Little Red Cabin: Short Stories and Long Thoughts

By Mike Hansen

From the remote wilderness of untamed northern Wisconsin to the timeless teachings of the Messiah, author Mike Hansen takes you along rarely traveled paths. Venture to a little red cabin situated on a dead end road. Mike’s father, skilled and scarred by the war, found solace with his family in the wild outdoors. The remote setting became a

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hansen Log Homes
• Release date: Nov 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781734374629

Mike Hansen

Born and raised in Wisconsin, Mike Hansen worked and explored the north woods. A log home builder, husband, father, grandpa, uncle, and friend, Mike resides in the far northwest corner of Hayward with his wife of forty plus years. Together, the couple reared eight beautiful children who share a love and appreciation for nature, and faith in the One who created it all.

Book preview

Chapter 1

The Little Red Cabin

The little red cabin sat as far north as one could possibly get without being in Michigan. Just a few miles north of Conover and a few miles south of Land O’ Lakes in Vilas County, Wisconsin, the snowfall averaged well over 100 inches per year. To get to the cabin required exiting Highway 45 onto a single lane sand road that cut through a section of state-owned land, and eventually ended .9 miles smack-dab in the middle of nowhere.

At the time, we lived in Milwaukee. Menomonee Falls to be exact. My dad purchased six forty-acre parcels of the most remote and undeveloped land imaginable from a gentleman known as Colonel Horner. The cabin was not there when the land was purchased. Nothing was there. No power. No water. Nothing. Lots and lots of nothing.

And lots and lots of everything. There were endless forests, meadows, tag alder swamps, and those spooky, mysterious places my dad called the Jack Pine Islands, where he theorized, the monster bucks went when they felt hunting pressure. There was water. A small lake with fish called Wolf Lake. A lake I would only visit one time. A lake that became a sore spot with my dad, and was alluded to, but not talked about.

A golden thread of life meandered through most of the 240 acres of wilderness. Haymeadow Creek was a class one, spring-fed stream where yellow spots danced on the olive green backs of the speckled trout that thrived and naturally reproduced in the crystal water. Locals commonly slipped in uninvited to trap minnows and hunt the infamous black mallards.

The stream eventually wore a friendly, familiar path through my heart and soul. In fact, the hours spent as a family in that cabin became the womb where beliefs, values, and ideals were conceived and nurtured. Time exploring that land became the furnace that prepared me for the character shaping anvil of life’s hammer.

Those woods served as the matrix that created much of the perception, ideals, and framework that I carried with me some fifty years later. In the wilds, I learned work ethic, love, appreciation, and respect for nature, as well as contentment and simplicity.

Lessons were plentiful in how to improvise, take sailor showers, be alone, be together, and how to make things work. I caught and cleaned wily brook trout, shot a .22, swung a hatchet, piled brush, and killed my first ruffed grouse. I ate fiddleheads and grilled fish in a cast iron frying pan over an open fire after discovering the difference between utility water and drinking water.

Living at the little red cabin meant using an outhouse, priming a handpump to collect water for the day, using a posthole digger, and tamping posts. After graduating from a Zebco 202 closed face fishing reel to a Mitchell 300 open face, I spent evenings perusing Herter’s catalog where fishing hooks and sinkers could be purchased in bulk at wholesale prices. I watched the seedling red pines that we planted grow into trees that reached 40 feet high and ate my first blueberry pie that Mom made from the blueberries we picked not far from the cabin. And I discovered a warrior-protector inside of me as I saved my mom from what we imagined to be a life or death situation.

At the little red cabin, I witnessed determination and sweat transform nothing into something. A different side of Mom and Dad emerged as the pressures, stress, and weight of life seemed to lift from their shoulders as soon as the 1955 emerald green Cadillac exited Highway 45 to meander along the single lane sand road .9 mile and dead end at the little red cabin.

My soul is thankful for the early places and experiences that molded my formative years.

Chapter 2

Brush Piles

Even making brush piles took on purpose, spurred creativity, and provided a degree of satisfaction. At least that is true in retrospect. As a ten-year-old boy, the task felt monotonous, difficult, painstaking, and seemingly endless. I longed to be done so we could go fishing.

My dad had a lesson and a reason for everything we did and the way we did them. Principles. Skills. Methods. Even when stacking brush into piles. I can still hear him explaining that the pile became a home, shelter, and refuge where a rabbit might escape the jaws or talons of a predator.

Conservation, efficiency, order, perfection, and tidiness as we hauled and assembled the branches. Dad repeated demonstrations, gave friendly, and some not so friendly, reminders. I watched my dad rearrange my work until the result met his approval. All the butts faced one direction. Every piece neatly stacked. Piles located strategically in the woods.

Always, he instructed, leave the place in as good, or better, condition than when you got there.

Years later, while hunting grouse and rabbits, I found myself visiting those carefully stacked branches. Though Dad is no longer here, the good work of his hands still stands. Pausing at one end, I nudged the pile with my foot, hoping a rabbit might burst out from the other end. Somewhere along the years, I had taken ownership of the brush piles. Somehow, I had forgotten the monotony, the sore sap-stained hands, scratched forearms, sweat, and bug bites too abundant to itch, let alone count.

Most importantly, each experience served as a teaching. My dad consistently built incentives for a job well done and used those sweat-filled tasks for a purpose. Making sturdy brush piles built to last, was celebrated. After the work was complete to his satisfaction, we went fishing. I still feel his hand affectionately on my shoulder as we made our way to the stream. Fishing poles in hand, we cooled off in the shade while, together, we coaxed the trout to bite.

Disciplined work done well has the integrity to outlast the hands that did the task.

Chapter 3

Fiddleheads

Seems like we were always picking something to bring back to Mom. Those items we didn’t understand, or needed help identifying, we brought to Dad or brought Dad to them.

Mom appeared thrilled with nearly anything we brought from the woods.

Treasures, she called them.

Birch bark. Moss. Lichen-covered stones. Last year’s bird nests. Rusty things. Old bottles. Even skulls and bones, though the skull and bone things usually went first to Dad. When we brought edibles, Mom found a way to prepare and serve them. Whether fresh caught brook trout from the Haymeadow Creek, ruffed grouse from the tag alder swamp, or mushrooms, she prepared and served our finds. Fiddleheads were no exception. If we picked them, she cooked and served them along with whatever else we had for supper.

Fiddleheads are ferns in the early stages of development. Before they grew into the lush green canopy that shaded the