Tiny Homes Spur Big Ideas

Innkeepers Find Inspiration--and a Much-needed Solution--in Bangor’s New “Tiny Home Park”

When Drew Butterworth and his young family moved to Maine from New Jersey four years ago, they saw no trouble in their financial future. “Our accountant loved the idea,” said Drew in a recent interview. “It looked great on paper.”

     “The idea” to which he’s referring is his family’s purchase of Denmark’s Pebble Pond Inn, which Drew claims they bought “for less than the price of some Taylor Swift tickets.” Built in 1912, the sprawling country inn boasts 22 guest rooms, tavern, full-service dining room, and separate innkeeper’s cottage. Butterworth discovered the property during a 2021 vacation to the area with his wife. “We’ve always loved Maine, and here was a chance to get away from the rat race and be our own boss for a change.” A review of the inn’s tax returns sealed the deal. “Save for the pandemic, the place showed perennial growth,” said the owner. “Seemed a no brainer.”

     Sadly, the Butterworth Family’s “no brainer” turned nightmare when they found themselves confronted with a problem Maine business owners know all too well.

     “Not enough workers,” said Drew.

     During peak seasons—May through October and January through March—Pebble Pond Inn requires upwards of two dozen employees. “Our first three years in business, we had to make do with less than half that,” explained Drew’s wife, Darla. Desperate to attract more staff, the Butterworths began offering health insurance in addition to some of the region’s highest wages. It made no difference.

     “We couldn’t give prospective employees what they want and need most,” said Drew, “and what they want and need most is a place to live.” The innkeeper turned up his hands. “There’s no affordable housing around here--none. Everything’s a vacation rental or Airbnb. You almost never see anything for lease. And if you do, it’s a one bedroom for $1,800 or $2,000 a month. Utilities not included, of course. Show me a breakfast cook or housekeeper who can afford that.”

     Desperate for a solution, the couple converted six of their guest rooms into employee housing prior to the start of this year’s summer season. “It was our first time running this place with enough crew,” said Drew.

     Darla laughed. “Felt like a vacation!”

    Unfortunately for the couple, the season felt like a vacation in more ways than one.

     “We made no money,” admitted Darla.

     “Not a dime,” added Drew. “Losing those six rooms killed us.”

     Believing they would forever face a choice between not enough workers and not enough income, the couple began talking seriously of closing for the winter and putting the property up for sale.  Days later, though, Drew stumbled upon a newspaper article about Bangor’s new tiny home park--30 freestanding, 320-square-foot homes, each available for a reasonable monthly rent.

     Drew explained what happened next: “I showed the article to Darla and said we should develop something similar for our staff. On a smaller scale, of course.”

     Darla smiled. “I told him we didn’t own enough acreage for a building permit.”

     “I said who needs a building permit?”

     “Next thing I knew,” said Darla, “we were in the truck and headin’ to Lowe’s!”

     That afternoon, the couple purchased a dozen 10’x12’ sheds, each with a single window and household door. In the three weeks since, Drew (with some serious help from YouTube, Darla wants you to know) has insulated, plumbed, and electrified the buildings, in addition to fitting each of them with a small wood stove. Next up: appliances, generators, holding tanks (for wastewater), and, of course, furniture. “Once that’s all done,” said Drew, “we just sit back and wait for the ice to freeze.”

     In case you’re wondering: yes, he means exactly what you think he means: the Butterworths plan to locate their “tiny home” development in the middle of Pebble Pond.

      “Some people flat-out think we’re crazy, but it’s already made a huge difference to our recruiting,” said Darla. “I’ve received more job applications in the past few days than in the last three years combined. People really appreciate the availability of employee housing. And I think they’re attracted to the sense of adventure.

     “That’s fine for the winter,” I said, “but what about your summer help?”

     “One step ahead of ya,” said Drew. He tossed me a houseboat brochure.

Hunting Season at “The Branch”

As a kid, hunting season proved my favorite time of the year because that’s when The Long Branch was busiest. It was exciting to have the hotel full, to encounter groups of people on the stairs and in the halls. In the late afternoon, men loitered in hallways and leaned in open doorways, joking and laughing, sharing stories and comparing notes about their day’s hunt, their good-natured banter warming the drafty old hotel far better than its steam radiators. After showering and changing, these men made their way downstairs to the barroom, already busy with the happy hour crowd. The Rock-Ola blasted “Take This Job and Shove It,” and Kenny Rogers’ “Lucille,” a wood fire roared in the red-brick fireplace; a blue haze of cigarette smoke hung close to the ceiling; two-quarter stacks lined the rails of both pool tables; the cigarette machine clang-clunked with each pull of the lever; the front door opened and closed, open and closed with a squeak…whoosh, squeak…whoosh; people shouted, laughter boomed, bottles clanked, the telephone rang; boots clomped; billiard balls thwacked; air hockey pucks clacked; the foosball knocked and rolled; ice cubes crashed into the stainless-steel bin; chairs and barstools squeaked and scraped against the plywood floor, and I took it all in from the blue plastic seat of my Big Wheel.

     November brought deer hunters to the hotel from all over the northeast, places like Boston, New Bedford, Tiverton and Philly. These men--iron workers and firefighters, meat cutters and contractors--arrived in groups of two to more than a half-dozen. Most were hunting season regulars at the hotel, returning year after year and staying for a week at a time. Before sunrise each morning, they made their way to the second-floor dining room for a breakfast of bacon or ham, eggs or omelets, home fries and toast. They poured coffee from the large stainless-steel urn and orange juice from the glass half-gallon bottle. They took their meals at long rectangular tables that looked north toward the railroad trestle and the lake. They sopped egg from their plates with bits of toast and drained their coffee cups, gazing out at the dark water that stretched toward the horizon like an inland sea.

     After breakfast, many hunters filled their thermoses with coffee from the urn. Some men began their day feeling very tired, either from their barroom adventures or from the trains that passed in the night. The trains always proved popular breakfast conversation at Moosehead Lake Hotel. Few guests ever forgot the sensation of bolting waking to the rumble of diesel locomotives, their whistles blaring urgently, light from their headlamps blazing on the wall.

Before departing for the day, the hunters stopped by the kitchen to grab one of the boxed lunches my mother had prepared the night before, an Italian or deli meat sandwich on a bulky roll with a bag of chips and a can of Fanta soda. From the kitchen, they either exited the back door or returned through the dining room to the hallway and descended the weathered wooden stairs. Frost glistened on the handrails. The men’s exhalations shone like tiny bursts of fog in the early morning air, and their boots crunched against the frozen gravel as they crossed the parking lot for their pickups. Remote car starters were still uncommon then, and most hunters spent cold minutes waiting for windshields to defrost before departing for the Great North Woods in search of “Bambi,” as they liked to call their prey. The hunters usually returned to the hotel between four and six o’clock. They entered through the front door dressed in wool pants, black and red checkered coats and blaze orange hats and vests. They waved through the open barroom door to my dad. “How’d you make out?” he’d call to them, and they’d stop to report before heading upstairs. Those lucky enough to tag a deer had already dropped by our house and hung it in the garage. We often had to park both our F-100 and the Kharmann Ghia outdoors for all the bucks and does hanging from the rafters.

     Around 7:00 pm, the hunters, bottles of beer or drinks in hand, made their way upstairs to the dining room for a homecooked meal that varied depending on the night of the week and my mother’s mood. Each November 13th, though, she made spaghetti (my favorite meal), in honor of my birthday. A school friend would come for dinner, Aunt Isabel would bake a cake, and with my family and all the hunters singing “Happy Birthday,” it seemed like the entire world had come together to celebrate my special day.

Hap Gerrish

The dental chair reclines and I nuzzle my head against the headrest as the paper bib scuffs my chin, its metallic ball chain still cold around my neck. The only sounds: Paul Harvey sharing “the rest of the story” from somewhere in the ceiling, water swirling in the porcelain bowl beside me, and Dr. Gerrish humming his little tunes--each of them merry as the man himself. I’ve known Harold T. “Hap” Gerrish, D.M.D., since age 2 and have only ever seen joy in his eyes. For a dentist, he’s remarkably easy to like. Too, he inspires (in me, anyway) an unusually high level of trust. Some people fear dentists for the pain they cause. Suffer enough of it, though, and you learn to trust. Deeply. 

