RECIPE FOR A DELICIOUS AUTUMN IN MAINE

I don't know if it was that we got just the right amount of rain earlier in the year  

or if the temperature was just right or that we are just some of the luckiest people in the United States right now.....but the fall foliage this year is just absolutely breathtaking, spectacular, almost beyond words.


As I was driving home last night, and being the lover of cooking that I am, the thought popped into my mind that all of the trees look like God had these big seasoning bottles from up above and sprinkled cinnamon, cayenne pepper and dry ground mustard all over the trees.  The burning bushes are the most brilliant candy apple red I've ever seen.

The mixture of colors makes the artist in me salivate with eagerness to get my watercolors out! 

I figure if we threw in some apples and sugar, and added  nice flaky crust over Maine....we'd  have a yummy warm autumn pie that was spicy, sweet, exotic and just about perfect.  If you don't live here....I'm sorry you're going to miss it.  I hope you have a beautiful autumn where ever you are.   It's no wonder this beautiful time of year leads right into the blessed time to be thankful.     
                                                                                     

                                               

"Just before the death of flowers,
And before they are buried in snow,               
There comes a festival season
When nature is all aglow."

Author Unknown

Home Sweet Home

After 45 years of living out in the middle of 40 acres way out in the country, in Texas,  my Mom (85) and my Dad (87) have decided to move into town to be nearer to the grocery store, nearer to the doctor/hospital, nearer to shopping....and they seem to be taking it well.  

Actually much better than I am taking it.  Don't get me wrong, I am truly overjoyed that they are making this move.  I live so far away from them--miles away--states away that I worry about them being way out in the country behind three country gates that have to be unlocked and opened *(by hand).  They've loved and thrived on their privacy.  I've been happy for them to be where they've wanted to be and to have been able to have lived like they've wanted to live.  But, as the years have slipped away and although they seem to be in relatively great shape for their age, they are beginning to show signs of age and frailty.  The kind that living out in the country isn't always kind too.  The maintenance of a country home, a water well, the inconvenience of distance from anything or anyone is not so tough to take when one is younger.  


My folks have never been, are not, and never will be quitters.  The fact that they've lived so many years out in the country doing all their own work and maintenance is proof of that they are not afraid of work.  But they are also sound of mind and realized, more so recently, that if both of them took ill, living out there all alone would not be in their  best interest....and they care very deeply for each others health and welfare.  


In just a few days they will celebrate 63 years of marriage and they still rub each others feet and hold hands.  They are and always have been my measure of true love.


The last few years we've heard them talk about "someday we won't be able to live out here"....but (even though we were glad those thoughts had crossed their minds), we never pushed the issue....knowing, hoping, praying that in time they would come to their own decision of when the time was right.  And that day did come.....I think perhaps when the well broke down and they had to finally hire someone else to fix it....it was probably one of the last straws and then they were both feeling not quite up to par.......and they must have lovingly looked at each other one evening and said..."it's time".


As though through a miracle, by the grace of God, almost unbelievably, the housing area on the base where my Dad retired (a base that is now closed and almost non-military) decided that instead of tearing down all the housing, they would lease the homes.  How perfect!  Right across the street from the grocery store they have shopped at for 45 years, within 2 blocks of a Walmart and other shopping, 30-40 minutes closer to the military hospital they go to....but (another miracle) a huge new hospital is being built right on the base about 2 miles from their new home.  They made the decision and signed a lease that week.  I'm sure they must have felt the smiles from here to where my sister lives and all the way in between.  Likewise they probably heard our sighs of relief.

They've said many times in the last few months that they wished they had made the move several years ago, but that housing wasn't available then and the prospect of all they things they had to dispose of was just too overwhelming.  I undeniably believe with all my heart in the thought that things happen for a reason and God lets them happen at just the right time.  I know he's always watched over them and me........and I believe that sometimes it's just almost unexplainable the mysterious ways He lets things happen....his wonders to perform.


And so the task has begun.....slowly.....ever so slowly of sorting through years of treasures and memories and having to choose what's truly important and needs to be carried to the new home, what makes you look at each other and say "Why? What were we keeping these for? How?  How did we accumulate so much 'stuff'?  


My sister and brother-in-law, niece and nephew and John and I have each gone to help....but for the most part it is their task.....because it must be.....it's their life that they alone can sort through and make decisions on and it must be done in their time.....as slow as that might seem.  In the end it will be best that way.  They will not feel forced into the move, they will not be forced to give up something they might have wanted to keep and were talked into shucking.


When I went back recently I had moment of tears for the things they can't take with them...the home they built from the ground up, the heart in the sidewalk my dad scratched into the wet cement with the words Lee loves Jane, all the trinkets Mom had in each of her theme decorated rooms (the mardi gras room, the spanish room, the jungle room), the years of hard work and joy they had living there.  I wept for those things.....that they couldn't take with them.  But when I got there and saw the frustration of the task before them I realized as much as they loved that place it had become an albatross around their necks that they could not wait to get out from under....so we worked like banshees to help them get some of the work done.


Slowly they are moving, each day a few steps more.  


