Several days ago, or maybe last week, I started to write a story about "Where went summer," based on a comment my oldest grandaughter had made when we moved away from California. She could not understand why, and she asked me, "Where went California?" One could ask that now and mean something very different about California, but here I am now in Maine, and I'm wondering, where went summer."
I started to write again this afternoon, but alas, the power went out. It was taken out by a runaway pickup that had been parked by the side of a house on a very steep hill, across the road from the Mill Pond. And you guessed it, the parking brake was not on. The truck nailed the power pole as if it were a bulls'eye, and carried right on, under the power pole, across Rte. 96, and down the hill, stopping just about two feet from the Mill Pond itself. It was quite a ride only there wasn't anyone in it.
Perhaps I'm not supposed to write about 'where went summer,' but it has been such a grand and glorious summer that I need to keep trying. Tonight I've just come from a Garrison Keillor type presentation of stories and music by Danny Beal and the Holy Mackerels. It was marvelous and somewhat more original than Tim Sample in that Danny has not been discovered, and allows an occasional emotion to show. But I haven't heard Creedence Clearwater music played so well in 40 odd years, and they led with Tombstone Every Mile - my mantra song at college.
Last weekend, I spent time thinking about 45 years ago, as I sat with Holly on Priscilla (see photo) all dressed in flags for the Boatbuilders' Festival here in town. We sat on her on Saturday night, having cooked,organised, and decorated, and ate pizza from our terrific General Store, drank a good Barbera, and watched the schooner Bowdoin come into the harbor, followed by the schooner Harvey Gamage. The Bowdoin is on its way to Halifax, on a summer cruise with Maine Maritime students; the Gamage does semesters at sea for the Ocean Classroom here the Harbor.
But it was the Bowdoin that sent me into the past. Admiral MacMillan who commissioned her in Boothbay 50 years ago, was an arctic explorer of some renown, and a good friend of my grandfather Bass.' He and his wife, Miriam, used to come up to Wilton before and after various expeditions, and I have childrens' books that Miriam wrote about Eskimo adventures. Even before my time, my uncle Streeter went with Admiral Mac to Baffin Island and Greenland on the Gertrude Thebaud in the summer of 1937.
The Bowdoin was also at Mystic when I worked there, but that was not such a happy time. The Seaport had no money to keep her up, nor use her appropriately. So she has found her way back to Maine, at Maine Maritime in Castine, and she looks very happy - workable and fit. Her people seemed pleased to be there also. It made me happy to see that.
At Boat Builders, I display art and work at helping children build boats out of odd pieces of wood. They are wonderfully creative - if their parents let them be, and I love doing it. It does tire you out though, and I admit to falling asleep in my chair in the afternoon when I should have been selling art.
It was a magical day though, 72 degrees and dry, just like the Fishermans' Island event for the Historical Society, and as the days have been when I've been out sailing with all the good friends and family that have come to visit. It has been as close to perfect as I can imagine a Maine summer being, and I suppose that is why every time I've sat down to write about it, something has caused me to stop writing. I was not meant to spend the summer in front of the computer, and I haven't. But it will take me awhile to pick up the pieces - the couch that came that wouldn't fit in the house, the Genoa jib that ripped - again, and the barn sink that needs ordering. Yet the barn keeps going up, and the puppy is turning into a dog, and I need to go to bed - even though the Holy Mackerels are playing at McSeagull's tonight.
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