Kaitlin and Jon Arrive

This morning I’m writing my blog from the dock, waiting for these two to return from their morning kayak jaunt.

Kaitlin and Jon got here yesterday afternoon and immediately made themselves at home, Kaitlin by jumping in her swim float and and lazing around on the lake in pursuit of her record setting eighth consecutive LVV award, (least valuable vacationer). My son in law has made his presence felt by assembling a campfire. In doing so he looked down his nose at my fire making skills, dismissing my use of artificial fire starting materials, and in that classic millennial way, assured me that all-natural was the way to go. Of course when he got around to actually trying to light the thing he looked like Cro Magnon Man down on his knees hyperventilating. Finally he turned to me, his old-school father in law, and mumbled “maybe we should use one of those first starter things.”  In five minutes the fire was roaring, I felt cocky vindication, and the world was once again spinning correctly on its axis. Of course, the boy hadn't been here ten minutes before he erected this...

...which speaks volumes about his intentions for the next 10 days.

Lest anyone get the wrong idea, my son in law is a great kid. He is a great husband to Kaitlin, a hard working provider, and one day will make a wonderful father to my grand kids. But, I do love my role as smart-mouthed father in law, so the fire thing was just perfect!! Besides, all the women in my family, every single one of them on both sides adore Jon, fawn over him, cater to his every need. So, it’s my job to provide the appropriate counter balance, a job that I do with great flare and skill.

The girls are still out somewhere on the lake. I have to go into town at some point to pick up my new phone, which means I must bring myself to leave the lake, not as easy as it sounds. 

Wait...there has been a sighting!

Game Changer

Pam and I have been here almost two weeks, just the two of us. Today, our oldest child and her husband arrive. We pick them up in Bangor this afternoon. They will be with us for a week. Kaitlin and Jon have been up at Acadia for the past few days staying at a fancy Airbnb. Now they will have to come here and stay with us at a not so fancy cabin, the biggest benefit of which is the fact that Mom and Dad will feed them. To that end, Pam made her second big grocery run yesterday at the Hannaford in Camden. We are stocked with all the essentials:

Coffee

Sausage

Bacon

Beer

Swiss Rolls

Four bags of chips

Fruits and vegetables

All manner of meat

Toilet paper

After a very cool storm passed through last night, this morning there’s bright sunshine, with the next two days calling for “much warmer temperatures with increasing humidity.” For Union, Maine this means...upper 70’s. Perhaps by Sunday we may reach 81 degrees!!

UPDATE: A brand new iPhone is being delivered this morning via Verizon, due to the fact that I had purchased insurance on the water damaged one. I had to pay the $200 deductible, but that’s a lot cheaper than a brand new phone. Insurance can be a beautiful thing.

Reading my fourth novel of the trip, a great read from a Maine writer named Julia Spencer-Fleming...One Was a Soldier. 

NOTE: I have absolutely no idea what is going on in the world at this point. I have kept up with the stock market, an occupational hazard, but other than that, nothing. I can only assume that 2020 is still a dumpster fire, the country is still busy ridding itself of objectionable statues, Democrats are still Democrating, Trump is still Trumping. Maybe by the time we get back to Short Pump, the sports world would have purged all offensive team names, the ones that objectify an entire race or group of people unfairly. The Redskins, The Indians...The Vikings, The Celtics, The Fighting Irish. There’s still a lot of work to do! Meanwhile, I’m up here getting introduced to a new delicacy on the menu at Hazel’s...The Sausage Reuben. That’s right boys and girls...a fat piece of sausage on a sub roll, slathered in Thousand Island dressing, melted Swiss cheese and the most delicious sauerkraut I have ever put in my mouth. It’s a game changer, folks. 

A Good Idea Gone Bad

This photograph could be characterized in many ways. Some would use words like peaceful or relaxing to describe this scene. But, if I were asked to name this particular photograph I would use different words. The Calm Before The Storm. A Good Idea Gone Bad. Minutes Before Mayhem....come to mind.

So, yesterday was a very mixed day for me. On the positive side of the ledger was another glorious sunny day on a lake in Maine, where no matter what happens, it’s always a good day. When bad things happen in Maine it’s all extremely relative. Generally speaking, the folks back home don’t want to hear you complaining about how hard it is to find a car wash—while you’re lazing around for a month on a lake! “How about you wash the car yourself, you lazy bum?” Nevertheless, just because we’re in Maine for a month does not mean that bad things can’t happen...which brings me back to the idyllic photograph above. It all started when my wife ( See: Genesis 3:12 ) had an inspiration while we were sitting on the end of our dock enjoying the sunshine:

Pam: Wouldn’t it be fun if we took our beach chairs out to the swimming float? That way we would have a better view of the lake and the way it floats around in circles, it would be like being on a ride at the Fair!!

