WHY MAINE?

We were driving down our road today and since it is mid March we have to drive slowly to avoid breaking an axel or blowing out an over priced snow tire.  Why, you ask.  We are in that pre-mud season season I call Frost Heave Season.  Here we have a perfectly even and smooth road that can support speeds up to eighty miles per hour, which it often does, but which today would hold you to sub 40 MPH with a foot near the break peddle for good measure.  We have one road just around the corner which is virtually impassable.  We will seek alternate routs until sometimes around the first of May at the earliest when things begin to smooth out.  There's a rhythm to all this.

Yes, these things could be avoided by digging down over four feet to begin laying the foundation for the road at a cost of 17 bazillion dollars every ten feet.  That's how they do it on I-95.  And that's about what it costs.

The other remedy is to slow down and wait for warmer weather.  That's exactly what will happen.  But with reservations and hesitations which, of course will result in broken axels and busted snow tires.  It's Maine in Spring.  What did I expect?  Still there's that nagging question: Why Maine at all?

I'm not going to spend too much time on snow.  Already did that and have the sprained back to show for it.  In a civilized culture, shoveling snow off the deck, walkway or driveway should be assigned to some sub-human species at best and in the least, high dollar snow blowing equipment subsidized by the government, of course.  I mean, the alternative is to let the stuff lay there until July 4 and light a firecracker and drink a cold beer.  Nothing like being American.  It's Maine.

We are but a brief week away from the Vernal Equinox, also known as the first day of Spring, when the length of day and night are equal.  This cosmic egalitarianism actually doesn't mean a thing in practical terms.  Spring storms can be among the most emotionally damaging examples of weather.  Hope is strongest at this fragile time of year.  We really believe in the onset of good, that is to say, warm, sunny and dry weather.  To have those hopes dashed by six inches of wet icy snow or a flooding rain storm after over a week of marvelous sunny and warm weather is simply enough to call onto question the existence of a deity even remotely concerned with the welfare of mere humans.

There are places in this country where spring seems like spring.  So I ask again, Why Maine?  What is it that drew me here over thirty years ago, even in the middle of winter?   

There was a weekly news paper called THE MAINE TIMES, as well as that still going strong instrument of the Maine Organic Gardener and Farmer organization, (MOGFA).  I had done a little gardening in the South but was not at the time, and had not done any in years.  Why had I thought that moving to a place with a growing season the length of my little finger would somehow magically transform me into a Back-to-the-lander, is completely beyond me.  

Regarding the Maine Times, I felt that was one of if not the best weekly paper I had ever seen and I still think so.  A state that supported such a news outlet had to be the place to be - right?  Well, right and wrong.  Right it was a fantastic paper and wrong the state did not support it.

In short, we gleaned as much information as possible from various source.  We wrote to a couple dozen towns in Maine asking for information that might be useful to new immagrants and got replies from most of them, including one from Eustis.  Eustis is a postoffice and a few buildings way over in western Maine.  I had written asking for information on the town and area that might be of interest to people moving into the state.  I got a hand written reply saying, in summation: Thanks for the request, however, we don't have a regular town office and I am the town clerk as well as the Post Master but will try to answer your questions.  Which she did by saying that "we" are a small community in the foothills of Western Maine - just plain Yankee folks and except for the woods and hills there isn't much to do here.  I drove by there one day by and by and sure enough the Post Office was closed (it was a weekend) and not a single person was in sight.  It's a good thing we didn't try to move there, given to social stimulation, as we were.

Still the dream lingered and we moved, lock stock and barrel.  I can't say I never regretted it.  That first year was tough.  My wife at the time made multiple efforts to modify her life here and ultimately did escape.  Something held me here.  As I stare out at the mud and dirty snow piles in the yard, I wonder what that something was, or is.

If you stay somewhere over thirty years, things called "roots" begin to anchor one to a place, no matter what.  Sometimes that's not enough but it is a force to be contended with.  Some of the characteristics of those "roots" are as follows.

1   Friends: all but a few of my friends, it turns out, live in Maine.  I think about being somewhere else and leaving all these friends and I nearly get sick.  Only a few ever come see me and even fewer ever call or send an email or text but they are here.  If I should call they'd say, Oh hi, Jerry - I remember you.

2   All my  doctors are here.  This is not a small thing.  Enough said about that.

3   The ocean!  Here's the thing - there's a whopping tide here.  It can be more than ten feet here and much higher the farther Down East you go.  It can be seen in action driving to Portland or anywhere on the coast which is near here.  I've written about the ocean before [ see WHAT IS IT ABOUT THE OCEAN at <treetopviews.com>] .  I see the tides sort of like the life breath of the earth.  In and out it flows twice daily.  It can happen quickly.  Once we were on a little island that was accessible at low tide.  We forgot to check and found that the tide had come in and closed off out escape route.  We took our pants off and waded thigh deep holding on to each other to reach the shore in a swift currant.  You can't do that  in Tucson.

4   Four Seasons.  This was probably one of the main reasons for our move so long ago.  The idea of only four seasons is a standard joke in this state.  You have mud season, frost heave season, black fly season, Japanese beetle season, getting your wood stacked season, leaf raking season and snow shoveling season.  There's more, but you get my point.

5   Home:  For the time being, we live in a nice large house on three acres of woods on a paved road.  We are thirty minutes from Portland or Lewiston/Auburn and ten minutes from Freeport.  I mean, think about it. We couldn't do this anywhere else.  Some friends of ours down the road are selling their home and land and moving into a condo later this year.  I am envious.  I am tired of the work, but not that tired yet.  I'll get there, I know.  Don't yet know what the next "home" will look like but I can tell you it will be a heartbreaking day when we give this up.  It won't happen this year.

Why  Maine indeed?  Ridiculous question, eh?