Last Holiday of Summer 2020

 

What a lovely last day of this holiday weekend.  The low tide this morning was very very low, and the morning moved from brilliant sunshine to fog rolling in from seemingly everywhere.  Dense at first then lifting exposing more and more of the narrows and it’s flats.  

I listened to my Ruth Reichl Save Me the Plums Audiobook as I washed the dishes and brewed my tea. It was another morning where I could feel the deep appreciation that comes from these simple moments.  Enjoying hearing Ruth's voice tell tell enjoyable story of food, people and life.  Smelling my favorite blend of tea as I sipped and watched the fog moving thickly around the narrows.  Moments like this are timeless. 

I put them on along with a sweatshirt as I got ready to leave the house and take a morning hike while the tide was low.   I headed out of town to the Parklands of Cobstock Trails.   I have not walked any of these trails before and I was not disappointed.  Another conservation effort of woods and waters - I love the "fingers" of coastline, and I could smell before I could see that there was bay water on both sides of the trail that I was walking.  For a seventy year old solo walker,  these trails are great, well marked,  many options for taking a rest, including several screen houses, picnic tables and totally beautiful benches.   I found my favorite sitting place on the metal stairs that went down to the water.  The tide was out and the flats not really walk-able, only sinkable.  I sat on the stairs and took in the smells, felt the slight breeze and conjured up memories of seafood dishes that I had just heard as I listened to my book this morning.  I could taste the sea in my mouth as recipes I have made floated through my consciousness mixing yesterdays with this moment where I had so been swept away by the sea. 

 As quick as the memories and senses came they left.  I was left with lingering sensations and the desire to move on.  Up the stairs and back into the woods, the tide was so far out that I couldn't even hear an ocean sound.  I liked the difference in the sound that my feet and walking poles made in the woodland path versus on the shore or along the gravel pathways.  I saw a rafter (yes, that's the name for a group of turkeys) of turkeys - lost count at 10 just hanging out in the sunlight heads bobbing and just meandering along in a little open patch.  Butterflies flew by, and a few other people passed me by. 

 What a good way to end this long weekend.  I enjoyed the hike back to my car.  And took a long drive along the water to head back into Lubec.  By now the sun was bright,  no fog rolling in, and tide was moving toward high.  I have such a romantic notion of living somewhere where you must pay attention to the tides, where there is always certainty about when it will come in and when it will go out.   The tides here are big, there is a big range.  The Bay of Fundy has conjured up many a story of bravery, courage and loss.  For today, I am once again glad to be able to so easily spend time at the ocean.  To be able to enjoy this easternmost town that I have come to love.  And I decided to stop for a pint at the brewery before heading back to my little loft.

 

I found a good table in full sun in the beer garden where I could look out at the lighthouse and see the flowers.  I tried a summer sour,  Clammer Slammer, a low ABV and such a good taste.  I read a little news, browsed facebook, enjoyed the clammer of the seagulls and this very delicious beer, it tasted almost like lemonade.  When I asked Gayle, the owner, about the beer he said he was going for lemonade and I let him know that he had found his mark.  

 

Time for a late, late lunch of leftover haddock and chips - I reheated them in the cast iron pan, got everything hot and the fries almost crunchy.  They tasted as good as last night, when I had picked them up at the to go place just out of town.  I had a glass of iced tea and laid down with my latest Louise Penny book that just came out.  I am already totally absorbed in the plot, but before long, I laid the kindle down and as the sun streamed in the window above my head I went to sleep.  I woke up after a very long nap, the sun still bright,  the water still high.  

 

The small seagulls that come here at this time to eat the hatched flies were back circling around, eating up the hatches in the atmosphere.  The temperature had dropped and I put my sweatshirt back on.  

 

What a good day.  It is Monday.  It is Labor Day in the USA.  There are 57 days until the election.  I keep making my contributions and I will be volunteering soon.   I have not given a thought about going home but I know that tomorrow I will be a little more aware of my trip back home on Thursday.  There are plans that will be done when I return, but for now they are just waiting for me.  I am here, I am in Lubec, Maine the easternmost point of the United States.  The tide is going out - and I am snuggled in for the night.