Weirdly warm winter days ... and Rufus

It was 39 degrees this morning when David and I took Ella for our morning walk.  Weird.  Last night it was in the 20's when I walked Ella and even that felt balmy.  Supposed to be back in the 20's during the day and teens at night by the weekend.  

I took this past Monday off of work and took Ella to her new vet for some booster vaccines.  Then I took her Maine rabies certificate to City Hall and registered Ella.  For the bargain price of $6, Ella is now officially "licensed."  Since I was out and about, I stopped by a local kennel called (naturally) Harbor Hounds and got the complete dime tour.  They do boarding and day care, and there were sure a passel of dogs having a good time.  So I made arrangements to bring Ella back to try out day care today.

This morning after our walk, we dropped Ella off.  She met Rufus, a Airedale-Poodle mix of more or less her size and very gentle.  The owner put Ella in with Rufus to get her acclimatized before putting them both with the entire gang.  From the office we could see her running around, checking things out.  

Now we're back home and I'm about to go to work.  It seems weird that Ella isn't here.  I forgot - when I got all excited about signing her up for day care - that she wouldn't be here at the house.  It's amazing how quiet and empty the place feels without her. In her honor, here's a recent photo:

In other news ... we ended up not doing the "pie festival".   This coming weekend there are services at the synagogue and the Soup Kitchen on Sunday.   I'm interested in a Short Film Festival at the Strand Theatre here in Rockland - 8 or 9 short international films.  Reminds me of Sam's Atlanta Philosophy Film Festival, and I'm hoping that David and I will go check it out.

Peace and fun with a Rufus everywhere.

Settling In … and Pie?

Well, we are settling in.  And apparently my 10+ year old African Violet likes it, too.  

Our new thermostat settings are working well.  It is truly a wondrous thing to wake up at 6:00 am, dress in the dark to take Ella for our walk down to the coast and come downstairs to feel (and even smell) the warmth of the radiator in the downstairs hall beside the stairs.  This is a good thing because it only hit 13 degrees today, and tonight is supposed to be -2 degrees.  

Since I last posted here, we attended a Shabbaton at the local synagogue - Friday night services and dinner and discussions about interfaith families, and Saturday services, lunch and continued discussion.  We also helped out at another Soup Kitchen for which all of the food was donated, prepared, served (and cleaned up) by the local creme-de-la-creme restaurant, Primo. Definitely good food; in fact, the pasta I had may have been the best pasta I have ever had anywhere, including all the fancy New York restaurants I visited in my New York law firm days.  On the other hand, also definitely HT (hoity toity).  Their website menu features items from their garden , from local farms and locally "foraged" items!  This in Rockland, Maine!  After sponsoring an incredible meal at the Soup Kitchen, the restaurant is closing until May.  Oh well, not that I thought it was going to be a regular hang out for David and me.

I have also gone back to Connecticut again, this time to attend meetings at my office, and was able to stay with my friend, Helen, which was lovely.  I took the bus this time rather than driving as, being January, I was worried about iffy weather.  The bus trip was … interesting.  It takes about 8 hours by bus versus 5 to 5-1/2 driving.  You catch the bus at the ferry terminal (in honor of which I'll include a photo I took of one of the ferries on one of my early morning walks).

It is definitely cheaper by bus - a total of $80 versus at least twice that for gas by car.  The bus involves taking two different carriers - one from here to Boston and one from Boston to Hartford.  The Rockland-Boston bus showed 2 movies and gave out free water and bags of pretzels.  Both buses had WiFi, but it was so slow as to be basically unusable. It was nice to be able to read and even do some work.  

Looking forward, here's an item from The Free press, our local paper.  I'm not sure we'll attend, but maybe.  Sounds like a good way to spend a winter's eve, right?

