My father enlisted late in World War II and by the time his troopship arrived in the Philippines, the war was all but over. He spent about six months there, saw no conflict and returned home to Maine with a few souvenir Japanese swords and a bad case of malaria. Before he arrived home, my […]

My daughter was one of those kids who said she was never going to leave home. Though she’d gone to college in Colorado and worked summers on dude ranches, Maine was home. She was born here, raised in a sturdy ship captain’s house at Porters Landing. That graceful home, with its wavy glass windows and […]

One cool and sunny spring morning, Captain Elliot asked me for help to sail his old 30 foot wooden power cruiser out of Blue Hill Bay to its summer home, at a mooring in Bucks Harbor. The trip of about 20 sea miles up Eggemoggin Reach should have taken only a couple of hours so […]

As I was making my way north from a conference, across from the Delaware River I happened upon something “hidden in plain sight.” How I missed this before, I can only speculate. Anyway, at the Conference, in 2016 in Dover, Delaware, we United Methodists had celebrated the bicentennial of the African Methodist Episcopal [AME] church. […]

“We have the same policy as Grandma,” my 26-year old son says to me from his home in Denver, Colorado, where he lives with his wife. “You’re welcome any time.” He grew up hearing that from his Grandma, my mom, who lives in the San Fernando Valley in southern California, my home from age 6 […]

Between my junior and senior year of college, I spent a summer in Vienna. Before leaving, I promised my grandfather that I’d visit his birthplace in the Netherlands. My grandpa had immigrated from there as an contract worker. Little did I know when I made that promise that it was to be a hot Sunday […]

I turned onto the River Road, near the Boothbay Play House. My good friend Dick spent summers there back in the ’50s looking for a career in acting. River Road parallels the Damariscotta River, narrow, hilly, winding but without a view of the river. Access roads lead down to expensive homes, Dodge Point Preserve offers […]

When I was a young child, my parents brought home a Moosehead furniture-made, dark maple, dining room table with eight matching chairs. The glossy wood table was beautiful and there were two leaves to add more room for more people as needed. For you see, in my family, dinner was the most important meal of […]

My husband and I moved to Maine five-and-a-half years ago. He’s from Scotland and his family all live there. I’m from Kentucky and all of my immediate family lives there. We are the ones that decided to move elsewhere for a while, but then settled away from family. So, here we are and we love […]

I flew up the front steps of 2021 East 4th St. clutching a huge stuffed dog I’d just won at the holiday bingo at Holy Rosary, our parish in Duluth, Minnesota. It was late evening by then. I’d been invited to go with my best friend Ibby Kubiak and her Dad. It was my 10th […]