Standing inside the Mill City Museum, you can see the Guthrie Theatre from the window, reflecting the history of all those who worked the mill, and never saw a play. 

I learned more about the history of the Minneapolis flour mill in that ten minute Flour Tower ride, than I had bothered to learn in the decades I lived here. Oh sure, I had taken the photos, but never really the time. Hearing the voices of those who worked there — those who dared the danger of the whipping wide-open belts, those who never really got the white dust from their clothing or lungs, those who thought maybe, just maybe, if they could work long enough to climb the ladder to get to $25 a week pay, that they would live like kings, but never did — the history, the story, came to life. And it became so clear, that there would be no Guthrie theatre — a place that I did get to learn, to see, to love — without the people who created this city, day by day, hour by hour, milling it to life. 

I suppose that’s why I tell you of my grandparents, my mother, my teachers. There will be no tour to visit, to learn, so I write. I show you their reflections as you look into my daily world. And you see them, in each word, in each stroke of paint. They are the ones that milled my world to life. Gave me the opportunity to do what I do, do what I love. A history that will never be erased from my hands. Nor my heart. Their love, a continuous grist for my life’s mill.