"Rockland, which has been dubbed 'Pie Town USA' by the Food Network, will go pie-crazy on Sunday, January 27, from 1 to 5 p.m., when the Historic Inns of Rockland are joined by downtown businesses and restaurants to welcome hungry pie eaters to the town for the ninth annual Pies on Parade Pie Tour.  Pie lovers are invited to sample more than 40 different pies throughout Rockland and enjoy tours of common areas and some guest rooms at the participating inns…Each of the 20 participating venues will serve both both a savory and sweet pie. with all proceeds to benefit the Area Interfaith Outreach (AIO) Food Pantry. … All proceeds from Pies On Parade benefit the AIO Food Pantry and Fuel Assistance Program. Over the past eight years, Pies on Parade has raised more than $50,000 to benefit AIO's Food Pantry."

Sweet!  Peace, y'all.

Of snow, sidewalks, thermostats and other Mainely matters

I suppose that asking who started the old saw that the coast of Maine isn’t cold like the interior of Maine would be like asking who’s responsible for the one that says “It’s not the cold, it’s the wind.”   

We live 7/10ths of a mile from the coast of Maine (that’s mid-coast Maine –not northern Maine and not southern Maine – the radio always gives at least 3 different Maine weather reports – for the north, the south and the “coast” – that’s us), and it is cold.  According to Weather Underground, it’s 3.2 degrees Fahrenheit this morning.  When that last “monster” storm arrived in the northeast, the local weathermen said the coast would get only a couple of inches.  They were right … and then they were wrong.  First we got about 4 inches.  Then a day later it snowed for 12 hours and we got another 8 or 10 inches.   We don’t have a big yard or driveway, but shoveling snow is still hard work.  After the second snow, we were shoveling when a guy in a pickup truck with a snowplow attachment (and a very cute dog riding shotgun) came by and asked if we wanted a plow.  For ten bucks, he did the hard part – the bottom of the driveway and sidewalk. 

Speaking of sidewalks, we know we live in a real city because we have them.  Sidewalks, I mean.  Sort of.  Not every single street seems to have one, and the streets that have them – except right in downtown Rockland – have a sidewalk on one side of the road only.  These aren’t concrete sidewalks like we had in Connecticut , but asphalt, as if the road lifted up 6-8 inches and continued for 3-1/2 feet.  Come to think of it, the asphalt might be because it’s cold in Maine (even on the coast!).  Even in Connecticut , cold wrecked the concrete sidewalks in a fairly short period of time.  On the other hand, unlike in Connecticut here in Rockland at least, homeowners aren’t responsible for shoveling the sidewalk in front of their houses – that wouldn’t be fair since only one side of the street has a sidewalk.  Instead, a day or two after the snowfall – perhaps depending on the street – the city comes by and more or less plows the sidewalks down to a level where they are at least passable on foot.

Besides all the snow, New Year’s was another milestone for us.  After 3 months of living here, we finally programmed our thermostat.  It has 4 settings per day for Monday through Friday and another 4 settings for Saturday and Sunday (or 8 settings, if you want different settings for Saturday and for Sunday).  (Probably all you homeowners know all this, but I’ve been a renter for almost 40 years.  In my experience, renters don’t have programmable thermostats; in fact, I haven’t always had any thermostat.  In my last apartment, the landlord hired a cheap non-union electrician to rewire the building and he mis-wired the thermostats to our apartment and the one upstairs.  When we turned up the heat, they got warm, and vice versa.  To get them to turn up the heat, we had to turn ours down so they’d get cold and turn up our heat.  You got to laugh.)

Since mid-October, our thermostat setting was 54 at night and 55 during the day.  We could change the setting manually, and we did every day, several times a day.  But whenever the next setting point was reached, the thermostat went back to 54 or 55.  If you woke up in the middle of the night to pee, it was pretty darn cold in here.  The upside has been that our fuel oil usage has been very modest and we’re way ahead of our “budget.”  Nonetheless, 2013 is a new year and we resolved to read the book on how to program the darn thermostat.  Resolution achieved!  Our thermostat settings are now:  5:00 a.m. – 66 degrees; 10:00 a.m. – 62 degrees; 4:00 p.m. – 66 degrees; and 10:00 p.m. – 60 degrees.  It has made a big difference; at least I think it has.