    Hap greets me with a handshake and makes small talk, asking about my parents, my schooling, the skiing at Squaw. Then he turns to his workstation and, apropos of nothing, reels off a limerick.

On the chest of a barmaid at Yale

Were tattooed the prices of ale

And on her behind, for the sake of the blind

Was the same information in braille

I chuckle and look around the room. Straight ahead: the fireplace of what had once been the foyer of this old farmhouse. To its left: three plastic horses standing in a row upon the windowsill. They’ve stood there for as long as I can remember, just as the framed 1957 Saturday Evening Post Cover has hung on the wall for as long as I can remember. The print shows a young boy sitting in his dentist's chair, looking extremely apprehensive. Compared to me, this young man has little to worry about; I can almost guarantee it.  

     Dr. Gerrish reaches above his head to aim the lamp at my face. I squint against the brightness.

     “Open,” he says.

     I open.

    He pokes around my mouth with his dental pic and a mirror for a few seconds, then twirls the pick in his fingers and taps a molar with its end. He reaches for his spray gun and shoots air at the tooth.  “That hurt?”

    “Hurt” is an understatement, but I won’t admit it. “You got my attention,” I tell him. 

    Dr. Gerrish resumes humming and reaches for my chart. He lifts a corner of my x-ray and reviews the handwritten notes beneath it. “Okay, young fella. Let's do number thirty and thirty-one today, the molars right here,” he says, touching his fingers to his lower right jaw. “They're both critical...”  He tosses the chart onto his workstation and looks me in the eye.  “...and they're probably gonna hurt like hell. But they've got to be done.”

    “You're the boss.”

    The old dentist grins and I see his teeth, off-white from age and nicotine but perfect in every other way. “You're tough,” he assures me, “you can take it.”  He knows, as I do, that I have little choice in the matter.  

     For most people, having a cavity filled is a trying experience under the best of circumstances. I, though, have never enjoyed the best of circumstances. In fact, I’m likely one of the most unfortunate patients—perhaps the most unfortunate patient—in Hap Gerrish's decades-long career. Years earlier, my mother had told the dentist (wrongly, I will someday learn) that I’m allergic to the “caine” family of anesthetics. The result: Dr. Gerrish fills my cavities “au naturale.” Most dentists would refuse the work for fear of a lawsuit or making a mistake on a writhing patient. Not Hap.

    The dentist sets up his tray table while I seek a spot on the ceiling on which to focus while he drills. Fixing my eyes on a singular point will help keep my body still. It’s a skill I taught myself and have had ample opportunity to hone. You see, Dr. Gerrish has been working on my teeth for months.

     The previous fall, my orthodontist removed my braces to discover more than three dozen cavities. Poor oral hygiene and a steady diet of candy, Coca-Cola, and sugar-ladened cereal, had taken their toll. Still just thirteen years of age, my teeth were literally rotting in their sockets. I’ve been sitting in this chair once a week ever since.

     The dentist lifts his drill from its holder, gives it a couple of quick revs, and turns to me.

    “Ready?”

    “As ready as I'm gonna get.”

    “Hang on tight,” he says, still smiling.  “Open.”

    I open and he leans in, his face fading into the shadow of the dental lamp above his head. Bright light reflects off the corner his gold rim glasses. The drill begins its haunting whir, and I clutch the armrests so hard that my hands hurt, but it helps distract me from the pain I know is coming.

    The drill bit, sharp and pointed, pushes against my rotted tooth and bits of enamel spray against my cheek and tongue. The radius bones of my arms push against my skin as I tighten my grip on the chair, steeling myself against the hurt, which I know will only get worse. Suddenly, I smell the smoke—from burning enamel and dentin—as it rises from my mouth and into my nostrils. Dr. Gerrish's drill provides water to reduce the frictional heat between tooth and drill bit, but it’s not enough to prevent the smoke and its horrifying smell. It’s like smelling my own cremation. I feel the pointed pressure of the drill against my molar as Hap grinds part of it away. The pain spikes and begins to consume me, and my neck muscles tighten like piano strings as I try to stay still.

      The drill stops.  “Rinse,” says Hap.  I pick up the small plastic cup with trembling fingers and take a sip. The dentist, drill in hand and still smiling, stands at the ready. “Swish it around,” he says. I swish, then spit into the white ceramic bowl and watch my tooth fragments, in shades of white and brown, catch the flow of water and circle toward the drain. I lift the bib to my face and wipe my mouth, and as I sit back, my hands instinctively grip the chair again. Hard.

    “This one is almost finished,” he says. 

    “Easy for you to say,” I tell him, trying for levity.

    Hap's smile turns sympathetic.  “I'm going as fast as I can for you, I promise.”  Then he says, “Open,” and the drill resumes its whir.

    I shut my eyes and the afterimage of Dr. Gerrish's lamp burns in my private darkness. The dentist bores deep into the dentin above the root and nerve. The pain is immediate and jarring. There's more of that awful smell, more debris splattering inside my mouth, and the hurt is so great that I worry about whether the chair's headrest can withstand my pushing against it. At least I'm staying still. That's the important part. I open my eyes and see tiny drops of water spraying out of my mouth and onto the lenses of the doctor’s glasses. The drill bit draws closer to a nerve and the pain crosses a new threshold. I wonder if this moment will ever end. The roots, nerves and blood vessels of my molar are nearly exposed to atmosphere, nearly exposed to Dr. Gerrish's tungsten carbide drill bit. Please let him be almost finished, I think. Worse than the smoke or the pain: I feel vulnerable. I’m naked in the cold, stumbling on lake ice with bare feet, trying to find my way home. I'm scared.

    “Go ahead and rinse.”

    I drink the pale green minty water and spit bits of tooth and blood. Then I lay my head back in dentist’s chair. 

     “Alright, Trav,” he says, still smiling, “One more and we'll be done for today.”   

A Visit to the DMV

Zipped down to Bangor yesterday. Actually, that’s not true. By definition, living in Greenville prohibits “zipping” to anywhere, save perhaps Shirley. You can “shoot” up to Rockwood or down to Monson, but for destinations beyond a ten-mile radius, there is no “zipping.”

     Where was I heading with this?

     Oh yeah.

     The drive from Greenville to Bangor is a mind-numbingly dull, 90-minute slog, and what precious little joy I feel upon arrival fades before I hit my first red light. Safe to say I’m not a fan of Maine’s Queen City. In fact, whenever I’m there, I try to accomplish as much as possible with the singular goal of not needing to return anytime soon. I plan the trip carefully, and if I still have time after checking everything off my “Must Do” list, I try to squeeze at least one non-urgent errand into the day. Yesterday’s non-urgent errand: a visit to the DMV.

     If you noticed me driving around town last summer with studded snow tires, it will surely come as no surprise that I’ve also been driving with an out-of-state license. It’s a New Hampshire license, and I’ve held it for a very long time—long enough to have lived in three states not named New Hampshire. Yeah, I know this is illegal, but I’m about as fond of the DMV as I am of Bangor. Unfortunately, my license was set to expire next month, so I had little choice but to make an appearance.

     I arrived at the Department of Motor Vehicles, stepped inside, and took a number from the machine. I pulled number 107, and the monitor on the wall showed that number 89 was already being helped. This seemed pretty good, and I took a seat. That’s when the scam that is the DMV numbering system began to reveal itself. You see, I mistakenly thought there existed only 18 numbers between 89 and 107.  Not at the DMV.  Nope, the Maine Department of Motor Vehicles has its own version of numerical order. It goes something like this: 90, 91, BA-47, BA-723, 92, BA-468, BA-218, BA-290, 93, and so on and so forth…

     Suddenly realizing that I might be there a while, I leaned back in my chair, closed my eyes, and eavesdropped on the DMV customers at the various service windows. I learned much, not the least of which is that there’s no such thing as a quick and easy transaction at the DMV. Perhaps most amazing: the utter lack of preparation on the part of customers. Seemingly not a single soul brought his or her necessary paperwork, and I heard countless tales of woe--grown adults offering up one “the dog ate my homework” story after another. In fact, customer incompetence ran so high that I actually felt sorry for the employees.

