Notes from Maine - 2024/06/09
Mom headed back home to Virginia. I think she had a good visit—I hope she had fun. We worked on the kitchen floor together, she got to paint some walls (her favorite), and she worked on the yard. Back at home, I’m sure her yard is waiting on a lot of maintenance. I never lived in Virginia as an adult. As soon as I was able, I got out of that area. For me it was too hot, too crowded, and obviously not a good fit.
Growing up, the population of Arlington County Virginia (you’ve probably heard of the cemetery) was about 170,000. Now, it’s up to 230,000. They currently have about 14 people per acre. Here in Maine, I’m lucky enough to have almost 40 acres for myself, the horses, and a dog. On a regular basis, we use five of those acres. The rest provides a good buffer. Some days I still feel a little cramped here. Don’t get me wrong—I like to visit with people every day, but normally those people are the imaginary kind who live in my head. Real people—actual living, breathing people—are a chore.
Population density aside, the climate in Virginia doesn’t suit me. I remember days when it was so hot and humid that breathing was difficult. Air conditioning wasn’t ubiquitous, so I moved to the basement bedroom where it was muggy but at least cool. Still, you had to go outside eventually. I guess I could have adjusted eventually. It seems like every sense dulls with age, and experience or apathy makes discomfort more tolerable. But there’s no reason to adjust. I would rather be cold than hot.
The first year I lived in this house, adjusting to doing year-round horse chores, I thought I would freeze. My fingers and toes would be frozen solid by the time I got back inside. I tried desperately to think of a safe and cost-effective way to heat the barn. Then, after a year of that, I grew accustomed to the cold. I got a better jacket, but stopped worrying about my feet entirely. I work outside year-round with socks and rubber boots that provide little to no insulation. It just doesn’t seem to matter anymore. In the same way, I suppose I would have eventually dismissed the heat and humidity of Virginia. I guess I never gave it a fair chance.
We’re coming up on the longest day of the year. Anything before June 20 feels like late winter. The days after feel like early fall. I’m not talking about the climate, just the calendar. According to the weather, we’ve been in summer for at least six weeks. But when I think of the calendar, we’re rapidly approaching winter and I need to get stuff done. It reminds me of Saturday mornings when I was a kid. If I got up before 8am, it was impossibly early. The good cartoons didn’t start until 8am. Bugs Bunny was my favorite, and he started at eight. Mid 1970s, Bugs moved to 8:30—what a shock. By the late 70s, Bugs switched to channel 9 and got later and later. I had all of them memorized, of course, but I would still watch religiously. If I woke up after Bugs had started, I felt like I had overslept. There was no perfect time to wake up—I was either too early or too late. That’s how the calendar feels now. We’re either before or after the perfect time in the calendar.
Maybe that’s why people enjoy vacation? They’ve chosen a group of days to represent their official break where they can take a breath and look around for a moment before jumping back into normal life. If you’re able to breathe every day of the year, but choose not to, then you’re starved for oxygen all the time. I’m torturing this analogy, trying to find a point. Now I could watch cartoons all the time—every single day. Duck season / Wabbit season would alternate back and forth in an endless loop. But I don’t think that I was watching the cartoons for entertainment, really. I think I was simply killing time in the least unpleasant way. I don’t have any desire to kill time anymore. There are too many enjoyable (or at least rewarding) things to do.
Part of the reason that I needed to move away from Virginia had nothing to do with the climate, the population density, or the job opportunities. I needed to get away from all that history. I couldn’t tell what parts of me were intrinsic and which were extrinsic (if I’m using those words correctly). Some of my personality, habits, and associations were imposed upon me when I was a child. It would have taken too much strength and effort to break away from those expectations while still surrounded by them. People will fight to keep you from changing and growing if you don’t align with their understanding of you. Instead of fighting, I just moved. I had a clean slate in Maine. No chance of running into someone in the grocery store who knew my brother. No chance of seeing that kid I had a fight with in fourth grade. In retrospect, I robbed myself of some growth opportunities. There are lessons to be learned from confronting the past. You can see yourself more clearly reflected in the eyes of people who knew you a million years ago. Maybe that’s why people enjoy reunions? I wouldn’t know.
It’s rainy here and I have cabinets to build.