Me: (in my head. NOT spoken aloud) Or, like being on that plate inside a microwave. (Spoken aloud) Sure. Sounds fun. Let’s just float out there with our chairs.

Pam: No, I was thinking of kayaking out.

Me: Ok

She went first. She got into her kayak. I handed her the chair, her paddle, her beach towel, and her bag of stuff...since my wife goes nowhere without her bag of stuff. I followed closely behind carrying my chair, my beach towel, with no bag of stuff. I mean...why?

Anyway, I watched with muffled laughter as Pam struggled mightily trying to hoist her beach chair onto the swim float (Pro Tip: Irony alert!). In the process of her clumsy efforts, her beach towel got soaking wet, but she eventually got the chair on the float and her kayak tied off with my gallant help. Speaking of gallantry, I offered her my dry towel for her use as I wrung out her wet one. She looked at me with those adoring eyes and sighed, “My hero!!”

I must admit that while we were out there it was kinda nice. Pam was right. We had a nicer view, and the 360 degree rotation of the swim float was fun. So far, her inspiration had proven to be a great success. But, after packing up Pam in her kayak for her return trip to the dock, I began surveying my options for leaving the swim float and like Abe Lincoln right before the play was about to start, I thought, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” There was nobody to hand me the chair, and the wind had picked up. So I fit the chair in the kayak all cock-eyed and catawampus. Then I thought, I’m going to have a hard time fitting my legs in what’s left of that little opening, maybe I should get it first then reach for the chair? But, as is my custom when presented with any dilemma, I chose the brute force option...”No problem, I’ll make it work!”

I didn’t.

As soon as my bottom hit the seat, it became clear that there was too much weight on the starboard side of the kayak. Then, things started to go in slow motion. As my vessel began its rightward tilt I grabbed for the swim float in vain. The next thing I know I’m flailing around in ten feet of water with a capsized kayak and a folding beach chair drifting away into the depths. I grabbed for the chair, retrieved it, then it promptly opened, serving as a giant sail behind me as I struggled to reach the kayak before it too drifted off. All of this time, Pam is oblivious to my plight, unloading her chair onto the dock, triumphant in the knowledge that she had come up with such a fun idea!

As I was pushing the upside down kayak forward with one hand, and dragging an open beach chair through the water behind me with the other, dog paddling like a madman, it occurred to me that my cell phone was in the pocket of my swim trunks.

Finally, after the longest 90 foot swim of my life, I managed to reach the dock, throw the beach chair onto the deck and struggle up the steps, totally exhausted. I was able to save the kayak and the chair, and myself from a far worse fate. Pam did check to see if I was alright first...but then asked, “Honey, where’s the towel? That was my all time favorite towel!”  

“I would imagine it’s at the bottom of the lake,” I gasped, gulping for air, as Pam quickly got back in her kayak to begin her ultimately unsuccessful towel search and rescue operation. “Don’t worry,” I yelled. “We’ll send Patrick or Jon down to look for it when they get here!!” Pam yelled back, “But, I LOVED that towel!!”

The lesson here guys, if you’re wondering, is never be all gallant and offer your wife your ratty old black and white striped towel you bought at the Dollar General to use while you dry out her favorite towel in the Universe. If not for that stupid mistake it would have been my ratty towel that sunk to the bottom of Crawford Pond. Problem solved!!

Here Comes The Sun

Finally. The Chamber of Commerce just whipped us up a day...

I have nothing to add to these pictures except to say that this is why we come up here for a month. 

Heading out this morning to play golf. 

A Cloudy Tour

Went into Camden this morning. While Pam was busy spending our kids’ inheritance at Once A Tree, I roamed the town in a thin cool mist taking pictures of various landmarks.

The best beer joint in town has fallen victim to COVID-19. Cuzzy has left the building.

The Owl and Turtle is thankfully still in business but closed on Sundays.

I wish our bank and Post Office looked like these guys.

Very disappointed to learn that The entire summer season of concerts, plays and shows at the Opera House were cancelled because of COVID. Town offices are still open, however.

The A-Frame on the left is, believe it or not, a Walgreens. The small building right next door somehow survived the great shutdown of 2020. Zoot’s Coffee Shop is a favorite and my daughter will be happy it still lives on!

The corner of Mechanic’s Street and Elm Street, an intersection prominent in the Academy Award nominated movie Peyton Place.