I always thought and often talked about wanting the old house and land....it was my dream to inherit it or buy it from them.  It was where I went when I had breast cancer and for 8 months it was my refuge from what seemed at the time a dark and dismal world.  I had lost my husband to a long slow illness and then been diagnosed with cancer a week later.....and that place was my life line that helped me hang on......so tranquil and healing out in the middle of nature and God's wilderness with the love of my folks wrapped around me to help me hang on, to bring back my health, to make me see the possibility of life and happiness again.  I thought then what a beautiful retreat it would make for cancer patients to recoup.  But as the years have gone by, I came to realize the huge amount of responsibility and work it took to live out there and life took me other places.  I know in my heart though, that I will always miss that place (even though I never lived there as a child, I didn't grow up there, I only visited and gained back my health there).....I know I will miss it and for years to come it will seem strange to go to Texas and not drive out there and open that big gate and the second gate and the third and walk into that eclectic house filled with love.  


As you get older and your folks get even older and the folks of your friends start to pass away, you can't help but start thinking that someday God will take them home too.....I think about that a lot.....and I ache with sadness and the tears flow..... but when that happens, the sweet man who shares my life with me reminds me that he wishes his folks were still alive and that I should not be sad, but should be filled with joy that my folks are still alive and that most importantly they love each other and they have been so blessed to have lived as long as they have on their own out in the privacy of God's country just exactly they way they wanted to live.


Now they've made a decision to move on to another phase of their long and love-filled life together.

When the final things are removed from the old home and the final papers are signed for someone else to take ownership.....I'm guessing that day will be sad for them....but life will be so much easier and much simpler (at least in my mind)...they will have to adjust to having someone live right next door to them...they will have to adjust to the noise that living in town brings.....that you don't hear out in the country.......but they will realize quickly the joys of convenience ........and they will once more be back to a time when they felt safe.....living in military base housing as they did for so many years before Dad retired.  

In some strange bizarre way it will almost be like coming home.......my prayer is that God will bless them with several more years of a wonderful life together and we will all come to know this old "new" home as Home Sweet Home.


Father Time is not always a hard parent, and, though he tarries for none of his children, often lays his hand lightly upon those who have used him well; making them old men and women inexorably enough, but leaving their hearts and spirits young and in full vigor.  With such people the gray head is but the impression of the old fellow's hand in giving them his blessing, and every wrinkle but a notch in the quiet calendar of a well-spent life.  ~Charles Dickens

If you love someone let them know today....tomorrow may never come.

   (copy the URL below into your search line...you won't be disappointed)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nr7DcJdbCS0

God bless the men and woman overseas and here in the United States who serve and protect us!

Mother Nature Redecorated!

As always with me, and perhaps with you too, time just keeps moving right along.  Summer in my world will soon be over and I am not ready for that to happen. My summer has been filled with winds, tornadoes, the never ending sound of chain saws and the ever-changing scenery in our subdivision. Gone is so much of our privacy as well as the privacy of our neighbors....some more than others.  And in many ways it is sad.

But as in so many things-- out of tragedy comes lessons, newness and a reminder of what is important in life.  Gone are the big beauiful trees that brought us shade and the sometimes comfort of the rustle of their leaves as the wind whispered through the branches. But now our vegetable garden will get all the sunshine it needs.  Gone are some of the truly beautiful flower gardens in our neighborhood.  But for some it will bring the adventure of expanding lawns and creating new gardens.  Gone is the quiet idyllic calmness of a small town neighborhood. Tempers have flaired and friendships have been tested.  But now we see houses we have never seen before that were hidden from our view and ours from theirs......and so perhaps new friendships will form.

I've spent summers in this neighborhood out in my yard with seemingly no one else outside, wondering where all the people are....wondering why they too were not out enjoying the wonderful weather, the sunshine, the extraordinary pleasure of living in a neighborhood that still had lots of trees and the beauty of nature gracefully placed in between, in front of, and behind the homes.  Where were the people?  But this summer Mother Nature gave us a bit of a nudge and people are out and about.....not always smiling....but for the most part trying to make the best of a bad situation.....trying to see the glass as half full instead of half empty.  It could have been so much worse.

It's true, this is not how I planned on spending my summer.  This has greatly taken away from time that I thought I would spend writing on my novel. This has given me an excuse to exchange walking everyday, for hours of raking and moving limbs (hopefully providing me with the cardio exercise I need).  The minutes have ticked by, the days have slipped away, the scenery has changed.   Summer will soon slip into fall. But that's OK. Life is good!  

I always try to see the bright side of things, the silver lining around the darkest cloud.....I guess I have a bit of a Pollyanna mentality......why just this morning I stumbled across a new blog and saw this cute sign and fell in love with it......

"I am fairly certain that given a cape and a nice tiara, I would save the world"

.....It made me think of my friend Debi Weaver who lives in Dallas.

Well I am off to do some more raking of my yard.  Enjoy every moment, enjoy every day.....and when someone or some thing unexpectedly changes scenery of your neighborood.......just think of it as Mother Nature redecorating.  I think she needs to talk to David Bromstad! :)

And life goes on.....

