For two weeks already, we are in Maine. The Internet works only sporadically, and my mind is not on blogging.
Maine, this summer, has taught me these points:
1. At least once a day, I dip into the ocean – either for a swim or after the sauna. The water down-east used to be so cold, I would freeze to the bones in minutes. But global warming is real: Now I can stay much longer.
2. The French Commissaire Maigret, Georges Simenon’s master detective, describes a morning in Paris thus: “Maigret always loved wandering the streets, while Paris made its morning ablutions.” Ablution, of course, is a fancy word for a cold water gush.
3. On my birthday, at full moon, we kayaked at night to the seals’ rock. It was something to remember – the smooth ocean, the bright moon, the sleepy calls of water birds. I saw the other boat only by the silvery run of drops from the oars.
4. If you dream of owning a boat, forget the expensive stuff – the stinkers with motor. Get a kayak, used, if possible! Put your kayak in a river, a lake, the ocean. Hear the silence of Nature speak to you when you paddle by.
5. I see herons, eagles, cormorants and terns – and the ubiquitous seagulls; I hear loons and ospreys. And, so far, I met a fox, deer, seals, feral cats and lots of chipmunks and red squirrels. The most exciting meeting was a with a hummingbird moth – because I had never before seen one. And we have real hummingbirds, too; it’s inconceivable how they can survive this far in the north. I understand they drink birch sap in the spring. In August, they suck nectar from my phlox.
6. I think I might be finished soon with my Kneipp novel. But I have thought that before …
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