     I don’t know how much they pay you people, I thought, but it ain’t enough.  

     After waiting 90-odd minutes, a computer-generated voice from somewhere in the ceiling said, “Now serving number 107 at window 5.”

     I approached window 5 where a 20-something lady named Trish greeted me with a “How may I help you?” and a professional, if slightly gratuitous, smile.

     “I’m here to trade in my New Hampshire license for a Maine REAL ID license.”

     “Okay, great!” said Trish, and I laid my supporting documents on the counter: my driver’s license, my birth certificate, a utility bill, my car registration. Trish took each one and read it over. Then, she broke my heart. Turns out my utility bill lists my town as “Greenville Junction,” whereas my car registration shows me living in “Cove Point Township.” This discrepancy meant Trish couldn’t give me my REAL ID. She could, however, issue me a traditional Maine license.

     “I’ll take it,” I said, adding, “I’ll come back for my REAL ID as soon as I have the town office change my car registration.”

     “Oh, you don’t need to go through all that,” assured Trish. “Just bring your new Maine license when it comes in the mail.”

     I wasn’t sure I heard her correctly. “You mean I can use the license you’re about to issue me to get my REAL ID license?”

    “Sure can!” she beamed.

     I looked at her and waited for…I don’t know…a smirk, an eyeroll—something, anything—to acknowledge the obvious irony in what she’d just told me. Trish, though, offered no hint of understanding, and all the sympathy I’d felt for her and her co-workers turned to scorn in less time than you can say, “Now serving one-zero-eight.” And then, she made it worse.

     “Soon as it arrives in the mail,” she said, still smiling, “you just zip right on back down here!”

Transfer Station Contemplations

Random thoughts while waiting for the transfer station to open:

~Was chatting with a local yesterday when he confided a grave concern. “The town’s changing,” he groaned. “Went shopping this morning and didn’t know a single person in the store.” The man was clearly bummed, so I offered my condolences. Didn’t have the heart to tell him that he’d just described one of my lifelong fantasies. I’m not kidding. Outside of, say, hosting The Price Is Right or dating Lady Gaga, nothing would delight me more than experiencing my hometown minus the familiar faces, even if just for a day. Indeed, I often drive to places like Belfast and Bar Harbor for no other reason than to enjoy a few hours among strangers. Because small town familiarity can be pleasant, but it’s often a pain. Be honest: who among us hasn’t, at one time or another, pulled a U-turn in the middle of Shop & Save to avoid an ex, or a creditor, or that neighbor we just can’t stand? Heck, I can’t count the times I’ve abandoned my cart in the middle of an aisle and hidden in the restroom ‘til the coast was clear. Ever buy ice cream that’s obviously thawed at some point and been refrozen? Now you know why.

~Speaking of neighbors: When I was a kid, my mother often said, “The problem with living in the city is you don’t know your neighbors.” I never took her seriously, for two reasons: a.) she’d never lived in a city, and b.) we had no neighbors. It was like having someone tell you, “Sasquatches smell like wet dog.” Sure, you could choose to believe it, but why would you?

~Couldn’t help but chuckle at my buddy who’s planning to escape town over the holiday weekend. He lives in a trailer at the end of a dead-end dirt road about a quarter mile from the nearest power line. Come Friday afternoon, though, he’s “headin’ upta camp.”

~Ever notice that many of the same people who lose their minds during a power outage will gladly fork over fifty bucks to sleep on the ground and poop in a hole?

~I recently used “skedaddle” in a sentence and people looked at me like I belong in a home.

~Bought Stephen King’s recent book, “Holly,” not realizing the cover glows in the dark. I don’t need those kind of surprises in my life.

~Why is there no air freshener that smells like coffee?

~I’m not pointing fingers, but have you noticed that the worst road around here leads to the Public Works Department?

~Think it’s mere coincidence that organ music shows up almost exclusively in churches and horror movies?

~Given the many regulations and recommendations around food safety, I’ve always thought it hysterical that we all buy fish from the back of a van.

~My bank recently froze my account for suspicious activity. Someone apparently tried to make a deposit.

~Ever have one of those days where everyone you meet reminds you of Jim from Taxi?

~I have OCD and ADD. Everything must be perfect, but only for a few seconds.

~Business idea: point a video camera at the public boat ramp and start a YouTube channel. You’re welcome.

~Can’t wait for the new mini golf course to open. I’m available to caddy.

~In forty years of golfing, the only improvement in my game occurred when the course-side condos removed their swimming pool.

~Guess I was overtired. Recently poured my corn flakes into the coffee maker basket. Worse: the basket was IN the coffee maker at the time.

~A California friend asked if Moosehead Lake is cold. “Let me put it this way,” I said. “The annual 4th of July festivities include a polar plunge.”

~I’ve always found it interesting that most pilots, upon meeting you for the first time, will, in the first ninety seconds of conversation, tell you that they’re pilots.

~Was offering a brand new pre-hung door online for $50. Received this message: “Give you $20 CASH.” Like I’m supposed to be impressed. How the hell else would he pay me? Certified check? Bitcoin? Beaver pelts?

~Ever struggle with those toilet paper dispensers in public restrooms? Specifically, the ones with the single roll of toilet paper that’s the size of a truck tire? Those rolls weigh so much that spinning them is impossible. You pull and pull and pull, a little harder, and a little harder, and a little harder, until finally the TP rips and leaves you with a postage stamp-sized piece between your fingers. I’ve heard the term, “designed to fail,” but these were designed to never work in the first place. It’s like they want you to just give up.

~Riddle me this: why is it that, when I see a bicyclist in the city, I think, “Good for him! I wish I had that kind of ambition!” Yet, when I see a bicyclist in rural Maine, I think, “Poor bastard must’ve lost his license.”

~Why is no one ever combobulated?

Enjoy the day--

Celebrating Everyman on Labor Day

Thirty-three or thirty-four years ago—1990 or ’91, I can’t remember which—I was hanging out at the local Citgo station (where Big Apple now stands), waiting for my friend Dewey to finish his shift. It was a Sunday evening in mid-May, clear and bright and cool, and Dewey had just finished “sticking the tanks”—measuring the fuel levels of the in-ground tanks with a giant wooden ruler—when in rolled a Chevy pickup. My friend and I watched through the window as a thirty-something man in a t-shirt and jeans climbed down from the cab and thanked the driver with a pat on the door and an appreciative wave. The truck pulled away while the fellow we now took for a hitchhiker began running toward the station entrance. Dewey flicked the ash from his Marlboro and said, “Well, this ought to be interesting.”

     The station’s old wooden door flew open fast enough to rattle its pane. “Thank God you’re here,” exclaimed the stranger to my friend behind the counter. “I need a tow truck.” His voice contained a notably high level of desperation.  

     Dewey asked what happened.

     The man’s reply, in a nutshell: road washed out, passenger van, front end sunk into the mud, wife and children still with the vehicle.

     “Whereabouts?” asked Dewey.

     “Back side of Big Spencer Mountain.”

     At that, I let out an audible, “Oh boy.”

     The region in question was well over an hour’s drive from town--most of it on gravel roads.

     Dewey looked over his shoulder at the clock on the wall. It read five minutes to six. He turned back around, butted his cigarette in the ashtray, and broke the news as gently as he could.

      “This ain’t your lucky day,” he said, and nodded toward the window. “See that tow truck across the street? It’s the only one in town. And the guy who drives it is on vacation.”

     “Oh my God,” said the man, bringing a hand to his mouth.

     “It’s gonna be okay,” assured Dewey. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch. I’m out of here in five minutes. I’ll get you unstuck. And if I can’t, I’ll at least get your wife and kiddos back to town.”

     My friend looked over at me. “Road trip?”

     “Wouldn’t miss it.”

     The stranger spoke. “I sure hope one of you guys has a four-wheel drive.”

     “Nope,” said Dewey. He broke into a grin and jerked a thumb in my direction. “Dumbass here doesn’t have a car, and I drive a Ford Escort.”

     The man’s jaw dropped. “You’re kidding.”

     I tried my best to console the poor guy. “Not to worry,” I said. “It’s top of the line. Even has a pin stripe.”