The dawn of yesterday was eye-opening.  The harsh realization that what happened the night before was not just a bad "dream" nightmare, but a real nightmare that did not go away. Our place was strewn with branches and debris so thick you could not see our yard. My beautiful perennial gardens that received so many wonderful compliments on my side and back yards were now covered with big trees that had toppled like matchsticks by the force of the wind.  Gorgeous wave petunias hanging from my front trees were stripped and trees in the back yard (for as far as we could see--which now had increased by about 500 ft.or more) were split, broken or down, broken bones poking through the skin of the earth. It is painful to look at them. In a few weeks they will all be gone.  The broken ones, the down ones, the ones with roots pulled out of the ground and only standing because they are leaning against another broken tree will be cut down, pulled away, or put through industrial chippers.  For weeks we will hear the whir of chain saws, chippers and cherry pickers.  Our landscapes will change, our privacy stripped away, but life will go on.

As we brought out the rakes, saws, and our own little chipper to begin the daunting task of cleaning the yard surrounding our home, we were thrilled to see that our bird feeder stationed where the lawn met the apron of the tree line was standing sturdy and ready to provide our bird (and squirrel) friends with seed.  The birds flocked in like nothing had happened to their world. Their beautiful chirping was uplifting and glorious to hear. Life goes on.

As the day past, sunshine pouring down on us through places that used to be shaded with tree tops, we made lots of observations. With each square foot of yard that was revealed by our cleanup, we could imagine that some day in a few weeks things would be accepted and our yard would be back to relative normal.  Our water breaks brought forward our thankful thoughts that we were not hurt, that our home was still standing (save only a few shingles blown off). We can not imagine what the people in Jarrell, Texas must have felt when a tornado hit that town (several years back) and left nothing in the whole town but miles and miles of wood splinters, the whole town leveled. Theirs was a category 5 with winds over 250 mph.  Ours was declared a category 1 with winds close to 100. Those fine people gathered their hearts together and never gave up hope, rebuilt their city....life goes on.  We can not imagine what people in war-torn countries must go through when they are bombed.  Thank God we can not imagine that.  For the survivors of those bombings....life must go on.  How courageous they must be. Our damage pales in comparison to those thoughts.  Our damage pales in comparison to other people in our town and the surrounding towns who lost roofs, houses, animals.  We just have a very messy yard huge trees to clean up.  Others in the abutting neighborhood who were hit harder than us begin their cleanup and are thankful, as we are, that no one was hurt.

On the bright side, (no pun intended) our small vegetable garden is miraculously still standing and will get as much sunshine as it needs.....nothing blocking the sun now!

Last night, after raking, dragging, and chipping away at the debris from 8 AM to 7 PM, we ached from the tops of our heads to the tips of our toes.  But as the hot comforting water sprayed down our backs in the shower it washed away the fright of the tornado, the pain of the clean up, and helped massage in the realization of the changes in our home/lot that happened in the blink of an eye.  Mother Nature brought a huge change, but once again she helped us realize what is really important....that we still have each other, that we can accept change.....that life goes on.

We were told by a neighbor coming home in the storm and stopping so the doors of  her car were not blown out....that she looked up and saw the funnel right behind our house.  That thought still scares me and I wonder and give thanks to God that it seemingly got the trees, but pulled up before it got our home.

If you love someone, don't miss the chance today to tell them so.

Dorothy, Are we in Kanasas?

The sky turned that icky color of gray-green. A sky like a child sick with a severe stomach ache. Heaving, blowing, rolling, and ready to erupt. And then the lightning struck straight down, wide, blinding, cracking right outside our 4-season room--ripping the bark right off of a huge tree--so loud it took my breath away. I heard the blood curdling scream and realized it was coming from the depth of my core. The uncontrollable tears poured out of my eyes like an inner ocean I didn’t realize I had. I was sobbing uncontrollably for what seemed forever. Panic and fear set in. Just as I was able to catch my breath and the sobbing subsided, the pings and hits began on the house and windows. We ran for the basement. The “train” was literally using our house as a track.


No sooner had we gotten down in the basement, then it got quiet and all we could hear was the blistering rain. We slowly ascended the stairs hoping that we’d just had a bit of heavy wind. Little did we know.

Our back yard, front yard, side yard, down the street, across the street, over to the next subdivision, had been hit by a bomb. What was our beautiful neighborhood looked like a war zone, save only, thank God, without any human casualties. The casualties were homes, trees, gardens. Thousands and thousands of dollars in damage. My thoughts went to the squirrels and birds and other nature creatures out there amongst all the rubble. And we were told ours was not the hardest hit.

Neighbors were out immediately checking on each other, crying out to each other to see if everyone was OK. We were hugging, crying, all in a bit of shock at the devastation. And then the rain came again, in sheets. Night descended and we knew all we could do was go to bed and wait until the light of morning to survey the complete extent of the damage.

We went to bed with the comfort that we were not hurt, we still had each other, we just had a lot of clean- up to do. And so the task is at hand and we must begin.

Anybody need some wood?

Would you sell your soul for your cell phone?

Yesterday afternoon I had something happen to me that freaked me out, made me panic, made me feel desperate and then made me laugh at myself for feeling all of those things.

I lost my cell phone!!

