Tag: Maine

How this new life’s looking one year later

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been living in Eastport a full year now. Admittedly, during the initial four months, I was commuting the 300 miles back to Dover every weekend or so, mostly to help declutter the house and prepare it for sale. What amazed us, though, was how quickly my loyalties switched – Eastport was where I felt at home, not the house I’d lived in for the previous 21, the longest of anywhere else in my life.

As you know, I delighted in Dover. Some of my previous moves had left me homesick for a year or more – the colleagues I missed, the social and arts circles, the landscape and opportunities. Even in some of the less attractive places, there was something or someone I regretted leaving behind or unfinished.

This time, though, it felt more like dropping a fantastic perfect lover by being swept away by someone more exotic. You know, leaving a knight’s castle to go off to live on a shack on an island with a mermaid, even if she smelled like fish. (Remember, we’re talking about homes here, not actual people.)

Trying to sort out the reasons for the ease of my quick identity shift has been tricky.

I was at a point in my new creative project where extended solitude would be very helpful. And it was. You know, the writer’s retreat or arts colony.

Covid had also already distanced me. I was no longer swimming laps daily and seeing that crowd. Quaker worship and committee work was on Zoom. Choir in Boston was suspended. With museums and concerts canceled, there wasn’t even any point in taking the Amtrak down and back. And the research I was doing had enough resources online that I could finish the project. There are some questions that might be answered if I had a few weeks to spend in the reopened archives, but I’m content to leave off where I have for now.

Eastport has more of an active arts scene that Dover did, though there was plenty once you included a few neighboring towns. It’s just that the one here feels more organic, as you’ll likely be hearing. We have to be resourceful, since there’s nothing like Boston over the horizon, as there had been in Dover.

Getting back out in the wilderness has been especially invigorating, even if the years are taking a toll on my hiking abilities. Ditto for taking yoga classes on the waterfront here in town.

Did I mention meeting a series of fascinating people, all with rich stories and experiences?

Or the artists-in-residence or world-class chamber music performances by local pros?

Quite simply, I’ve declared this was my best summer ever. The prior highs had always had some big downsides – trouble at the office, upheavals in romance, unnecessary complications. Not so this one.

We had hoped to get the renovations under way, but all of the contractors have been booked out for a year – and even if we had one on the job, supplies have been hard to get, as is the case everywhere. The delay does give us a chance to plan more thoroughly for what we want to see done. And it did mean I didn’t have everything torn up for the workers. I’ll leave that for next summer.

Anyone else feeling a bit dizzy?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Let me admit that looking at the Red Barn posts as they popped up during the past year often left me feeling a bit schizoid.

As this blog has evolved over its nine years so far, its revolving categories run like a merry-go-round, and that’s led me to plan far ahead and schedule accordingly. If I tried to post right as things unfolded, I’d never have time to write anything else. Besides, this way allows me to get in a groove with each of the categories and explore them in more depth as a series rather than one-offs.

Two things I wasn’t expecting at this time last year have intervened with what I had scheduled and uploaded.

The Delta variant of Covid was one, leading to renewed closures and limitations. For me, the jolt came in bits that included seeing pictures of me standing in Canada from a few years earlier. Well, it was a reminder of what we’re fondly looking forward to doing again. In case any of you were wondering.

The bigger jolt came in the posts of Dover and our usual rounds there, especially in the garden. The problem was that I was no longer there, not after we closed on the house sale back in April – the event that sent me off to Eastport and a lot of our possessions into storage. I really didn’t expect the seller to accept our offer, but we bid in good faith and some hard budgeting and a shared dream.

That’s meant I’ve been exploring an exciting new place and learning about it, which I’ll be showing you through the coming year. What I saw on the Red Barn, on the other hand, was what I would have been experiencing through my old routine. And I must admit I’ve really, really missed those heirloom tomatoes. They just don’t grow up here, much less ripen. (Sigh!)

For the most part, my attention has been consumed by the revisions on my upcoming book – one based on a contrarian history of Dover. So I’ve been connected to the old community anyway, along with Zoom meetings with its neighbors and Friends. Be warned: I’m very much looking forward to sharing a lot of the outtakes and thinking with you through the next year. I think it will change your understanding of New England.

During much of the year, I’ve felt slightly AWOL when it comes to social media. I’m really happy to be getting back.

Running on the wind

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

One sight always catches our breath as we drive Route 9 across what sometimes feels like the fringe of civilization as we’ve known it. And, for the uninitiated, the state highway from Bangor to Calais can become pretty monotonous in its long uninhabited stretches. As they say, make sure you have a full tank of fuel before you tackle it.

On a clear day, from a dozen miles away you might catch glimpses of a corner of the windfarms on Weaver Ridge and adjoining hills in Hancock County – I’ve counted at least 30 towers before the road dips away – but there are more tucked away in the high terrain. Still, nothing can prepare you for that first flash of the big blades turning gently in the air right in front of your face, or so it seems.

Each blade weighs 1½ tons, even though it appears svelte.

They dance gracefully – sometimes as a solo, then as a pair, or four. You spot them to your left but they suddenly show up on your right – the roadway twists along the slope. As those slip behind you, more giants rise above the hedge of forest. And all too soon, you’ve moved on.

The towers and their blades are bigger than you’d suspect. In fact, at the moment, they’re the tallest wind-powered electrical generators onshore in America, though much larger ones are projected for offshore installation.

The hub stands 382 feet above the ground – that’s more than the length of a football field – and the blade tips reach to 585 feet.

Wind generation accounts for nearly a third of the electrical production in Maine, though the state also imports a fourth of its electricity from Canada, largely Hydro Quebec.

I am baffled by the “not-in-my-backyard” opponents to similar windfarms. They still want energy for their computers and refrigerators and lighting, right?

A tractor-trailer rig could easily be parked in the gearbox or “cabin” attached to the hub.

As if these “spoil the view”? I find them mesmerizing, even enhancing as a kind of sculpture and a reminder of the currents in the air itself. They definitely look better than a toxic oil refinery – and there’s no awful smell. For that matter, they strike me as much more attractive than a television transmitter or cell phone tower as a hilltop crown. And they do remind us of the charming Dutch windmills in a much smaller scale.

The latest installation, 22 Vesta towers and turbines, cost $150 million and went into full operation earlier this year.

Sometimes they seem to play peek-a-boo as you drive.

Our first significant snow of the season

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

Since the ground isn’t frozen, this will melt off quickly. But it’s what greeted us when we woke up this morning.

Someone had already been out walking the dog.

 

Our neighbor doesn’t pick her semi-wild apples but leaves them for the deer. At the moment, they look like ornaments.

My first exposure to a winter of heavy snowfall started off the day after Thanksgiving and continued, with one melting around Groundhog Day, until nearly Palm Sunday. That was Upstate New York, with around 130 inches of snow total.

The stories I could tell since!