We arrived at dusk. The man reunited with his wife and two young children while Dewey and I surveyed the scene: a vintage Volkswagen van, front wheels submerged halfway up their hub caps. Dewey asked the man’s wife to drive in reverse while we three men pushed. The VW budged not an inch. For perhaps the next quarter hour, we batted around bad idea after bad idea. Then someone noticed that the van sat far over to the right side of the road. Might we have enough road on the van’s left side to swing its front end clear of the washout? I turned to the man’s wife. “You folks have a jack?”

     We worked in the glow of headlights, mud and icy water halfway up our shins. Again and again, we jacked the front of the van as high in the air as possible and pushed it from the side. Sometimes we managed to nudge it a foot, sometimes just three or four inches. Together, though, we eventually rotated that van far enough to land her wheels back on solid ground.

     I don’t recall exactly how much money my friend earned in those days. But I remember well that I took a job several years later for $4.25 per hour. If Dewey cleared one hundred-fifty dollars per week pumping gas at that station, I’d be very surprised. And yet, when the van owner reached out with a wad of bills, Dewey told him to put it away.

     “C’mon man, you just saved our vacation.”

     “Don’t worry about it.”

     “Take it, please.”

     Dewey waved him off. “Nah,” he said, “Just buy your gas from us next time you’re in town.”    

Happy Labor Day, and thank you for all you do.

Minnie, Monty, and a Lady Named Cora

My great aunt Wilhelmina (“Minnie,” for short) was born in 1894 and in her 98 years saw the arrival of many life-changing inventions, everything from radio and television to the electric toaster and Polaroid cameras. Aunt Minnie, though, shunned all these newfangled contraptions and most others that came along, she having spent much life with a near obsessive aversion to technology—a phobia rooted in the untimely death of her husband Freemont (“Monty”). 

     By all accounts, Monty was a kind and hardworking man, if a bit lacking in the commonsense department. A cobbler by trade, he specialized in making and repairing spiked boots for the men who worked river drives, and was highly regarded from Bangor to the Canadian border for his craftsmanship and reasonable prices. In fact, Monty’s business proved so lucrative that, in just three years of running his own shop, he managed to save enough money to buy a Model T Ford.

     The shiny new automobile arrived by train in the spring of 1915 and, for the next several days, Monty and his young bride reveled in cruising around town, making endless loops back-and-forth between the Junction Wharf and the scenic lookout on Blair Hill. Monty and Minnie, the story goes, might well have been the first Greenville couple to ever go “parking.” As owners of one of only three “horseless carriages” in the region, they were having the time of their lives. Then, on June 3, 1915, tragedy struck when Monty lit a cigarette while driving to the post office.

     Model T gas tanks were located directly beneath the seats.

     Widowed and traumatized, my aunt blamed the car, and from that day forward shunned all new inventions, preserving like a time capsule her home and manner of living for the next 68 years. Finally, in 1983, Minnie--age 88, her mind and body slowing--moved to Beaver Cove to live with her younger sister.

     Aunt Minnie adapted reasonably well to her new, infinitely more modern, surroundings. One thing, though, continued to intimidate her: her sister’s telephone. You see, in Minnie Belmont’s 88 years on earth, she’d never once used a phone. Ever. And she flatly refused to call anyone with her sister’s phone for fear that the rotary dial might sever the tip of her finger or, worse, break a nail. Months’ worth of encouragement from family and friends, however, eventually provided Aunt Minnie with enough gumption to begin taking calls, and she seemed to enjoy the conversations despite a constant fear of eavesdroppers. You see, in 1983, Beaver Cove remained one the last places in America with party lines.

     I was thirteen that year and, having watched Minnie talk on the phone, I can attest that it was quite a production. The woman was scared to death of the thing. She’d pick up the handset with the timidity of someone attempting to diffuse a bomb, and she always spoke into the mouthpiece as if taking the call in the middle of a Sunday service. In person, Minnie presented as gregarious and pleasantly boisterous. On the telephone, though, she whispered—no doubt in effort to protect herself from nosy neighbors. I called one day. When she answered--on something like the 72nd ring--I heard a voice soft as that of a church mouse.

     “Hellooooo?”

     Even four decades later, I’m not proud to admit this, but I decided right then and there to play a little joke on my elderly aunt. I said—with my best little old lady voice—“Hello, is this Minnie?”

     My aunt whispered, “Yes, who’s this?”

     To keep up my little charade, I made up a name. A completely fictitious name. I said, “Minnie, this is Cora Fielding.”

    “Who?”

     “Cora Fielding!” I shouted. “Minnie, I haven’t seen you since 1930!”

     For a long moment, I heard only silence on the line, and I visualized my aunt standing there, eyes narrowed, the wheels of her mind slowly turning. Suddenly, she burst out.

    “Holly MacIntosh!  Cora, how you doin’?”

     Continuing with my little-old-lady impression, we had a nice chat for two or three minutes. Then, no longer able to keep from laughing, I reverted to my normal voice and said, “Auntie, what are you doing!”

     “Travis,” she said, “get off the line—I’m talking to Cora Fielding!”

Maine State House News

In 2021, Athol, Massachusetts named him “Businessman of the Month.”  He hosts an investment advice program on a 50 watt AM radio station.  His motivational speaking engagements fill medium-size banquet rooms from Danvers to Dorchester.  His name is Zack Zorkerschmel.  (“Pronounced just like it’s spelled,” he wants you to know.)  He’s a Massachusetts developer.  And he wants Maine to lease him a few million acres at a dollar per year. 

     Zorkerschmel’s name might ring familiar.  As a businessman, he’s enjoyed—critics might say endured—a long and colorful history in New England.  As owner and operator of Mainely Moose Tours, he earned a small fortune during the 1990s through his knack for marketing and some well-placed salt licks.  A years-long investigation by the Maine Warden Service led to removal of the licks and a reportedly six-figure fine.  The business soon dissolved.  Zorkerschmel, though, retained enough cash to launch his next venture:  OOB Boutique, which he describes as “a combination Speedo Shop/Skee-Ball Center/Burner Phone Emporium.”  It lasted one season.  Other of his less-than-successful ventures include a coffee brandy flavored energy drink, squirrel jerky, and--most famously--turning the Mount Washington Auto Road into the world’s largest snow tubing park.  “I’m still bitter about that one,” he laments.  “The entire infrastructure already existed, right down to what would have been the world’s coolest passenger lift:  the Cog Railway.”  Zorkerchmel gazes into the middle distance and shakes his head.  “New Hampshire politicians, man.  They have no vision.”

     Zorkerschmel hopes Maine lawmakers possess the type of vision their Granite State counterparts lack.  He’s in Augusta this week aiming to convince them to place an estimated 3.2 million acres of undeveloped forestland under his control.  His plan:  the world’s largest theme park, one based entirely on the history of logging in Maine. 

     In a recent interview, Zorkerschmel produced a poster-size map of the land in question and spent ninety minutes presenting his idea, which he called “part working forest, part tourist attraction.”  The park will contain numerous “towns,” each designed and constructed to honor a particular period in Maine’s logging history.  “Visitors will be able to experience Maine life as it was, all the way back to 1830,” Zorkerschmel explained.  Among the planned attractions:  hotels, restaurants, museums, exhibitions, midways, log flumes, roller coasters, woodsman exhibitions, lumberjack competitions, logging camp tours, and river drive re-enactments.  His proposed name for the park:  Bunyan World.  As in Paul.

     I asked Zorkerschmel if he worried that Mainers might find his vision more akin to Disney than Acadia.  The developer rolled his eyes. 

     “Acadia.  Hike a mountain at three in the morning so you can see the sunrise at six.  Yeah, that’s a good time.”

     He emphasized the importance of Bunyan World’s working forest, which he claims will guarantee thousands of woods-related jobs and the restoration of Maine’s title as “Lumber Capital of the World.”

     “The reason Maine’s logging industry has suffered,” said Zorkerschmel, “is because it hasn’t adapted to the times.  These days, when a person buys a stick of lumber, he envisions the tree from which it came.  He wants to know where that tree grew.  He wants to know that it lived free of pesticides and chemical fertilizers.  And, of course, he wants to know that it was harvested humanely.”