Tonight we may go to the local food co-op, The Good Tern, to hear a local author, Eva Murray, speak.  Likely she’ll talk about or read from her two books.  One is about life on Matinicus Island , a small island 23 miles off shore from Rockland .  Eva Murray moved there something like 20 years ago to teach in the one-room school house.  She got married and stayed to raise a family.  Her new book is about one-room schools, not just on Matinicus and other Maine islands and communities, but throughout the U.S.   She also writes a column for the Free Press, our local weekly paper.  David and I went up to Camden in November and heard Eva Murray speak.  She’s a very good writer with a unique point of view and I highly recommend her column to all – not just Mainers.  I haven’t read her books yet but am sure I will. 

Well, I guess I’ll go put on a sweatshirt before the 62 degree setting is reached.  By the way, can anyone recommend where to find really warm gloves/mittens? 

Peace.

Happy Holidays from Rockland

It's been a roller-coaster 10 days or so, with the nadir being the murder of 20 children and 6 adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut by someone not much more than a child himself, at least chronologically.  Well,  enough more than a child to be armed with 3 guns including an automatic rifle.  Enough of a "man" to kill his mother - who bought the gun that murdered her - and then deliberately head to the school where she had worked - and where he himself, I believe, had once been a student - to murder 6 and 7 year olds.  Babies!   I'm listening to public radio this morning - Christmas Eve - and they are reporting on the NRA's proposal that the government require every school to have an armed police officer.  Only in this country - or possibly China or Soviet Russia - could this be seen as a "good" idea by any one other than an extreme fringe element.

The nadir for me is not only the deaths of the 26 people - 27 including the shooter's mother? - but the response.  Of course this was a terrible event.  Of course the deaths of these children and their teachers and other care-givers are tragic.  Like just about everyone I know, I cried when I heard the news, and cried again and again as I learned about the victims.  But what do we expect? We have given the government of this country to big business and Big Guns are very big business and the NRA is their lie-spewing mouthpiece.  The NRA spends millions and millions of dollars to make sure that the politicians they back in Washington tow their line. I heard a story about one Republican candidate that dared to oppose some NRA-proposed law and the NRA funded and ran a different Republican candidate to get rid of her.  The Supreme Court keeps knocking down laws aimed at gun control in the name of "freedom."  Freedom - tell it to a six year old.   I have a six year old grandson.  And this is true in every realm of society, not just guns and gun violence.  And throughout the world, not just in this country.  We are reaping what we sowed over decades.  This, too, makes me cry. But will crying get me off my butt to find and join others to do something about it all?  What will do that, for me and for others?  What will it take?

But this is the season of hope and light.  Here's my Hanukkah menorah on the last night of Hanukkah, when all candles were lit, with David's crow puppet enjoying the light:

And here is Rockland's own special Christmas tree, built of something like 150 lobster traps (which will be raffled off to local lobster fisherman after the holiday):

We may get a dusting of snow tomorrow.  It won't be enough to cover all the muck and mire left from the warmer rainy days we've just passed through.  But just for a moment, the world may seem bright, hopeful and at peace.

May there be peace on earth for all.  The sooner the better.  And may I find a way to do more than just wish and pray for it.  So may we all.

To Away and Back

Last week I made my first trip away since moving from away to Maine, going back to Connecticut to attend some meetings at work. It was interesting to see how it made me feel.  The best part of the trip was seeing friends and spending some time with them.  I also liked being in the office for a couple of days; it made me feel re-connected to things there.  A friend I had dinner with asked me "do you miss Connecticut?"  I thought about it and I realized (and told her) that no, I don't miss Connecticut.  I miss certain people (including her), friends.  But that's it.

Maybe it's in part the fact that I have wanted this move to happen for a long time, but had to be patient and work over many months to achieve the goal of buying a house - even a 152 year old small "dated" house in a small Maine town - that makes the fact of my being here so meaningful.  The decision to move to Maine, to buy a house here, was not one that was possible to make and act on immediately.  It took really more than a year of planning and work.  I think it may be the first time in my life I set myself a concrete goal that had to be really worked for to be achieved - and then went for it and succeeded.  Perhaps that underlies a good deal of the happiness I feel every morning when I wake up here.  And it's true - I wake up happy every day.  It is a blessing and I am grateful.