Holy oh Hannah!  I was jumping through hoops retracing my steps, writing down all the places I'd been since I last saw my cell phone.  Let's see I had it with me when I did my 5 mile power walk . Yep had it with me then because I remember when the sweat was pouring down my face I took it off my fanny pack belt and put it on my kitchen counter....had it then.  Then I went to take care of some paperwork at an office, brought my brief case with me, and it was clasped to my purse in the little side pocket where it always is....I think.  Then I went to the grocery store, put my purse in the baby seat on the grocery cart (which of course they always tell women not to do....because dirty diapers have been where --the bottom of your purse is....euuuuu....well you get my drift).  But yeah, my purse was in that seat.  So it certainly could have gotten caught on the handle bar when I went to pay (the phone pocket is on the outside of my purse).  I went to the pharmacy and hiked my purse up on the counter to pay.........geeze I thought I saw it there.  Then I went back home, unloaded my groceries, could have sworn I saw the phone then.  And then I went to Walmart.  OH NO!!!! Not Walmart.  If I dropped it at Walmart I may never find it or have it returned.  I realized it was not in my purse when I went to use it at Walmart.  But I didn't panic at Walmart because my better sense told me it must surely be on my kitchen counter where I know for sure I saw it earlier in the day.  I only thought I put it back in the phone pocket of my purse.  Not to worry.  As soon as I get home, my "security blanket" will be right where I left it. I finish shopping and drove home--walked in the door, my eyes almost flew out of my eye sockets to the Counter ....NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO  THE PHONE IS NOT THERE! Panic immediately set in.  Humor me....it's my cell phone.  It's my security if I'm ever in an accident.  It's my means of calling to see if we need anything else when I'm at the grocery store.  It's my additional phone in case you can't get me at my home. It's the place I have all of the phone numbers of friends, relatives, doctors, dentist, beauty salon.....taxi cab numbers for taxi's in San Antonio and Dallas (I need them 2-3 times a year).

So I start one by one calling the places I've been to see if I left my phone on the counter and some kind benevolent soul found it and turned it in.  I even called my cell phone company to see if they could beam me up and see where my phone was (I'm sure that guy got a good laugh out of that question).  I did all of this after going with my portable home phone back out to my car and all over my house calling my cell phone number. But I couldn't hear that Mexican Hat Dance song that I have as my ring tone.  Come on ring, ring, gosh darn it all...RING! DA DA-- DA DA--DA DADADA DA DA........nope, the only ringing I can hear is on my home portable and that dang Mexican Hat Dance music is playing somewhere out there.  So the advise I got from the cell phone company was that if I had not located it by tomorrow morning to call customer service and have the number turned off.........cause heaven forbid some guy (or girl) would find it and call those 1-900 numbers and start charging long distance charges up the wazoo on my cell phone.  It's just so depressing, to have to get a new phone and try to remember all the numbers you had in the old one....and then get use to and give out a new number to 85,000 people (OK....maybe 85!).  I am in a major panic.

Breathe Peggy, breathe.  Calm down. Chill. Let it go.  It's not the end of  the world.  You're not out in the middle of no where in a blizzard with no houses around for miles. It's a cell phone.  You can get another one.

OK.  I'm feeling less stressed.....but let me retrace my steps one more time.  Empty my purse on the counter, Go into every room in my house, every closet, through every pocket of my brief case, unzip every pocket of my brown leather brief case...nope....I've looked there before for my cell phone in it's brown leather case....I did look there before didn't I.............go ahead scroll back up (I'll wait).....did I tell you I looked there before.......have you guessed by now....right there on my brown leather brief case attached to the side pocket was my brown leather cell phone case with my cell phone right there in it.  I guess I just overlooked it when I went through the inside of that case maybe a dozen times.  Oh good grief.....heavy heavy sigh (of relief).

Which brings me to the questions: What have we become that we are so dependent on a little piece of plastic that flips open and connects us to the world?  And would you sell your soul for your cell phone?" There was a time (come on I know some of  you remember it) when we did not have cell phones, when we actually asked someone before we left home, "Is there anything else you can think of that we need at the grocery store?" or "What is that brand of shirts you like so much?".  There was a time when we didn't have computers and were not nearly so impatient if information didn't come to us in a nano-second.  There was a time when children went outdoors and created games or rode their bikes with other children (or alone).  And they call this progress!?  But it's true, I have a computer and I have a cell phone.........and oh yeh, just yesterday I bought my first ever I POD.......now I'm not sure how to use it, but I think I know how to get my favorite tunes onto that tiny little shuffler that is barely 1" by 3".  And no I don't need the one that I can put videos on and I'll never need to have more than 500 songs on it at one time.  I don't need a phone that I can play a gillion games on or shoot a video on, (but it sure would be nice to sign on and get my boarding passes when I'm in a remote area and it's 24 hours before 6:00 AM when my flight leaves).

But the world is already moving way too fast.......so this summer I'm just going to try to chill out and make each day last as long as I can.  I'll listen to my music on my tiny I POD, write a chapter or two on my novel, read, walk............and oh yeah.......keep my cell phone super-glued to my body!

