Eulogy for Aunt Annette, 1914-2002

Read by niece Pam Miller at Aunt Annette Kulseth's funeral in January 2002 at St. Olaf Lutheran Church in north Minneapolis. Annette is buried by her beloved Hart at Glen Haven Memorial Gardens in Crystal, Minn. (Virgil Bye is also buried nearby.)

Eulogy for Aunt Annette

By PAMELA MILLER

It's possible that if the Minnesota Vikings had not lost on Monday night, we would not be here today. Annette was the Vikings' biggest and nicest fan, and lately they had disappointed her bigtime, even though she had forgiven them, as was her way. Though I'm less forgiving, I don't want to blame her death on Dennis Green, because a lot has been blamed on him lately, and unfairly, I think. So it's not Dennis Green's fault.

It's Randy Moss' fault.

Annette loved the Vikings. She and her husband, Uncle Hart, who died in 1985 and was just as sweet as she was, had Vikings season tickets for years before there was a domed stadium. They would never have let a little thing like freezing cold keep them away from a Vikings game. In her later years, she never missed a Vikings game on TV unless she was here at church, and no doubt she let Pastor Dale [Hulme] know how she felt about services that ran into noon games (although probably in a nice way).

But the Vikings were just one of the things she loved.

She loved her family, especially her siblings -- Adelaide, Edward, LeRoy, Emma, Anna, Marion, Florence, Alverna, Elmer, Clarence and Kate. Five of them are still alive and here with us today. In her long-ago youth, Annette made many loving sacrifices for her siblings, including taking care of them when they were babies and toddlers and preteens and quitting school in the eighth grade to go to work to put some of the younger ones through school. This was heartbreaking for her, because she loved to learn, and indeed would continue to learn all through her life. But she loved her siblings even more, and to her dying day, she would do anything for them.

She treasured her family, and by example taught us all how to live in a family -- to love each other, to not judge each other and to endlessly help and forgive each other.

Annette lived through many hardships and heartbreaks: World War I, the loss of the family farm, the loss of schooling opportunities, hard work for sometimes difficult people, the Depression, World War II, more wars, deaths and losses of all kinds. Yet she was the happiest person I know, and I never went to see her when I didn't come away feeling better. Her happiness was organic, and it was contagious. She embodied the goodness and sacrifice and broad perspective that made the generation she was part of earn the title "the Greatest Generation."

Annette also loved her many nephews, nieces, grandnephews and grandnieces, and would do anything for any of us. We all learned that if you went to her house and said you liked something, she'd insist on giving it to you. So you had to be careful what you said you liked if you hadn't brought along a U-Haul. She never seemed to run out of delightful, eclectic things to give away. Those of you who've been to my house and seen the things hanging up on my walls know that everything that didn't come from Target came from her.

She made me take it all.

Annette also loved animals. She had three sainted dogs in her life -- Schnitzel, Seth and Seth Too. As kids, we nieces and nephews used to point out to our strict, hard-bitten, merciless, slave-driving parents that Schnitzel, Seth and Seth Too got treated a lot better than we poor, hard-working, much-persecuted kids. Those dogs ate better, had nicer accommodations and got more TLC. But our parents didn't buy any of it. If we wanted that kind of treatment, we had to go see Annette and Hart to get it.

So we did.

Annette loved the outdoors. Her house a few miles north of here overlooks Eagle Lake and was once in the country but is now part of a booming suburb, Maple Grove.

She loved her neighbors, particularly Cathy Ewing and her children, Jenna and Christina, whose visits delighted her.

She loved the North Shore of Lake Superior and went there every year, including this past one, to stay at a little cabin right on the lake.

She loved her humble cabin in Old Frontenac, Minn., and spent as much time there as possible. She loved to walk and simply be outdoors, watching the birds and dreaming. The first thing she'd do when she got to Old Frontenac was fill the birdfeeders and set about10 old lawn chairs under her great big weeping willow tree, and that was the most relaxing, peaceful place to be on sunny days, particularly if you were trying to escape a parent who wanted you to paint the house or walk the dog or clean your room or do your homework or practice the piano.

Annette and Hart never made you do any of those things. They gave you cookies and lemonade and sat in the lawn chairs with you and told Ole and Lena jokes.

She loved her God, and her church, and all of you here who are part of that church. She's gone here for decades, and loves this church's people, its pastor, its music, its message and its mission. She was a low-key Christian who sought to walk in Christ's loving, forgiving footsteps. I have no doubt she's sitting right now in heaven in one of Jesus' lawn chairs.

There are so many other things I could say about Annette. Some of you who think you never met her actually might have at the State Fair, because for years she served the best food there at the St. Olaf booth. Every Christmas she concocted rosettes that made Norwegians I work with genuflect in awe, and sugar cookies that melted in your mouth. She also was a talented rosemaler and created many beautiful, artistic things. She could pick up a big, dead weed off the ground and turn it into a Christmas wreath with a few deft turns of the wrist.

She read voraciously. On the days I've taken her groceries I've also often taken her a bag of books. One day last summer I took up a big bag full, including Steven Ambrose books about World War II or Lewis and Clark and several classic novels. I figured that would keep her busy until Christmas. A week later I went up again with groceries and she had the book bag ready to return. Don't you want to read them? I inquired. "I did read them," she said. Incredulous, I quizzed her, and sure enough, she had read them all.

She read the paper from end to end and caught any mistakes I made in my job there, or maybe it was my brother's mistakes she caught, because I don't make any.

However, Annette wasn't perfect. She embodied some contradictions that puzzled us. For instance, she couldn't stand [WCCO Radio's] Dark Star, and so she listened to him every chance she got. she had some funny theories, such as the time she insisted to me that El Nino was responsible for disabling her garage door opener. Probably because she never drove, she had no sense of direction, but pretended to. Once we took a four-block detour to see an old farmstead in Brooklyn Park that she vaguely insisted was "over there" and ended up in Hassan Township.

Annette was usually sweet, but sometimes she could be contrary. She had a very pleasant way of taking you to task. For instance, a couple of months ago she and I were in Lake City, in my car in a funeral procession for my cousin's husband [Duane Davidson], when she said to me in the most pleasant voice: "Pamela, isn't it a tradition to get your car washed before you're in a funeral procession?"

She'd be glad to know my car is freshly washed today.

She could be stubborn, most recently about the suggestion from some of her relatives, including me, that she might be more comfortable in assisted living. She let me know she would never live in a place that had plastic flowers in the lobby. And she let me know, stubbornly but kindly, that she wanted more than anything to remian living, and someday to die, in her own home. It had its risks for a person of decreasing mobility, but it was what she wanted, and I did my best to respect that.

Annette was very philosophical. This past Sept. 11, our world was shaken by unfathomable acts of evil, and many an afternoon before I went to work Annette and I would sit at her kitchen table and talk about how the world had changed, and what it all meant, and about how her country and her values would endure, no matter what.

In summary: Annette had a beautiful personality. She was kind, intelligent, hard-working, stylish and funny. She loved life and made the world a better, sweeter place. We are all better for having known her, and we'll always remember her big, beautiful smile.