     “Harvested humanely?” I asked.   

     Zorkerschmel arched his eyebrows in inquiry.  “What?”

     “Trees don’t have nervous systems.  They don’t…you know, feel.”

     He dismissed me with a wave.  “They’re living things, and they deserve our respect.  And ending their lives with those loud, unsightly, diesel smoke-spewing tree harvesters is anything but respectful.”

     I asked if he had an alternative in mind.  The businessman smiled.

     “Crosscut saws and axes.  The way nature intended.”

     “Impossible,” I said.  “You’d need to pay each crew member a thousand bucks a day to work that hard.”

     “Wages will run high, that’s true.  But Bunyan World ticket sales will more than offset them.”

     Zorkerschmel heads to Bangor tomorrow for a meeting with city councilors.  Bunyan World will need a mascot, and he’s hoping to buy a certain statue…

A Real (Thanksgiving) Turkey

Thursday night, I was fretting over what to write for this column when my phone rang.   

     “Happy Thanksgiving,” I answered.

     A burly voice boomed in my ear.  “GOT YA DEER YET?”

     “Hi Tom,” I said, and closed my eyes against the headache already forming.  

     The inquisitor on the other end of the line was none other than Thomas R. Smith, AKA Cousin Tommy.  He’s one of those family members you talk to about once every five years whether you want to or not.  We speak so infrequently that his name and number weren’t even in my phone, which explains why I answered.  Mind you, Tommy’s not a bad guy.  But he has a long-standing reputation as one of those people who reaches out only when he needs something.  I was therefore naturally leery when he kicked off the call with a job offer.

     “I wanna open a store somewheres in Greenville and have you run it.  Yessah!” 

     “Oh wow!” I said.  

     Oh God, I thought.

     For the next twenty-odd minutes, Tommy regaled me with his sales pitch.  I turned him down for a variety of good reasons, not the least of which is that I know him.  Still, listening to the man gave me an idea.

     “Say,” I said, “while I have you on the phone…mind if I profile you and your business for the local paper?”

     “SHOR!”

     My headache began receding ever-so-slightly.  

For the last decade or so, Cousin Tommy has owned and operated Tommy’s Taxidermy on Belgrade Road in Pingree.  If you’re one of the dozen or so humans who still listens to terrestrial radio, you’ve doubtless heard his ads.  Tommy’s Taxidermy:  We’ll make your animal appear so life-like, you’ll be tempted to shoot it again.

    Yes, he’s THAT guy.  

    I make fun of Tommy--mostly because it’s easy--but I give him great credit, too.  My cousin is quite literally the modern-day embodiment of the American Dream, the rare man who made something of himself despite starting with nothing.  In Tommy’s case, “nothing” includes brains, looks, and good taste.  His 10,000 square foot combination taxidermy showroom/sporting goods store, though, is proof-positive of the man’s savant-like genius for marketing.  Once, upon hearing a customer bemoan that he hadn’t caught a legal fish all spring, Tommy nailed a high-tension bungee cord to each end of a hardwood plank and dubbed it, “The Fenwick Fish Stretcher.”  Guaranteed to add as much as two inches to any freshwater fish or the next one’s half price!  They flew out the door at $49.95.  When he noticed a spike in business each year around Valentine’s Day, he created a line of blaze orange lingerie.  “Took off like a California wildfire,” Tommy told me, proudly.  Spurred by the success of that little venture, he hired a ghostwriter to pen a Maine-based romance novel titled, Fifty Shades of Camo.  It’s in its fourth printing; there’s even talk of a movie.  Tommy also dabbles in real estate (sort of).  For as little as $149.00 per night, you can rent one of his hunting blinds through Airbnb.  Despite these and other big sellers, his primary money maker remains something you’ve probably seen a hundred times and never noticed.

Tommy had been in business for about two years when, while driving home one November night, he spied a deer hanging in his neighbor’s yard.  

     “This fella was one of the worst hunters you ever laid your eyes to,” explained Tommy.  “Couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn with a shotgun and a scope.  Hell, he hadn’t shot a deer in twenty years that I know of.  Then one day he bags this little spikehorn and he’s so damn proud of himself that he hangs it in his front yard for all the world to see.  Problem was, there weren’t no trees in his front yard.  His back yard’s a forty-acre woodlot, but he’s got to show off, ya know?  So get this:  he strings the deer from his dog run!”  Tommy snorted at the memory.  “Damndest thing you ever saw.  Looked like Rudolph on a zip line.” 

     As Tommy tells it, he went home and started disparaging the neighbor to his wife.  He was initially shocked when she defended the man.  “Cut the poor guy some slack,” she scolded.  “He’s waited a long time to have a deer to show off.’  

     “That,” explained Tommy, “is when it hit me.”  He paused as if reliving the magic moment.  “Every hunter wants a deer hanging in his yard.  Well, I decided right then and there that every hunter should have one.”

     Capitalizing on modern society’s “everyone gets a trophy” culture, Tommy launched an entirely new industry.  Instead of mounting deer in the life-like, upright poses he’d always done, he began mounting some to look, as his website says, “Fresh off the roof of your car!”

     Tommy priced his first “field-dressed, ready-to-hoist” white tailed deer at $3,995.  It sold in an hour.  He sold two hundred in the first year.  Three hundred the next.  This year, he’s already doubled that.  “And we’re still getting Christmas orders!”  he chimed.  

      I asked Tommy where he’s finding all these deer.

     “We’re doing more and more custom jobs all the time,” he said.  “Most are still road kills, though.”

     “So, you recycle.”

     He roared with laughter.  “Zackly.  For a taxidermy shop, the environmentalists love us.”  

     Each ultra-realistic, fully weatherproof mount comes with ten feet of rope, a roll of cheese cloth, and--ironically enough--a “lifetime” warranty, guaranteeing that the hunter can get skunked year after year and the neighbors will never know.  

     “That’s actually brilliant,” I admitted to my cousin.

     “Ooh!” he said, “I almost forgot to tell you about the special I’m runnin’!”

     Order your ready-to-hang white tail by December 1st and receive a replica deer tag absolutely free.  

     “What do wardens think of all this?” I wondered aloud.

     Tommy ended the call there.  Muttered something about a headache.

Family Portrait

The rising sun sparking on the watery plain, pine walls awash in golden light, windows open to the sounds of early morning; chickadees and blue jays singing in maple trees, crows crowing in the spruces and firs; a small outboard putting in the distance; dew on the lawn, air and water perfectly still; our aluminum skiff at the dock, floating in wait; the German shepherd curled up beside the sliding glass door. 

     My father began his day at dawn, while my mother and I still slept.  He dressed in the slacks and button-down shirt hanging from the bedpost, then stepped into his Moccasins and headed for the kitchen, humming a merry tune and playfully rapping the fingernails of his right hand along the hallway wall.  He plucked his fishing hat from atop the pool table and perched it on his bald head as he stepped out the door.  He drove the Ford pickup into town.

     Two or three minutes later, Dad pulled up in front of a not-yet-open Breton's Store where a stack of Bangor Daily newspapers stood guard at the entrance.  He slid a newspaper from the bundle and tossed down his 35 cents, then looked across the road toward the Junction Wharf.  If he spotted any early morning fishermen, he might drive over and ask how they're biting, or simply sit for a few moments and watch them cast. 

     Upon returning home, Dad reached beneath the kitchen counter for the half gallon of Popov, and into a tall glass sans ice poured enough of the vodka for two or three regular-size cocktails.  He added orange juice--more or less for color, I think--and stirred the concoction with whatever proved handy; spoon, fork, knife, Bic pen—didn't matter.  Satisfied, he tapped his stirrer on the rim of the glass and sucked it dry.  Then, cocktail in one hand and newspaper in the other, he ambled over to the dining room table and took his seat beside the picture window.  He lit a Chesterfield with a match, slipped on his reading glasses and commenced with working the crossword puzzle with a pen.  Dad completed the crossword puzzle every morning of his life, and always in ink, pausing occasionally to sip his “vodka and orange juice” and gaze out at the lake.   