A BRIEF HELLO TO FILL THE LULL

I've been reminded on more than one occasion that this blog has "once again" set silent for far too long. Time just does not seem to be my friend lately.  Or maybe I have my priorities out of order.  Lately I seem to be scrambling and grasping at any minute, 15 minutes (heaven help me if I find an hour....I'm delirious) to read.  I'm obsessed!! I often think in the time I eek out reading, I could be writing.  Sometimes I feel like I am just gathering courage.......but sometimes that is the best time to write, or paint, when you're unsure of yourself, when you're sure no one will like what you write or the picture you paint or whatever task you have at hand.  I am more and more convinced that the person I should try to please is me.  After all isn't it like the old adage that you have to like yourself before others will like you.  So I promise I will write again soon.  In the meantime let me share my reading with you.  I've just finished Pocketful of Names by Joe Coomer (just as wonderful as One Vacant Chair) and I'm just starting to read the latest book by Laraine Herring  It's already sucked me in!  Well I just heard the Today Show music gear up on TV....which means 7:00 and time to get my rear in gear and head downstairs and get to work......writing time is over for today.  Check back soon.  I'll write again, I promise.  Have a perfectly wonderful day....Remember 'As the corners of your mouth go, so goes your day'! :)

Read. It's good for the soul!

I am and have been reading voraciously.  I can not seem to get my fill of so many different, revealing, personal, touching and unique ways that writers write. I have allowed myself to become the flesh and breathing of characters in the books I have read, so much so that I cry and laugh out loud when the characters in the books do so.  I allow myself to block out the chair in which I am sitting, the treadmill on which I'm walking, the view out my window so that I may sit in a chair in the book, walk down paths I would have never walked down, and see out my window the view of the town, village, city, street, room that I have suddenly been welcomed into. I am happily, magically, completely overwhelmed with desire, pain, happiness, and oneness to each setting/character(s) into which I melt  The voices around me, dialects new to my ear--seem so strangely familiar.  New smells and aromas, colors and sounds fill my world, my thoughts, my passion, my need to be able to put down on paper words that will evoke those feelings and complete surrender of readers to my writing.  If you've not read these books, you surely must....
.The Help by Kathryn Stockett, Little Bee: A Novelby Chris Cleave, and the one I am currently reading that has brought me to snorting guffaws of laughter and heart-wrenching sobs of sorrow One Vacant Chair: A Novel (Graywolf Press) by Joe Coomer.  Joe Coomer is magical. His characters will reach out their hands and beckon you into their lives. This is his latest. He has many others.  No doubt I will read them all.

I am hearing from many sources that to be a great writer you must read, read, and read some more.  I've come to think 'So many books, so little time'.  Read, it's good for the soul!

"Ba Haba"

You simply cannot live in Maine and never make your way someday to Bar Harbor on Mt. Desert Island.  It's a must see, but probably more memorable in the dead of summer when the tourist are packed like sardines on sidewalks, in hotels, bed and breakfasts, cottages and beautiful huge mansions.  Although the folks taking up summer residence in the fairyland homes with the breathtaking views of the Atlantic Ocean are probably not considered (nor do they consider themselves) tourists.  They are summer residents from far away places.  Their summers are probably more spent behind the privacy fences in their luxurious "summer homes".  But I could be wrong. They may well love the hustle and bustle of the crowds that overtake this paradise island from the 2nd week in April until Labor Day.


We chose to go a couple of weekends ago. Easter weekend. One of the last weekends before the quiet goes away. Hotels and business were putting on the final touches and signs heralded the approaching season and the opening of those establishments.
 
The ride up US 1 is interesting.  All along the way there are the rows and rows of white coffins some in a line, some squeezed in this way and that. At least that is what the boats with white shrink wrapped tarps in every port along the way looked like to me. Coffins or rows of soldiers waiting patiently for their unveiling when they could once again breath life into themselves and the men and woman that captain them.

As we drove up the sun was beating in through the passenger's side window toasting my right ear and face.  The warmth penetrated the window.  I closed my eyes and let myself feel the wet sand as the water laid itself in lapping motion against the shore.  I could smell the salt wafting off the water through the air. The warmth and my imagination transformed me from the car to a warm tropic beach.

Our trip took us through Brunswick past the St. John's Parish Hall and the strangely named St. John The Baptist Catholic Church.  We scooted past the Wylie Gallery-Contemporary Craft and the stop light at the "Town Mall".  Then on past Bowdoin College with it's lovely campus and painstakingly cared for old buildings. Brunswick is a town with lovely old homes.  Not far down the road (or should that be up the road) is the town of Bath, home of Bath Iron Works where they build huge ships for the United States Navy.  We waved hello as we past the Morring B and B and the Taste of Maine. We noticed that Suzie Ater had her sign out on a few houses for sale.  We traveled up over the bridge that brought us to some wet lands.  We went out past the Ledgeview Road following the meandering of U.S. 1.

The Shelter Institution and Montsweag Farm brought us into Wiscassett past Simpson's Seafood and a sign advertising "Solar Clothes Dryers"...(Is that a fancy name for a clothes line?). Another turn of the road held the sign to the Two Bridges Regional Jail, Blue Haven, and Big Al's Super Value. Wiscassett is Small Town USA.  The road curves on down a hill past some lovely homes, past the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office, "Real Eats" and the water of the Sheepscot River glistening like jewels lulling us right into Edgecomb.  6 miles from New Castle overlooking the Sheepscot River was a beautiful salt water farm. At the cut off to Booth Bay Harbor, up on the hill, sat Cod Cove Inn.

