Tag: Life

Now for our storm door out front

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Are you ever caught up when you own an old house? Or is it like a personal sailboat, where you pour copious amount of money into a hole in the ground or the water?

The latest item to join our home maintenance to-do list is the front storm door, which detached from the frame a few weeks ago. It was too heavy and awkward to go back in, and apparently some shifting had warped the angles. It hadn’t been closing completely, and the last time I tried, bingo! We were in trouble.

It wound up, as I said, coming off altogether.

Oops!

We do want to get that fixed before winter hits, though. The front door itself is rather leaky.

Yet part of me is thinking maybe that can wait till I’m dead.

Damn, I do miss being able to call maintenance back when I was living on Yuppieville on the Hill. Back before I so deliriously remarried.

One commute I can’t complain about

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Some Sunday mornings, my drive to and from the Quaker meetinghouse a half-hour from my home is a meditation in its own right.

Even in fog or snow, it can be refreshing.

Much of the road is through forest, plus stretches along Passamaquoddy and Cobscook bays and their tributaries. The route also passes through a tribal reservation and a national wildlife preserve, which does sound a bit exotic though I take it as routine.

Eagle sightings are common, and I have had to stop for deer or turkeys in the middle of U.S. 1. Once I even spotted a moose far ahead on the pavement.

A radio program of classical choral music on a CBC station that comes in quite clearly is often also an element, depending on my mood.

Do you remember the freedom you felt when you first learned to drive? Some mornings, especially when there’s no other traffic, that elation returns.

While I’m tempted to proclaim “What could be more glorious than this!” I will also note many of the scattered homes I pass resemble junkyards – poverty in Washington County is a constant – so there’s a reminder of that reality, too. I suspect there are more dead cars and trucks here than people.

As an added touch, there are no traffic lights, either.

Among the many mysteries of adult life

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

I never understood how some people with a demanding career and a family or committed relationship found time to conduct an extramarital affair on the side.

I mean, just a primary relationship deserves more attention than it usually gets. Don’t they mix their communications? Which one said what or their preferences? As for names?

And yet some get away with it. Even habitually.

On the other hand, I doubt they would understand all the hours I’ve put into writing, either. What else am I missing? Dear?

 

All these guys I know are hitting 75 around me. And I’m biting my tongue.

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Eastport and the neighboring towns are filled with fascinating characters, and it’s been delightful getting to meet so many of them in my new community.

One thing I keep hearing the men say, though, is that they’re coming up on their 75th birthday and, well, they’re beginning to feel realities of getting older. No matter how physically fit they seem.

Gee, do I really think they look a little older than me? Or do I really look young for my age?

Even though I’ve been viewing this as my Diamond Anniversary?

Let me utter a big sigh.

Much of what our commercial fishermen catch isn’t ‘fish’

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Eastport’s fleet doesn’t use nets to fish. Rather, they use dragging gear or baited traps, mostly.

Technically, the bulk of what they catch isn’t fish, which are vertebrates, have gills, and lack limbs with digits. Fish fall into the scientific superclass of Osteichthyes, as noted in a previous Tendrils.

Shellfish, meanwhile, are invertebrates, have external skeletons, and are classified as molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms. See a more recent Tendrils.

So today, let’s look at what the local commercial fishermen catch. Or, in some cases, used to.

  1. Lobsters. The mainstay.
  2. Scallops. Some of the world’s best, in our humble opinion. The haul, though, is tightly regulated.
  3. Clams. While many of these are raked on sand or mud flats at low tide, others are dredged by boats at sea. They add up to the state’s third most valuable fishery.
  4. Urchins. A specialty niche making a comeback. Japanese foodies love them, but the market’s tricky.
  5. Crabs. See a previous Tendrils.
  6. Alewives, herring, and mackerel. Often caught for use as lobster bait.
  7. Shrimp. Well, not anymore, but we can keep hoping the stock will rebound.
  8. Mussels. There are some interesting attempts to establish farmed beds around here. Now that would be lovely.
  9. Cold. I’m talking about the crusty fishermen. They do bundle up in the depth of winter, though, and rarely complain.
  10. The sunrise. They head out early, all seasons of the year. Some of the views they catch are unbelievable.

Let’s not overlook salmon, a major product here, which are farmed in pens and harvested directly by special boats using tubes that work something like a giant vacuum hose. Not kidding.

This is a clue to what really occupies my mind some days

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Ten random notes in no particular order:

  1. I’m still learning to spell Katahdin.
  2. Was it a mama moose I hit that cold night on my commute back from the office, rather than a deer? Now that I’m getting to know deer, I think the collision involved something bigger.
  3. Red states? They’re where nobody really wants to live. Or at least the paying jobs.
  4. How dark the house is at night in an electrical power outage! There’s no ambient light from the street lamps or apparatus power-on buttons.
  5. Glyphs = little typographic devices.
  6. I dreamed I was playing violin again. In an orchestra, no less.
  7. How deeply backpacking as a youth shaped my values (forget efficient as a factor). It’s that travel light thing.
  8. After living in New Hampshire, I’m still not used to a sales tax.
  9. English country dance lyric, “If love were an ocean / and water was gin / I’d walk a long plank / and throw myself in.” It’s not from “Robin, Mad Robin,” is it?
  10. A voicemail message for today: “Let me a message or text me. I’ll get back.”