A memorial erected at the base of the flag pole in the center of the town Commons...right besides the Church with the iconic steeple seen from every house in town.

While taking pictures in the Common I heard muffled voices singing. I followed my ears and found this hearty congregation around the back of the church braving the elements for a worship service.

Since the Owl and Turtle was closed, We drove into Belfast to shop at Left Bank Books. Bought a couple of novels with either Maine themes or Maine authors. That should be enough to keep me busy for a couple of weeks.

 

Pierre

We have been in Maine for eight days now. It has been sunny for two and a half of those days, the rest either cloudy or rainy. This morning it’s raining again. It’s also been...chilly. Yesterday, July 4th, I was in long sleeves, wrapped in a towel on the dock, a breezy 66 degrees. But, it has been my experience that...the weather...is at the top of a long list of things about which I can do absolutely nothing. Other items on that list would include, traffic backups, toll booths, stupid people and the continued existence of yogurt. Try as I might, I can affect no changes to these things. Traffic backups will continue to happen at the worst possible time, the sand-pounding idiocy of the toll booth will frustrate me for the next millennia, stupid people will always be among us—they turn up everywhere— and people will continue to claim that yogurt is wonderful, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, especially its rancid, foul smell...like a teenaged boys sneakers drenched in sour buttermilk. Nevertheless people will persist, loading it up with fruit, granola, and anything else that helps them choke the stuff down, all the while claiming that it’s delicious. 

Much has been made of the giant pink flamingo who lives at the next camp over from us. Pierre, first appeared in a photograph I took the day we arrived...

Unfortunately, due to all the inclement weather, Pierre has been totally ignored, having gone eight days without use. Consequently, Pierre is going through the various stages of grief, having gotten stuck on depression, as these troubling photographs attest...

The neighbors have even gone to the trouble of bringing around Pierre’s child to cheer him up...

...so far to no avail. I will keep you all posted on his recovery.

I’m thinking that I’m ready for another trip into town. We’ll grab some breakfast at either Camden Deli or Mariners, then stop in the Owl and Turtle to pick up a few books and who knows what else. We’ll take more pictures this time. Camden is the type of town that is beautiful no matter the weather.

The House Library and July 4th

Every house we have ever rented up here has had one thing in common. Books. If you live in a place like Maine where it isn’t fit for humans half the time, books are a necessity, not unlike food and water. What else to do when there’s a foot of snow on the ground and more on the way? Each house has a collection of books, some of them bought for renters to read. I can tell because their spines are straight and unwrinkled, usually John Grisham or Elin Hilderbrand. Isn’t that what people read over the summer? But sometimes I stumble across a gem.

The first week at Loon Call I found one that frustrated and a second that beguiled. That’s always the chance you take when you open an unknown book. The first one I picked up was Kingdom of Fear by the frustrating Hunter Thompson. The Gonzo-Journalist who had appalled and amazed me 40 years ago with Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, now frustrates me. Where did all of his nihilism and arrogant self indulgence get him? A self-inflicted gunshot to the head. The older I get, the less patience I have with narcissism, no matter how talented a writer the narcissist may be. Reading Thompson at 62 is a much different experience than reading him at 25.

Then, as if God knew I needed a mental shower, I stumbled across this book...

It was stacked under several Ken Follett books. When I saw the endorsement from Oprah, I almost passed. In truth, this is by far the most girlish book I’ve ever read. I don’t say that as a criticism, just an observation. The author was unknown to me, a German named Nina George. This book was written in German, later translated into a couple dozen languages. Parts of it were tedious, other parts too predictable for my taste. But it was so beautifully written, even as a translation. Incredible. And, unlike Thompson, entirely hopeful and celebratory of life. 

I do this every time I come up here. I plow through a half a dozen novels...because I can. I have the time. My attention isn’t divided. But now, the library at Loon Call Cottage has been exhausted and I must hit up the Owl and Turtle for reinforcements.

Pam just left the house in her morning kayaking outfit, a bright pink athletic ensemble with a sky blue Camden, Maine baseball cap. She will disappear into the  fog and by the time she returns it will have lifted. It will be time for breakfast. Then, who knows? It’s the 4th of July, a national holiday which has suddenly fallen out of favor in our woke new world. The people around this lake still celebrate it if the booms, cracks and pops from last night are any indication. We will celebrate it too. I’m still grateful for my citizenship, if a little less triumphant. The sins of America do nothing to dampen my appreciation for her virtues. Show me another country without flaws and I’ll show you a country without great responsibilities or accomplishments. We struggle with our past sins. We wrestle with how to atone for them, but we move forward with gratefulness.