     My mother awoke at about 6:30. Dad greeted her with “Good morning, dear,” as she came down the hall.  She answered in accordance with her mood as she turned the corner for the kitchen.  Sometimes, she replied with a loving “Good morning” in her sweet voice, and sometimes she offered a gruff and guttural “Mornin'.”  Listening from my bedroom, I knew from her tone how the next few minutes would unfold.

     If my mother answered in her sweet voice, she’d turn on the radio to Q106.5, the only country station we received in Greenville.  She’d fill a saucepan with water and place it on the stove.  While waiting for the water to boil, she’d open cans of dog and cat food with the electric blender, both animals charging into the kitchen at the sound.  My mother would look down at the cat nuzzling at her legs.  “Good morning,” she’d say.  “You're so pretty, yes you is.”  She’d feed the dog first, bending down to spoon Alpo into its bowl.  “There you go, old boy.”  Then she’d tip the can of cat food upside down and shake it until its contents slid out with a slurp.  The cat always took her meals on the kitchen table as a quasi-defense against the German Shepherd stealing its food.  But the dog, having finished its meal in a series of quick chomps, now stared longingly at the cat’s breakfast as if eying its dessert.  “You leave that kitty alone if you know what's good for ya,” my mother would warn. She then spooned her instant Maxwell House into a cup, added hot water from the pan, topped the mixture with a splash of milk from the gallon jug and took her seat at the kitchen counter.  There she’d spend the next hour or so sipping coffee, smoking Pall Malls, listening to the radio, making small talk with my father and reading borrowed sections of The Bangor Daily News. 

     If she answered in her gruff voice, I’d pull the blanket over my head. 

     Anything could set her off.  A hungry cat (“Get!  Get before I fuckin’ shoot you.”); a low supply of milk (“Ain't that fuckin’ sweet, huh?  Another fuckin’ gallon of milk, gone!”); a dog that won't come in from outside (“Fine!  Stay out you fuckin’ bitch!”).  And nothing raised her ire like my dirty dishes in the sink.  “You son of a whore, you!  You rotten little bastard! You ain't nothing but a fuckin’ pig.  You’ll be wearing a fuckin’ bra pretty soon, your tits will be so fuckin’ big.  I'll put a chain around that God damn refrigerator if I got to.”  On and on she raged.

     I hid beneath the covers, afraid to leave my room.

     Dad lifted his eyes from the crossword, looked toward the lake, and sipped his vodka and orange juice.

     My mother's rages shook my very sense of self.  They felt like earthquakes, complete devastation without warning or means of prevention and no way of limiting the destruction.  Now entering preadolescence and no longer possessing the cuteness of a toddler or the innocence of a young child, I transitioned from merely witnessing my mother's tirades to almost always being the target of them.  Dad encouraged me to turn the other cheek.  “Your mother likes to blow off steam,” he'd say, “It's best just to ignore her; she doesn't mean what she says.”  But I couldn't ignore her because I couldn't distinguish between "meaning it" and "not meaning it,” and the reason I couldn't distinguish the difference is because there is no difference. 

     My mother grew increasingly hostile toward me as I grew older, and as I grew older, I began to talk back.  This had the unfortunate side effect of intensifying her fury, and what had always been her tirades now became our wars.  By the time I left for college at age eighteen, my mother and I likely fought hundreds, perhaps thousands of times.  We fought more often than most people take out the trash, or buy milk, or do laundry.  I'm not talking about petty, run-of-the-mill squabbles; my mother and I were incapable of mild disagreement.  Our fights escalated into full-fledged nuclear confrontations—all of them.  Yet, within minutes of an argument, no matter how traumatic or intense, I could never remember how a fight began.  Our conflicts were so commonplace that I lived without awareness of their origins, like a person lives without awareness of his heartbeat.  The only thing I knew for certain is that the fights were my fault.  This I never doubted, not even for a second.  To make sense of my life, I had a choice to make:  View myself as bad or my mother as bad, and no child wants to view their parent as bad. 

     Fights between my mother and me always followed the same trajectory.  She'd complain about something I'd done, or didn't do, or wanted to do, or asked to do.  Unable to bear her anger, I'd talk back, and we were on our way to Armageddon, volleying verbal bombs at each other, both of us getting louder and louder until she threatened me with physical harm (“I oughtta fuckin’ cold-cock you, you son-of-a-bitch”) or the loss of a privilege (That's it!  No minibike for you!”).  At this point, the emptiness swallowed me up and all my anger turned to fear and shame.  Crying and wailing, I begged forgiveness.  I needed her to let me start over.  “I'm sorry, Mommy!”  I needed her to stop being angry with me.  “Please, Mommy!  I'm sorry!”  I needed to know she still loved me.  “Please!  Mommy!  I'm so sorry, Mommy!  I'll be good!  Please!”  But it was always the same response:  I didn't know how to be good, and it was too fuckin’ late for sorry.  Hysterical with panic, I continued to sob and plead until she completed my rejection with “Get out of my fuckin’ sight if you know what's good for ya,” or “If I was you, I'd go to my fuckin’ room and stay there.”  Wailing with pain and fury, I ran down the hall to my room and jumped onto my bed, kicking and punching the mattress, screaming and crying until I fell asleep.

     My dad refilled his glass. 

Trying

My mother stands on the end of our dock with her Minolta in hand.  She eyes the dials, a quizzical look on her face.  Trying to figure something out.    

     I call across the water.  “Ready?”

     She shakes her head at the confusing piece of electronics.  Dad bought her the camera three years earlier as an anniversary present, but despite the owner’s manual, a photography book, and Anne Rojas’ expert coaching, she’s never really learned how to use it.  I’m not worried, though.  Her outdoor shots are usually pretty good.  She lowers the camera to her side and peers in my direction.  She looks uncomfortable but determined.  She’s trying. 

     “Ready as I’m gonna be, I s’pose.”

     I’m thirty feet away, standing in a suit and tie atop a gently sloping ledge where it dips beneath the surface of the lake.  I look down as a small wave laps the toe of my shoe.  I dry the wingtip with a flick of my foot and readjust my stance.  Hands in pants pockets, I look out over the lake.  “Okay,” I yell. “Go for it.”

     “Ain’t you gonna face the camera?”

     I turn only my head.  “It’s a profile shot, ma.”

     “All right,” she says, “if you say so.”  Then, in her baby voice:  “Say cheeeeeeese!”

     I turn back to the lake and roll my eyes toward the overcast sky.  “Cheese.”

     My mother’s shooting pictures for my senior portrait.  It’s one of our good days. 

There had always been good days.  Rare as Seattle sunshine, perhaps, but forever recurring.  This knowledge—that homelife was sometimes good—instilled in me a perennial hope that it could be good again.  Hope kept me coming back each time I ran away.  That, and she was my mother.  That, and he was my father.  That, and this was my home.

     I often wonder how my life might differ had I possessed the courage to leave and stay gone.  It’s an unanswerable question, of course.  In simplest terms, each of us is a product of biology and environment, and even that seemingly straightforward combination offers infinite possible outcomes.  Had I left home at sixteen and, say, been adopted, I might have grown into a confident, emotionally steady, intellectual type—a college professor, perhaps, or a journalist or librarian.  Or an ax murderer.  You just never know. 

     What I do know, and often remind myself, is that I was an extremely lucky kid.  People made a difference.  Dad blessed me with his intellect, amiability, and gregariousness, and instilled in me a moral compass.  My teachers consistently emphasized the importance of education.  Uncle Jack and my brothers inspired me to dream of a world beyond Greenville, Maine.  Families like the Hubbards, Owenses, and Wallingfords, gave me a chance, a few hours at a time, to experience a loving home.  Charles Carter and Anne Rojas quietly stepped in to parent me when I needed it most.  And then there was Jan.

     I first met my friend Sam’s mom during the spring of my sophomore year when, while playing Nintendo at her house one Saturday night, the cowboy boot-clad brunette strutted through her front door, grabbed a can of beer from the fridge, approached the couch where her son and I were camped and remarked, in her sassy, central Maine twang, “You must be Travis.”  We struck up a conversation, and I soon abandoned my friend to join his mother at the dining room table.  Sam would need to save Zelda on his own. 

     My friend’s mom and I talked for hours.  She was bright, laughed freely, and avoided all the cliched topics on which parents usually rely when talking with their kid's friends.  To my delight, she even shared memories of The Long Branch.  I instantly liked her.

