90년 살고 알게 된 행복해지는 법 | 영어가 한국어처럼 들려요 🇺🇸 미국인의 영어 패턴! 무조건 외우세요
Callie Anderson's grandfather, who built their family's log cabin in Michigan's Upper Peninsula starting in 1994, shares how he constructed it and what he learned in 90 years: slow down, prioritize family, and listen to your spouse. He recounts roofing challenges, winter isolation, and the value of neighbors and apprenticeships.
Chapters
You only have one life. At some point, your life ends.
How long have you guys been together?
66 years.
Can you give some relationship advice?
Two words.
Hello everybody! Today I am at my family's cabin in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and I am with the man that built this cabin, my grandpa. When did you build the cabin?
In 1994, after I retire.
How long did it take to build?
Altogether, probably 5 years, because it's a log cabin and they build slow.
That's a long time.
And maybe I'm not done yet.
Oh, you're going to keep adding on, huh?
Well, there's always things to do. Like my electrician apprentice today, his name is Hong, and we put in a new light on the inside of the cabin today. Always projects at the cabin. A lot of work. And tomorrow we got more work to do. We got to cut a tree down. You know why? Because my apprentice electrician lost his dorm in a tree. The very top of it. And we got to cut the tree down to get it out of there.
Wow. I hope that apprentice is very grateful.
Well, maybe we will have to charge him something for the tree. You know, trees are valuable here. Yeah. We don't have many trees here. Just millions of them.
So what was the hardest part of building the cabin?
The roof. Originally when we build it, with the first roof we put on, we put on a shingle roof. And that is very common in the Upper Peninsula. We get so much snow, sometimes up to 4 feet, and it don't come off the shingle roof. The shingle holds it. So we decide we want to put a metal roof on. Now the snow slides right off.
That's nice. Was it scary? Because the ceiling's very high.
It was all right because I was a lot younger then. I was a young whippersnapper. I could run around on that roof. But I have a lot of help to put it on, so that made it nice.
What made you decide to build the cabin in the first place?
Because we like the the woods. We liked to deer hunt and we liked to vacation. And in the winter we would come up with snow machines with the family and with the little kids and the grandkids like you. We come up here for 4 or 5 days at a time and play out in the snow and make snowmen and go up and down the hills on the toboggans. You remember that?
I remember that.
Okay.
Lots of good memories.
Make big bonfires, roast hot dogs, marshmallows.
So that was kind of your vision for the cabin, a place for family.
Strictly for family, not for profit, because I could sell this for lots of money, but it's more for family because we love family. If you don't have love and family and faith, you're in big trouble.
Do you have a favorite memory here?
I have so many favorite memories. Maybe when everybody surprised me for my 80th birthday. Oh, that was big because they fly in from all over the United States for this party. They make a big, big to do out of it.
Were you really surprised?
Oh, I start crying so happy.
It's a very remote place, but you have some good neighbors here.
Oh, we have excellent neighbors. They come all the time, just like the ones that are coming to cut the tree down tomorrow to get Hong's airplane out of it.
You guys help each other out up here.
If you need help, all you have to do is mention it to somebody and they come. They come and help. And in the other respect, if they need help from us, we're there to help them too. Just like tomorrow, we got to take you out 12 miles through the mud and rain and snow and hope we don't get stuck.
Family is important, right?
You're going to bring your shovel?
I'll shovel us out. How did you decide on this location? Because I can imagine back in the '90s—
It's a lot different than today. I start coming up here to hunt the deer. That was in 1973, and we fall in love with the Upper Peninsula woods, and we decide to buy this piece of property, and then we developed this piece of property into this camp, and we enjoy making it available for the family to come. Looking forward to having more family come.
Is that a hint hint? Before you even started the cabin and there was nothing How do you start a project like this, building a whole cabin out of nothing?
First you have to buy the property, then you have it surveyed to know where your property is for sure. So after you find the property, you find out where you want to build, then you have to have somebody come with a bulldozer, level everything off so that you can build there.