That took us into lovely little Maine town of Damariscotta.  Right on past the Pioneer Motel on the left and a church with no steeple.  Well actually the steeple was there next to the church, on the ground, surrounded with scaffolding.  Right in front of the church was a huge sign with a huge goal line set on it and the words that said it all: RAISE THE STEEPLE.  Beckoning us on were the signs to Nobelboro and Waldoboro, past the Duck Puddle Campground, Moody's Diner that has been there for years.  As usual, business was booming. Waldoboro passed in the blink of our eyes and all along the way there were antique stores with memories for sale.  We went through Warren and Thomaston that was established in 1605.  Thomaston is the home of the old Maine State Prison known as "Tommy Town" and on down the road was the General Knox Museum.

 The afternoon found us in Rockland home of the Dragon Cement Co. claimed in the Indian Claim Settlement.  The road dead ends and turns right into the Atlantic Ocean (well it doesn't turn right into the Atlantic...it turns right....looking right into the Atlantic).

We saw the Samoset Resort overlooking the ocean and the lighthouse with entry by way of a breakwater.

You just know there are people in these little quiet, picturesque, quaint little towns looking out their kitchen window at the glorious awesome view of the ocean thinking ' in a matter of weeks there will be throngs--masses of people, shoulder to shoulder tourists, all trying to squeeze out of a weekend or 2 weeks, a month, a summer-- whatever amount of time their real lives allot them --the joy and postcard fantasy that I know as home'.

Out of my window passed Camden with its old mansions that speaks of big old money.  When we rolled past Linconville, the fog rolled past us.  But as we neared Northport and moved north away from the water, the sky opened to a tender blue being kissed by sunshine.  You could see all the way to heaven.

I spied a bald headed man with a beard that hung down to his waist.  He looked like he had been sitting there on that porch for as long as the old house had been there.  Sitting and rocking as the world whizzed by.

On past Searsport where we saw an old house that had literally crumbled into itself.






Then up over a bridge to Bucksport and the Jonathan Buck Monument.  We stopped at the cemetery to see the tombstone and read about the legend of  Captain Buck 

Ellsworth seemed more commercialized and there were huge signs advertising the GREAT MAINE LUMBERJACK SHOW on U. S. 3-- not opened for the season--yet.

The water along our trip was ever-changing.  In some places it was in constant motion, some places with white caps...other places like sheets of glass.  All a writer's paradise.

This is the ride up the rugged coast of Maine. Beautiful, serene, quaint, post card picturesque.  This was the road that took us to Bar Harbor.

For the most part on this Easter weekend, Bar Harbor was closed.  The season not yet "open".  The hotels still stood silent.  The stores and parks and sidewalks patiently waiting, all being buffed and polished and readied for all that the coming weeks and months would bring.  We were able to see the exhibit at the Abbe Museum by a breathtakingly poignant  writer Mihku Paul Anderson that I met at a writing workshop at UNE. Mihku  We were able to take a beautiful ride around the island and into a small part of Acadia National Park that was opened. I was mesmerized by the beautiful homes, by water trickling down the mountain sides; trails of water rushing to become one tiny stream, tiny streams rushing together to become one small creek, creeks rushing to the river that poured into the bay that swirled around the rugged coast of Maine and into the Atlantic Ocean.

The solitude, the fresh air, the ducks bobbing like tiny white buoys in the water. The foam of the water slapping against the jutting rocks.  I sat on the edge of a mountain in the park and thought what a writer's paradise this was--a writer's paradise surrounded by nature where imagination doesn't have to ask permission to run wild.

Someday we will go back when the season is in full swing, when the traffic is bumper to bumper, when there are lines outside the restaurants and ice cream parlors, when the hotels, motels and bed and breakfasts are filled to capacity.  We'll be there when there is laughter in the air, walkers on the trails, boats and tours and people--lots and lots of people. None of that was there this weekend but it was perfect for us.  It was what we needed. A quiet escape, a long easy ride up a beautiful coast.  This weekend started out to be about the destination, but it turned out to be about the journey.....and really isn't that what's important.

When Whoever's in New England's Through With You....

I'm a southern girl. Born in New Orleans. Became an adult in south Texas (after years of traveling). I miss the sticky heat, the drawl, the smell of good Tex-Mex food (heavy sigh), the fields of Blue Bonnets this time of year , the slow pace, the warm smiles, moss dripping like gray cotton candy off the branches, the warm pungent seductive aroma of the magnolias....the grits....ahhh the south.

But as I was driving to work this morning and the rain was trickling down my windshield, I could see tiny buds on the trees and tulips valiantly pushing their little green hands out of the ground as if to say, "hey, hello, we're back--spring is on the way."  That's the thing about New England.....the very distinct seasons.  The Spring that brings renewal, hope and a sense that you can start anew no matter what the past has dealt you.  The Summer with it's relative coolness and just a hint of heat so you can say, ah yes, summer.  Fall in New England, need I

say more.....crisp air, brilliant reds, yellows, golds and every variation in between as Mother Nature celebrates before bringing out her winter coat.

