In the days when my friend Leo was alive, I spent a lot of time at his cabin up north, which is what Minnesotans say about the Brainerd Lakes Area in central Minnesota. Snow Lake, Manitoba, is up north.

To Leo, the cabin was a dream come true, a place to work until he dropped into a chair at dusk and started planning the next day’s work, possibly the removal of a stone fireplace or maybe taking half the place down and putting it back together by the time his wife, Harriet, called him to dinner. They were not typical lake meals of fish or burgers on the grill. They were city meals of, say, roast pork with gravy and mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables. Then Leo would get up from the table and go mow the lawn on a Sears tractor he bought in 1962.

One time I was casting in the front yard and got Leo’s favorite green plug caught in a tree.

“Hey.”

I turned around and Leo was on the handle end of the wheelbarrow.

“Let’s go,” he said. The fireplace was under attack.

Leo enjoyed fishing, but he had rules. Everything had to be done first, rocks moved, grass cut, ladders put away, dishes washed. Only then was the coast clear. Probably quite a few World War II tail gunners held whimsical enjoyment in suspicion. The nautical equipment was iffy, one aluminum fishing boat and a two-story pontoon boat that resembled a facility that firemen could train on, climbing up and down and swinging under pipes. The pontoon thing — he never shared its origin — could not be steered or docked. If we went out, we went out in a straight line. We went back on the same line to shore and rammed it up on the sand, where the superstructure quivered like a struck gong. The stones from the fireplace, with which he lined the shore, put an end to that. The last I heard, that tub was in a park in Deerwood, used as a jungle gym.

Harriet died a few years before Leo, and then Leo passed, picking off enemy planes in a brief delirium. Years went by, the cabin seldom visited. Conversations stirred, interest ignited, negotiations arranged and it turned out that the oldest kid I used to have became the new owner.

On my first visit I asked, “Where do I start?”

“What do you mean?”

“Should I cut the grass?”

“We’re not up here as often as Leo. I have a lawn service.”

The ground trembled.

“I’ll take something apart and clean it.”

“Naw, relax.”

A shard of lightning missed us by inches.

“What about dinner later?”

“We’ll just grill some burgers, eat outside.”Harriet’s old pans rattled in the kitchen. I swear a ladder fell off its hooks in the garage.

The cabin hadn’t changed, but the reins had been loosened. The nautical equipment still featured the aluminum fishing boat, but the impossible tub was long gone, replaced by a pontoon boat, a real one. It had a steering wheel and seats and a top. I couldn’t believe it.

I was back again last weekend. This time, there were solar-powered covered boat lifts which could raise and lower a boat by remote control while sitting in the yard. Leo either would have been in complete denial that such equipment existed, or immensely pleased that boats no longer had to be crashed onto the beach.

Looking around I noticed some trees had been removed, improving the view. Nobody noticed a green plug in the fallen branches. One of these next summers, the cabin is to come down and be replaced with new construction, maybe even the re-creation of a big stone fireplace.

That night we had a fire, but in a Solo Stove, which is a bit like going for a swim in a pool next to the lake. The middle kid I used to have was on the trip. She actually tried to start the fire by holding a lighter to a log. That singular act summoned a dark cloud that parked above us. Everybody said it looked like rain coming.

I knew what it was. It didn’t rain.

Joe Soucheray can be reached at jsoucheray@pioneerpress.com. Soucheray’s “Garage Logic” podcast can be heard at garagelogic.com.