 

Does anything celebrate summer more than a watermelon?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

And here I was about to investigate all kinds of melons, starting with cantaloupe.

That said, just consider:

  1. A watermelon is one of the few foods to be classified as both a fruit and a vegetable. Wish I could count it twice on my daily dietary requirements but guess that would be cheating.
  2. It’s a relative of both pumpkins and cucumbers.
  3. It’s far and away the most popular melon in America.
  4. There are more than 1,200 varieties, but the seedless hybrids are the only ones you’ll likely find nowadays at the market, at least in the USA.
  5. Those seedless versions aren’t genetically modified. Technically, they’re simply sterile with white seeds that are perfectly safe to eat.
  6. Watermelons originate in Africa and have been cultivated in Egypt for 5,000 years. That’s why they really do need a long stretch of summer.
  7. Based on weight, watermelon is the most consumed fruit in America.
  8. It’s 92 percent water yet rich in vitamins and contains only six percent sugar. By the way, there’s no bad fat or cholesterol.
  9. Its flesh isn’t always red – orange, green, yellow, or white are other options.
  10. In Japan they’re grown in glass boxes to maintain the unnatural cubed shape.

 

Where to from here, as a writer or a person?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Creatively, I’m feeling a lull or perhaps more accurately adrift.

After my Cape Cod presentation via Zoom earlier this month, I have no other Quaking Dover events on the horizon. Nor do I feel compelled to undertake another big writing venture.

Authors these days are often saddled with the promotional end of any publication, and I’m coming up on a year of launching the marketing push on my latest book. Admittedly, I am proud of my public appearances on its behalf – each one unique, reflecting what another writer declared a “rich feast of a book” – but it’s also exhausting, especially, as I hate to confess, at my age.

Do I cut the ties and say it’s time for the book to sink or swim on its own, or do I find new ways to try to generate a buzz? It is the one book that seems to speak to a wider audience, especially, say, than poetry or my hippie novels.

The blogging hits have slowed down, perhaps as many viewers have shifted to other platforms. Social media and mass media both appear to be hemorrhaging there, so I can’t say I’m alone.

I’m certainly out of touch with youth and often can’t understand their conversations. That really hurts. I believe there’s so much knowledge that needs to be handed down but don’t know where to begin. Besides, I’ve often found them a source of great energy in my own outlook.

In short, I don’t have a big project calling for my attention and devotion. That part feels really weird.

I do have a big backlog of periodicals and books to finally tackle as well as a shelf of personal journals that deserve visiting, so that points to an overdue reading orgy.

There’s plenty of outdoors around here to indulge in, too.

I may even have to look at my remaining possessions and reorganize and cull them.

As I’m saying, I’m feeling a bit strange.

I’m sold on Maine’s crab

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Ours are smaller than the glorious Dungeness of the Pacific Northwest or Chesapeake Bay’s popular Blue delicacy, named for the color of their tips.

But that’s not to say Maine doesn’t have crabmeat that’s as sweet. Ours comes from two species.

Here’s some perspective.

  1. Jonah crabs are the slightly larger and more celebrated of the two. They’re reddish with large, black-tipped claws, and found primarily in deep waters offshore.
  2. The meat comes from the claws. When Jonahs show up in a lobster trap, a fisherman typically removes one claw and throws the rest of the crab back. The crab, we’re told, can survive on one claw while the other grows back.
  3. Jonahs are regulated by an interstate commission that places a 4.75-inch minimum size on keepers and prohibits the retention of egg-bearing females.
  4. Atlantic rock crab, or “peekytoes,” live in bays and tidal rivers closer to shore. These measure just five inches across and are the most commercially caught crab in the state.
  5. Peekytoes cannot be shipped live, presumably because they’re too delicate. Instead, they’re cooked and hand-picked before shipment.
  6. Both commercial and recreational crabbers require a license from the state and must observe strict limits on their take. At least, those specifically going after them. See the lobstermen, above, for a clue to exemptions.
  7. Locals in the know say that picking the meat from a crab is a nearly lost art. They admit they can’t avoid getting hard bits of shell in the tender flesh, no matter how carefully they try. Instead, as they advise, go to Betty’s in Pembroke or Earle’s down in Machias for your supply.
  8. Favorite dishes around here are crab rolls, crab salad, and crabcakes. Our house also celebrates a heavenly crab imperial. Others make them into a dip or spread. And, in some circles, Jonah crab claws make an appetizer served like a shrimp cocktail.
  9. They can be harvested year-‘round, though fall, when crabs are most packed with meat, is the peak season.
  10. Smaller, invasive, nasty green crabs have been proliferating as Maine waters warm, decimating other marine species and their breeding grounds. Some enterprising chefs, though, see tasty opportunity in some dishes to counter that.

Me? I haven’t yet had to complain of having too much. Now, please pass the Old Bay.