And of course, Winter, white, cold, blustery, sometimes frustrating, sometimes wonderland, always long.

I always learn so many things no matter where I live. The south gave me warmth in the air and in my soul. The north gives me hope and compartments of time in her seasons. Time to work through things and time in which to look forward.

I am trying as I've been taught--to bloom where I am. To savor my surroundings and dig in. To call it 'home' no matter where I find myself. To 'find myself' in the world where I exist at any given time.

Every place is beautiful. Every place is full of history. Every place has something I'll remember and miss when I'm not there. Every place a potential story just waiting to be written.

I'm a southern girl and I miss the south....but for now I'm a northern girl and I'm here till 'Whatever's in New England's through with me'. If the time ever comes that I go back south, on some morning when I'm driving and the rain is trickling down my windshield, I'll hear New England whispering (to paraphrase the song) "You know its not too late 'cause you'll always have a home to come back to"

Why do I write--or not?

This morning when I was on my treadmill reading (well reading while I was walking), what I was reading made me think about my writing (or lack thereof). Among other books, I am currently reading Writing Begins with the Breath: Embodying Your Authentic Voice by Larraine Herring. Larraine is a writer, author and teacher. In the chapter titled Self-Awareness she talks about how you should consider why you write by turning the question around and considering why you don't write or why you procrastinate in your writing.

That got me to thinking and had I not still had a half hour left on the treadmill, I would have sat right down and written my thoughts on this. But instead I avoided the act of writing by prioritizing my exercise above my writing. So why do I do that? Is the exercise more important than the writing? Perhaps for my physical and future wellness the exercise is something I should not push to the side. But for my mental wellness I need to write. Larraine explains in another chapter that writing is just like showing up for exercise. Weight loss and good health will occur if I keep showing up for the exercise and writing will take me places if only I'd keep showing up.

So why do I not put my writing up at the top of my priority list? Perhaps it is because the writing is mine, the writing is for me, the writing is my joy,release, escape. And because I have just recently, early into my 60s made time for me. It is a long story, briefly covered in some of my other post (I think). A story of a caretaker and someone that always tried to please everyone else but herself. That was me. And so perhaps that was the void I never could fill. Perhaps there is some truth in the words "to thine own self be true". Only in brief moments throughout the last 45 years or so have I taken more than just a day or two (perhaps a week) to be true to myself and to acknowledge the voice crying inside me, the spirit calling out my name from some far off place, the aching that will not go away, the burning need to write. That voice, that calling,keeps showing up, keeps begging to be recognized as real and important, will not let go no matter how far I push it aside. And now it demands to be heard. It has broken free from the depths of my being and is racing through every vessel, every pore, every thought. It will no longer take no for an answer. It will no longer be pushed aside while I take care of someone else.

The line at the top of my blog says "Someday, Somewhere, Somehow...to write a book and have it published--hopefully in this lifetime". Perhaps that will happen and perhaps it will not. But this I know. This is what is important...that I listen to my calling, that I show up everyday and that I write. I am a writer. I always have been.

Writing in La La Land

One of the things writing teachers tell you is to take notes, be observant, jot down ideas, record things you see, however insignificant, write out dreams you can remember--you just never know when those thoughts, ideas, observances or dreams might be just what you are looking for when you are writing.

OK. So get this. I'm standing in a lobby of a very tall building. I'm very sleepy, groggy, fighting desperately to open my eyes. I'm standing in front of a window that is a credit union in the lobby of this building (like an order window)...you don't go in and talk to the loan officer, you just order it at the order window. But I needed to wake up enough to explain to the loan officer at the window why I needed to borrow the money. I told him I was working for an organization that did compassionate shipping and clothing for morbidly obese people. We made boxes they could be shipped in (OK this part confuses me just as much as it's confusing you) and we make clothes that have to have support around the waist. The only thing we've come up with to use is what I keep calling "cotillion wire". The credit union loan officer does not know what "cotillion wire" is. I keep saying, "You know, like in the movie 'Gone with the Wind', the women wore the big hoop skirts to the Cotillions. The wire hoops held the skirts of their dresses out in a big circle." I kept repeating that, but they never could understand. In the meantime, I am still so sleepy, I can barely keep my eyes opened. I sit down on a chair in the lobby and doze off. Occasionally I wake up long enough to hear a voice on a loud speaker saying "My number is 3378 (or whatever 4-digit number they were) and the reason I want to be heard on the afternoon salute to Joel Ward is (and they'd state their reason) (Joel Ward is a man I used to work with years ago who recently passed away). I could rarely remember what they'd say past their number because I kept dozing off.