On another level, I believe this particular town really does suit me.  Rockland just feels like I think a town should feel and it so quickly felt like "home".  I haven't seen all of it by any means (even though it is only 18 square miles, I think), but there is a real downtown, with actual stores, galleries, restaurants, taverns - that local people really seem to patronize - rather than being dominated by tourist-oriented businesses.  The harbor is a working harbor, and again, not tourist oriented.  Someone in Connecticut asked me about "walking on the beach".  One doesn't "walk on the beach" here; there is no real "beach".  It's a rough and rocky shore.  One walks TO the shore and during daylight hours, perhaps out the mile long breakwater to the lighthouse.  There one might watch lobster fishermen hauling up their traps, keeping the lobsters that are big enough, throwing the others back, re-baiting the traps and dropping them again.  In the early morning one might walk to a local boat school's dock and out it - to watch the sunrise. But no, there's no pink-painted-toenail-dragging-as-you-run-through-romantic-sandy-beaches in Rockland.   

Many people earn their livings from this harbor year round, fishing, boat building and repairing, the ferry that runs to off shore islands, the fish processing plant, and so on.  I learned at the local synagogue this past Friday night that in Rockland we have a full-time, year-round Harbor Master (and a part-time, seasonal only, Assistant Harbor Master)!  I love walking Ella just at daybreak down to the shore and seeing the crane in one of the shipyards with its lights on, men arriving in their pickup trucks, going to work right on the water's edge as the sun rises behind them.

I love the fact that the neighborhoods are made up of a wildly eclectic mix of houses - from relatively new to very (very!) old.  From tiny to very (very!) large.  Elaborate Victorians, simple New Englanders, ugly (in my view) 1950's ranches, duplexes, condominiums, apartment buildings - and many more.  Other parts of Rockland may be more homogeneous than our immediate area, but around here at least, the hoity toity seem to be living shoulder-to-shoulders with the rest of us: middle class, working class and some that may be just hanging on.

It was warm last week (almost 50 degrees some days), which was convenient for making the 5 hour drive to/from Connecticut - no worries about snow or sleet on the drive.  This week has been a little cooler but not really cold.  But tonight the checkout girl at the local grocery chain, Hannaford, said we're getting snow, possibly starting on Sunday.  The Hanukkah lights are in the window tonight and for 3 more nights.  Neighbors up and down the streets have put out Christmas lights and evergreen wreaths abound.    A little snow would be nice.   

I'll keep you posted.

December 2, 2012

With thanks to all my friends and family who have followed my blog, "Peace, Peace, Far and Near" that began in the immediate aftermath of my diagnosis with Stage IIIA uterine cancer and continued through my surgery, chemo, radiation and more chemo, and then periodically through follow up CT scans, biopsies, and oncologist visits, and finally only sporadically as I gratefully reached the 2 years' "no evidence of disease" milestone - I have decided to start a new blog.

As those friends and family likely all know, in October, I bought an old "1-3/4" house (2 stories, but not the entire house) in Rockland, Maine, and David (my significant other), Ella (our 3 year old hound-herding dog mix) and I moved from Connecticut to Maine.  And here is where we intend to spend the rest of our lives.

This blog is intended to keep friends and family updated with what this major life change has brought to our lives, mine in particular.  I don't know how often I'll write - probably about weekly, sometimes more and sometimes less often, I suspect.  I expect I'll rant about things in the wider world that "get" to me, laud people and happenings that make me laugh, cry, hope or dance, and not all of these posts will be Maine-specific or even personal.  But if you want to know what I'm thinking about from time to time - drop by.  If you have anything to say in response to my rants, my lauds, or otherwise - please leave a comment.

And in the not to likely event that anyone other than friends and family may be interested in the happenings of this blog, I'll leave it open to the public.  Everyone welcome - from here and from away.

xxxoooLaurenceAnneyourfriendinMaineoooxxx