Mm-hmm.
Then before you start building, You gotta have water. Then when you get the water, then you can start thinking about what you want to build. How big a cabin do I want? So now that you can have the cement people come and put a foundation in to bring it up where you want it, and then you start putting the wood together. Wow. When I came and did all that, that was in June, and then I start building the logs. And I stayed until December before I went home, all by myself.
By yourself?
Up in the woods. And then on the weekends, my wife Shirley, she would come and she would help me for 2 days. And then she'd kiss me on the cheek and wave and go bye-bye. She'd go to Saginaw. And so then I'd be here by myself until the next weekend. And then she'd bring me more eating supplies so that I didn't starve up here.
No restaurants around here, right?
No restaurants around here.
Mm-hmm.
75 miles away. The next thing you do, you put in the water and you put in a bathroom because you get tired of going to the outhouse. The outhouse gets cold in the wintertime.
Not pleasant.
Not pleasant at all. Then you start putting walls in and closing things off, and then you put doors on.
So it's all step by step.
And they're all baby steps because you do everything by yourself. And the reason that I was able to do most of this work by myself is because I did it prior to building this. I helped my dad build his house. I was an electrician at work, so I know how to do electrical work. Well, when you work around skilled trades, you see other skilled trades like plumbers doing their job.
Mm-hmm.
You watch, you keep your mouth shut, And you learn. You just watch and observe, and you can learn. You just pick it up.
That's pretty amazing.
You have mice come. They always come at night.
Don't tell me this.
That's when they—
Oh no, no. I don't need to know this, Grandpa.
Well, they'll wake you up when they run across your face.
Oh geez, I'm going to be wide awake tonight. Sleep with one eye open. He said he saw 3 of them in the basement.
Yeah, we had them in the pail.
Oh my gosh. So you like going out hunting?
Yeah, we enjoy hunting. Grandma Callie, she likes to hunt and she don't shoot the little guy. She waits for the big guy.
What other kind of activities do you do up there?
Well, we go on the four-wheelers now, visit other camps, see a lot of partridge. Every once in a while you'll see a bear and then you stop and watch him.
Not scary?
He doesn't bother you. One day Grandma and I was out on a trail and we hear the dogs barking and all of a sudden a bear charged out of the woods right straight at us.
No!
He didn't know that we were there. Do you know what your grandma did?
What?
She jumped up on top of the four-wheeler to get away from the bear. No, she was up there with the bears coming, the bear's coming! But the bear, he sees us and then he turns and he runs in the other way, you know.
That's funny. She didn't start the ATV?
She was I don't know, too excited, too nervous, too what? I don't know.
Frozen in fear. To be fair, I don't know how I would react either.
Oh well. And we laugh at each other and make fun of each other. We get back home safe, so.
That's good.
Yeah, we had fun that day.
So the people watching our video, any advice?
Well, I think you have to realize that You only have one life. You want to make the most of it, but enjoy your life as you go. Take time with the family because time goes on. It does not stop for anybody. When I was working, I worked 7 days a week. I didn't have time for my family. I was making money for my family, but I didn't have time to do anything with my family. At some point, your life ends. Slow down. Don't try to think that you're gonna— if you work 24 hours a day, you're going to get ahead, because you're not. You're going to destroy your body. So just relax. Try to do the best you can, but enjoy your time with your family, because your family is most important.
Yes, that's a good reminder.
And take time and build yourself a cabin out in the woods.
There you go. How long have you guys been together, you and Graham?
66 years.
Can you give some relationship advice?
Two words. Yes, dear. It always works. Yes, dear. But with relationships, you have to have trust in each other regardless what it is. You got to have trust in your partner in order to make it work.
Thanks so much for sharing the story about the cabin.
That was fun. I love you. I love you too. I'm glad that you took time to come to the woods, spend some time, you and Haw, with Grandma and Grandpa. And you're always welcome. And I hope I've give some people some advice and, uh, hope to see you again maybe.
All right, goodbye everyone.
Bye!