     Jan, Sam, and Sam’s young sister, Jessie, lived in a gabled ranch overlooking an open field in the woods about six miles south of Greenville.  A recent divorcee, Jan’s lack of money was visible all around.  The field grew wild.  The horse barn and four rail fence remained unpainted.  The house, with its bare plywood floors and untrimmed windows and doors, remained unfinished.  Furniture was secondhand and sparse.  Kitchen cabinets held mismatched plates and Cool Whip containers that served as bowls.  Yet, despite its starkness, I would soon think of this place as my sanctuary. 

     It's often said that men think and women feel, but Janice B. Ryder thought more than she felt.  She possessed the honesty to speak her mind and the confidence to pull it off without appearing arrogant or angry.  The woman exuded credibility.  And so, I paid attention when, mere minutes into our friendship, she became the first person to ever tell me, “Esther Wallace is a difficult woman.”

My mother doesn’t understand why we’re doing this again, especially in such dreary weather.  She devoted an entire roll of film to this project just a week ago, on a day bright and warm.  I’d posed on the lawn that afternoon: me in my shirt and tie, me in my blazer, me with my blazer slung over my shoulder, me wearing my gold rimmed glasses, me not wearing them, me talking with my hands to an imaginary person off camera.  Many of those pictures turned out well, my face well-centered and in-focus, colors so bold you could almost smell the fresh cut grass.  Any number of those pics would’ve proved perfectly suitable for the yearbook, but then I conjured this idea. 

     My mother snaps two quick photos and I ask her to hang on a sec. 

     “Are you getting the lake?” I shout.

     My photographer smiles.  “Of course I’m getting the lake.  It’s behind you, ain’t it?”

     “I mean—”  I try to think of the word.  I know even less about cameras than her.  “Like, don’t zoom in on me.”

     “All right,” she sighs.  “Have it your way, I guess.”

     I pause for a moment.  I want to tell her to keep me near the left side of the frame, but I’m not sure if that will mess with her ability to focus the lens. 

     My mother grows impatient.  “You want me to keep goin’ or what?”

     To heck with it, I decide.  The yearbook staff can crop it.  “Yes,” I answer.  Again, I position myself sideways to the camera.  Straight-backed, I twist my torso slightly and look to the islands.  “Ready.”

Despite her knowledge of my mother, Jan--for a time, anyway--held out hope that my situation would improve.  At one point, she even suggested my mother and I see a therapist.  She knew a good one, she said.  In Skowhegan.  “I went to him when I was going through my divorce,” she said.  “He’s a great guy.  Wicked down-to-earth.” 

     I shook my head morosely.

     “There’s no shame in asking for help,” Jan said.

     “Oh, I know that.  And you know that.  But…”

     “You don’t think Esther will do it.”

     “Not a chance.”

     My friend’s mom shrugged.  “Well, go by yourself then.”

     “Yeah right,” I muttered.  “She’s not going to let me drive to Skowhegan.”  A sixty-five-mile, ninety minute, one-way trip. 

     “Take my car,” offered Jan.  She lit a cigarette, tilted her head back, and blew a smoke cloud at the ceiling.  “Jesum Criminy, I’ll even pay him if you need me to.”

     I knew nothing about mental health therapists or therapy.  In fact, Jan was the first person I ever knew who’d sought such help.  Or, perhaps more accurately:  she was the first person to admit it.  The idea of sharing my troubles with a stranger intimidated me, but I was desperate enough to try anything, and Jan’s offer to pay made me think there might just be some value to it.  Still, I wanted to avoid indebting myself to a person I barely knew.  I would ask my mother.  It took me three days to work up the gumption.  She responded exactly as I’d feared.

     “I don't fuckin’ think so.” 

     I burst into tears.  “But Mom!”

     “Hey, they ain't a goddamn thing wrong with you,” she said.  “Except you're an asshole, maybe.” 

To my mother’s credit, she eventually agreed to my therapy.  Also to her credit:  she drove me to the appointment and paid for it.  She sat in the waiting room while I met with the therapist, a mild-mannered, sixty-something man named John.  John asked a series of general questions from an intake form, and then I gave him a verbal synopsis of my life, focusing on my troubles since dad’s stroke.  When, toward the end of our hour, John suggested that I grieved the person my father had been, I cried because someone had finally said what I’d been feeling for months.  Interestingly, I told him little of my mother, except to say that we fought a lot.  She most certainly was a difficult woman, yet I continued to believe that the power to make her happy rested with me, that I needed to do better, that I needed to change.  Not her.  It was never her. 

     John’s statement about my grief became my personal narrative, the story I told myself and others, the way I made sense of my life.  It’s a story I’d believe for years to come, and for good reason:  it seemed to explain my troubles perfectly.  I never realized that my struggles predated dad’s stroke, or that my mother may have contributed to them.  Perhaps John would have discerned these things in time.  I like to believe he might have convinced my mother to participate in family therapy, or individual therapy.  He might have taught me that not everything was my fault, might have begun to disassemble the shame machine my mother had built in my brain.  Sadly, he never had the chance to form such goals, never mind achieve them.  Two days after my therapy session, my mother and I fought again.

     “Ain’t this sweet,” she snarled.  “Haul your ass to Skowhegan for couns-lin and for what?  Sixty bucks—fuckin’ gone!”

     I never saw John again and wouldn’t see another therapist for a dozen years. 

Of the twenty-four photos my mother shot a week earlier, more than a dozen would make perfectly suitable senior portraits, but I’m hesitant to choose any of them because they just don’t feel right.  In every picture, I look like a kid basking in the afterglow of a glorious, happy-go-lucky four years.  This is not how I view my high school career.  Yes, I enjoyed some good times, and yes, I’d made some good friends.  But my happiest moments and greatest successes seem distant memories, and I’ve come to think of high school as a long, painful trial I’d somehow endured.  I want my senior picture to reflect this.  A few hours spent brainstorming and the idea comes to me fully formed.  All I need is a dark, cloudy afternoon.  When such an afternoon finally arrives, I ask my mother if she’ll snap a few more photos. 

     “Now, why would you want your pitcha taken in the friggin’ rain?”

     “It’s not raining yet.”

     “Well, it’s gonna, just as sure as hell.  That sky’s coal black.”

     “Please?” I whine.

     She shakes her head as a small, mystified smile forms on her lips.  I know what that smile means:  she doesn’t understand me.  “Suit yourself, I guess,” she says, finally.  “Let me finish my smoke and I’ll find my camera.”

I’d known Jan but a few months when I arrived on her doorstep one afternoon after an especially ugly fight with my mother.  We talked for a long time.  Eventually, I mustered the courage to ask to spend the night. 

     “Of course,” she said, scoffing at the question with a wave of her hand.  “Any time.  You don’t need to ask.”  I thanked her, and then she brought me to tears. 

     “I’ve actually been thinking of asking if you want to move in.”

     I’ll never forget the talk that ensued.  Jan called me “a good kid,” and “wicked smart.”  She told me how, during his eighth grade year, Sam would come home from school and “whine about  you kicking his ass in Algebra.”

     She lit a Parliament.  I dried my face with a sleeve of my sweatshirt.

     “Travis,” she continued.  “You need to listen to me.  I know you love her, but your mother’s toxic, and there’s not a friggin’ thing you can do about that.  She’s never gonna change.  It’s not gonna happen.  And you know what?  Bill Wallace would tell you the same thing.”

     I asked about Sam and Jessie, how they’d feel about me living there.

     “Jessie’s too young to care,” explained Jan.  “And I’ve already talked to Sam.  It’s not a problem.  He understands.  He gets it.”

     Jan emphasized that there was no pressure.  I could move in if I wanted, whenever I wanted.  Like her son, I would need to help with the horses, fill the wood furnace, pick up after myself, and go to school every day.  “And no smokin’ pot,” she added.  “Those are my only rules.”

     I wanted to take Jan up on her offer and, eventually, I tried.  But although I liked the situation very much, I returned home in less than a week.  Shame helped fuel my return; shame for thinking I’d abandoned my father, shame for thinking I’d hurt my mother.  More than anything, though, I returned home because I missed the familiar.  My normal may have been ugly, but it’s all that was truly mine. 

