jacobson Pottery Studio in Sunrise, where he, Janell Jacobson, and several other potters were exhibiting in the open air as part of the annual St. Croix Valley Pottery Tour.

Hilary bought two coffee mugs, and she also ran into several of her teachers and friends from the Minnetonka Art Center. I saw a lot of people that looked like people I knew, though they weren’t those people: men and women of about my age—liberal, artsy, outdoorsy. One of them looked at me briefly as if he recognized me, too: the ex-husband of a former friend and colleague. No, it couldn’t be him.

We next stopped in at Guillermo Cuellar’s studio, once again to admire the pots—the shapes, the glazes, the decoration. We didn’t buy any, but later bought a bag of Tostidos at a gas station in Askov and were back in town in time for me to pay a visit a poet-friend who was in need of a bit of conversation.

Saturday morning, after a cruel half-hour on the tennis court, we drove down to the Lake Harriet gardens, where scads of people were out picnicking and taking photographs of each other. It looked like a big communal wedding. Orioles seemed to be singing from the top of every tree in Roberts Bird Sanctuary, though we only saw one. Our best sighting was of a coy warbling vireo ten feet away at eye level.

The day deepen as we sat on the deck looking out into the yard. “I think I’ll water the garden,” I said. Hilary was reading a Bruno mystery on her Chromebook. “Maybe you could water over by the fence, too,” she said. Sure.

Time passes. Clouds appear, then vanish. As I wander the “grounds,” I spot a baby rabbit feasting on the Virginia waterleaf in the cherry orchard. More power to him.

Once I’ve given the garden a good soak, it occurs to me it would be a good time to divide and transplant a few hostas to the back corner of the garden, a shady patch of solid clay where nothing else seems to do well, no matter how seriously we try. I bring over a few fronds of ostrich ferns for good measure.

These light tasks being completed, I feel that I’ve accomplished something, and sit on the deck looking idly up through the branches of the venerable silver maple that anchors the “woods.” There’s movement. A shaft of sunlight is striking a leafy branch that a squirrel is feverishly wrestling into place on a new nest, as if winter were right around the corner.

It’s well past six by the time we go inside to make some quesadillas. Hilary blackens the tortillas perfectly, and that appetizing aroma adds a final touch to the woodland atmosphere.