Yuen: In a hard year, these Minnesotans gave me hope

As we plow into a new year, we ask ourselves: What made us happy? What gave us meaning? What did we overcome? How will we remember 2025?

As a columnist, I’ve shared with you stories about everyday Minnesotans embracing the messiness, fragility and sweetness of life. As I close out the year, so heartbreaking in many ways, it’s a special time to reflect and catch up with a few people featured in my most memorable stories of 2025.

What a year for Mariam Mohamed. As I reported a year ago, she and her sisters helped build a sambusa-making empire that serves up the Somali deep-fried snack to thousands of schoolchildren across the state. Mohamed started the business, called Hoyo, to employ Somali refugee moms struggling to find steady work.

Since then, Hoyo has moved into a commercial kitchen at the Midtown Global Market, which has allowed it to more than double its daily sambusa production — as well as its staff. Then in August, Hoyo debuted its sambusas at the State Fair.

Now, you can buy the frozen hot pockets at not only co-ops, but also Lunds and Byerlys, Kowalski’s Markets and Jerry’s Foods. Parents who taste samples at the store have told Mohamed that sambusas are the only menu items that their kids eat at school lunch.

Then after a series of fraud scandals in Minnesota perpetrated by a tiny fraction of the Somali American population, President Donald Trump called the entire community “garbage,” saying they should “go back where they came from.” ICE has descended on the Twin Cities, targeting Somali immigrants.

“I never thought I would witness this in America,” said Mohamed, who first came to the States in the 1980s.

“Somalis are appreciative of the whole community,” Mohamed said. “We will not forget that.”

Andrea Lee still dreams of running a marathon. Doctors amputated part of her right leg after she was ejected from her motorcycle in October in a hit-and-run crash.

But the timeline she envisioned to accomplish her goal took a blow after Lee suffered an infection right after Thanksgiving. Back to the hospital she went for additional surgeries, delaying a fitting for a prosthetic leg by at least a month. A running blade, she hopes, will come next so she can get back to long-distance racing.

Lee hasn’t been a recluse. While she ventures out with a walker and runs into friends from running club, pickleball and church, her hardest adjustment is seeing their faces turn to sadness and pity.

“I feel it’s good for me and it’s good for them, as well, to understand the changes I’m experiencing,” she said. “That’s all part of the acceptance phase. It’s a healthy way for me to grow into who I’m becoming in my new season and stage in life.”

Lee is running out of hope that the driver will come forward, but her message remains the same: He should own up, for his sake. “Doing the right thing late is better than not doing it at all.”

Volunteers with the Twin Cities chapter of the Hot Mess Express scrubbed down and organized the homes of 13 women this year, without judgment or asking for payment. An article I wrote in August about these saintly do-gooders drew more volunteers, nominations and donations to the chapter, said Holly Pinkerton, who helped launch it in March.

One of the recent nominees, Elizabeth Risch-Janson of St. Paul, said her two boys shrieked when they saw their decluttered home. “I didn’t realize how oppressive my office felt until I saw it organized and warm and inviting,” she wrote in a thank-you letter to the crew.

No one should be surprised that identical twins Adriana and Ruby Mathiason are crushing their college experience after graduating at the tippity-top of their class from Richfield High School last spring.

Adriana is studying at the University of Wisconsin, deepening her love of music journalism. Ruby’s at Carleton College, participating in theater and mock trial. They proofread each other’s essays.

When they do get together, like they have been over winter break, the twins are inseparable. And even though Ruby will head to back to Northfield soon, Adriana is planning to learn to ice skate at the Carleton ice rink so the siblings can lengthen their time together.

Louie Conn wants you to know he’s happy. The Iowa native told me that cheering professionally for the Minnesota Vikings has led to friendships and memories that “surpassed every expectation I had when I accepted my spot on the team.”

Conn was subject to massive online abuse after the Vikings announced he and another man, Blaize Shiek, would join the cheerleading squad this fall. Outraged trolls lost their stunted little minds.

Conn’s mom, Kathleen, said the heckling extended into some of the games. Vikings fans laughed and jeered while shooting video of Conn performing the routines. She said a teammate pulled Conn aside and reminded him that when he’s performing in dance competitions, he never notices the crowd. Just dance, she told him.

“Maybe he’s matured a bit to not let it get under his skin so much,” Kathleen said. “Louie is doing what he loves, and that’s what counts.”