I finally woke up enough to realize I was very very late from returning on my lunch break and tried to find my way to the elevator (stopping at another counter to see how to get a number so I too could be on the afternoon salute to Joel Ward). But as you can probably guess by now, I found the elevator, stood in front of it and dozed off. I could barely see the up and down button. I heard a man's voice asking if I was going up or down. "Up", I said. My eyelids were weighed down like tiny bricks on each eyelash. The doors of the elevator opened and I was moving in slow motion like in the movie "10" where Bo Derek runs across the beach, like my feet are stuck in sludge. The doors are closing and I'm trying to get on. I turn sideways and slide in--but the elevator is 2-part, one compartment behind the other and I miss the first compartment and slide into the second. The second compartment is an express elevator that goes directly from the lobby to the 64th floor. There are two men on the elevator with boxes of 'packing popcorn' and bubble wrap. The 'packing popcorn' is all sticky and full of glue and it keeps flying out of the box and sticking to me. The two men act like they don't even see me in the elevator. At one point I am frantically trying to get a piece of this sticky gunk off my finger that has attached itself to me and feels like a leach sucking the blood in a jungle river. They get off on the 64th floor with all their boxes. I, of course, have again gotten very groggy. I can barely see the numbers on the elevator to go back down--on the ride down it appears the elevator stops on all the floors. I hit a button that seems to show floors 10-11-12. The elevator bypasses 12 and 11 and stops on the 10th floor. I get off, look around still in a daze. I am in an office I am familiar with but haven't worked in since 1995. A man whose face is familiar (from that time period), but whose name escapes me completely says "Hey Peg" and seeing how confused I look follows up with "10th floor". I ask him how to get to the 12th floor like it's my first time ever to be in this situation. He giving me a look like he thinks I'm two fries short of a happy meal, points to some stairs and says, "Up two flights, just like everyday". I'm fully awake now and run up the stairs wondering how in the hell I'm going to explain taking so long for lunch. I open the door to the 12th floor, look at the clock over the receptionist's desk and realize I'm only 3 minutes late.


OK. Now I know you're probably either laughing your head off or wondering where I slipped off the deep end of the world into La La Looneyville. But that's how dreams work. I can relate to Joel Ward. I worked with him. He passed away. But where the heck did the 64-story building, the "cotillion wire", the shipping obese people (to who knows where and why), the sticky 'packing popcorn--bloodsucking leach' scenes come from? And for that matter how would I ever fit any of that into a novel. Well I guess stranger things have happened. I've read some pretty imaginative books with some pretty far out scenes. So who knows. I'll stick these notes away and maybe one of these days, when I least expect it, I'll be looking for a character or a building or a box of sticky 'packing popcorn' to put in a chapter and I'll refer back to that wacky dream. That's what make fiction writing so much fun. It doesn't have to be true. It just has to fit into the story that is believable enough for the reader to want to read on.

'til I write again. Take care.

Shut up and write!

I just realized that I have been TALKING way too much about wanting to write and not doing what a writer must do.....WRITE.

On any given day I have a thousand things running around in my brain--kind of like a car that stops at a stop light and everyone in the car jumps out to play "Chinese Fire Drill". When all the characters get back in the car, they have changed--not only places, but appearances and thoughts. They jump out at the next stop light to yet change again. And I think to myself that I should write those thoughts down, write how each character looks each time they change, write down their thoughts, think about what they are doing, may be doing, have done and how it might fit into a not yet formed or written story.

But lately all I seem to do is just think about writing, yearn to write, ache to write, plan to write...a story, an article, a poem, a book. I am (in my writing study) reading a fabulous blog by a young woman named Laraine Herring. She is a teacher, writer, author, counselor, a playwright and an editor. But mostly to me, she is an inspiration, telling me (through her blog)...as they say 'not necessarily what I want to hear, but what I need to hear' (but secretly...it is what I want to hear). I can not begin to tell you the words of wisdom I have gleaned from her writing, her teaching and her thoughts.

I am learning to listen more, observe more, and write notes about things I see, hear and feel. I am learning to not be afraid of my past, my personal thoughts, my concerns of the future, my love and devotion to certain people and places, present and past--the secrets of my heart--how ordinary my life seems. I am learning we all have a story and each one is unique. We all have fantasies, wishes, dreams and ordinary lives that might or might not seem ordinary to a reader. We should write.

I am learning that it's time to lighten my load--that less is more. I am learning that I can "not color" my hair and the world will not stop because all of a sudden I have decided to grow old gracefully, naturally--salt and pepper gray. It is actually very freeing. I can talk myself out of the bed at 4:30 in the morning to get on the treadmill for an hour, so I don't have to do it in the afternoon when I come home so tired. I can get used to taking care of my body so that the approaching 'older' years will not be laden with aches, pains and illness. I'm getting used to the peaceful safe retreat I now call home. It is freeing.

I am putting down on paper things that bother me. By writing my thoughts and anguishes down, I get them off my chest, out of my heart, beyond the "Chinese Fire Drill" chaos of no direction in my head. For right now I will not share all the thoughts because I don't want the whole world to know (am I an optimist or a fool to think the whole world will read my blog?) I guess I will really be free when I feel comfortable enough to share my ghosts--past and present. I am seeing as Laraine Herring wrote in her blog, that writing frees every part of my world. And as a happenstance acquaintance once told me, write it down, hold out my arms (hands in a meditation pose), deep breath in, deep breath out and let it go.

I have said a thousand times (or more) that I never seem to have the time to write. Writers make the time to write. Writers must be disciplined. Every book that I read (about writing) tells me that I must write, write, write and write some more. So this has become my new lunch half hour. I will eat a bite (or not) and write during this short window of time. Hey it's a start. And of course, as quickly as it started, my half hour is done. Times up. (for today anyway)