     Even though I never lived there, Jan and her family allowed me to come and go as I pleased.  But despite spending hundreds and possibly thousands of hours at their house, I almost never stayed overnight.  Not even the most vicious fights with my mother could keep me from returning home.  Time and again, I ran away to Jan’s only to phone my mother at some ungodly hour and beg her to come get me.  And no matter how much anger she harbored, or how late or early the hour, she always answered the same way.

     “Yep.  Be there shortly.”

     My mother could stay mad at me no better than I could stay mad at her.  She too, I think, found hope in our good days.   

For the remainder of high school and beyond, I dropped by Jan’s nearly every day, often multiple times per day.  If I arrived when no one was home, I might ball my varsity jacket into a pillow and curl up on the sofa just to listen to the silence.  Sometimes, I’d place Jan’s rocking chair between the two tall stereo speakers and blast her old Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel albums and let my imagination soar.  In summer months, I would open the never-used back door and sit on the threshold with my legs hanging where the yet-to-be-built steps belonged, and with the quiet of the house at my back and the open field before me, I’d smoke cigarettes and watch butterflies dance in the shimmering heat, and The Emptiness seemed a mere bad dream and not something that ruined your life.  

After our photo shoot, my mother asks why I want my picture taken on such a dreary day.  I shrug and say, “It’s just something different, that’s all.”  I hate to hide the truth, but I don’t know how to explain it in a way she’ll understand. 

     “It just don’t make no sense to me a-tall,” she remarks.  “Whatever floats your boat, I guess.”

     What divides us feels wide as the lake.  Still, it’s one of our good days. 

One picture turns out exactly as I’d hoped—toes to the camera, chest and face to the lake, shoulders sloping gracefully against a backdrop of mist.  The wind catches the wave of my hair.  My suit looks tailored. 

     Clothes make the man.  I close my eyes and can almost hear my Dad say the words. 

     The camera captures me in full color, the world upon which I gaze, in shades of iron and ash.  I’m ready to leave behind all this darkness and stride into my future.  It’s no accident that I pose with my childhood home at my back. 

     I think I can start anew.  I think I can escape.  I do not yet know that The Emptiness lives inside me.

The Long Branch

Previously published by Discover Maine, 2015

The hotel remained from the days when vacationers came to town by passenger train.  It towered near the railroad trestle in the Junction and could be seen in the distance from any direction, four stories tall and rambling, with classic, stately lines, mansard roof and a white-painted 2nd floor balcony porch that hung in the air near the street.  From this porch you could look out over the street and down onto Wiggin Stream and the row of small, working-class homes along the opposite bank.  High on the ridge beyond these homes stood the lumber mill that gave the Junction its sound—a far-off din of screeching saws and diesel engines and warning beeps that settled over the valley every day from morning until night and nobody ever complained about the noise because it meant that men were working.  

    The people who stayed at the old hotel were blue-collar sportsmen who traveled to northwestern Maine for the woods and the water and the remoteness.  They didn’t come in search of luxury and they certainly didn’t find it.  Never known for elegance, the hotel had, by the 1970s, grown dated and tired.  Guest rooms still opened with skeleton keys and hallway floors squeaked beneath your feet, and the long balcony porch, now weathered and warped, stretched along the building's front like a wrinkle on an old woman's brow.  Few rooms had private baths, fewer still had TVs.  None offered air conditioning.  But guests appreciated the clean rooms and modest rates with hearty meals and boxed lunches included in the price.  They also enjoyed the staff's genuine, small-town hospitality.  And of course, they loved the barroom.  Everybody loved the barroom.

    With its old tin ceiling and the long bar of dark wood and the small tables with their wooden slat seat chairs, Moosehead Lake Hotel's street-level cocktail lounge looked as though it belonged in a western, so much so that the locals took to calling it The Long Branch, after the saloon in the 1960s TV series, Gunsmoke.  The real Long Branch may have been better known than its television namesake, at least in this part of Maine. In the history of drinking, there has perhaps never been a honky-tonk better destined for success.  It operated during the 1960s and 70s, an era when the logging industry still thrived, jobs remained plentiful, and laws against public drunkenness were viewed as mere suggestions among residents of this little village in the woods.  Moreover, as this little village in the woods boasted only two cops and one cruiser, most residents ignored such rumors.  Add live music, 25 cent drafts and a fun-loving proprietor with a Devil-May-Care attitude, and it's easy to see how The Long Branch became the epicenter of debauchery for an entire region of Maine.  Indeed, the place could be as rough as its barn board walls.  Sometimes it was funny and sometimes it was scary, but even when it was scary, nobody ever wanted to leave.  Such is the allure of 25 cent drafts.

    There are still many people living in Maine's north country who drank at “The Branch.” Each will tell you in his own way that there's never been another place like it, and then you'll hear the stories. All the stories are good, and some are truly wonderful. If you're lucky, you might hear about the day Dave Holmbom married wife number four while standing behind the bar in front of the Budweiser tap, the Protestant minister presiding, or the night that Charlie Barriault, irritated at having been shut off by the bartender, fetched a chainsaw from his truck and attempted to cut down the cedar posts that held up the ceiling and the three floors above it. You might hear about an otherwise quiet afternoon when Rollie Lizotte found himself being thrown out of the bar through the front door only to be thrown back in a minute later—this time through a window. If you're very lucky, as I have been, you may encounter a man—a senior citizen now--who will tell you about his very first visit to The Long Branch.

    The man and his friend had spent the morning fishing for trout at a small pond north of Greenville and decided to have a drink at The Long Branch as they passed through town on their way home. Neither had ever been to the place and wanted to give it a try, but they found The Long Branch empty, not a customer or employee in sight, and they hesitated inside the entrance, wondering if perhaps the barroom hadn't yet opened for the day. They decided to stay, though, when they heard the smacking sound of billiard balls emanating from somewhere out back.  The men sat down at the bar and waited, and the bartender appeared a moment later, a man is in his 60s with a horseshoe of white hair and a pool cue in his hand. “Hello there! What can I get for you, fellas?”

    “Whiskey and ginger,” said the first man.  The other raised a finger and gave a nod. “I'll take the same.”

    “Sounds like a winner,” said the bartender, who leaned his pool cue against the bar rail and began scooping ice into glasses. He placed two ice-filled high-ball glasses on the bar, then peeled the pop-tops from two cans of Fanta Gingerale and placed those on the bar.  Finally, he placed a full bottle of Canadian Club on the bar. “Holler if you need anything,” he said, and the two men stared at each other, dumbfounded, as their bartender grabbed his pool cue and walked away.

    I heard this story many years ago. The man who told it to me chuckled hard at the memory as he slapped my shoulder with the back of his hand.  I smiled at him and felt the sting around my eyes because he'd been talking about my Dad.

    I often went to work with my father in the years before I started school and afterward on weekends and summer breaks. The bar opened at 1:00 o'clock each afternoon and so we arrived in late morning.  Dad parked the pickup truck out in front, and I slid across the seat and he set me down.  I heard the lumber mill in the distance and felt the summer heat radiating up from the asphalt.  We stepped into the shade beneath the porch and Dad unlocked the hotel's wide wooden front door.  The door opened with a long creak and I followed Dad into the barroom.  The heavy door closed behind us with a rhythmic whoosh and satisfying clank, and then the only sounds were the hum of beer coolers and our footsteps along the plywood floor.  Two small rectangular windows high on the wall on either side of the fireplace cast narrow beams of sunlight diagonally downward to the floor. We walked amid a strange daytime darkness through a maze of tables and chairs and bar stools, and the air felt cool and smelled of cigarette smoke and stale beer.

    Dad stepped behind the bar and opened the circuit breaker box on the wall, and The Long Branch revealed itself section by section as he snapped the switches one by one. On came the florescent light over the air hockey table, then the light over the pool table, the foosball table, the other pool table, then the wall lights on each side of the fireplace, the entryway lights and finally, the bar lights themselves.  He flipped one more switch to turn on the jukebox and it flickered to life in silence. Sometimes the jukebox would turn on in mid-song at extremely loud volume, filling the room with the twang of whatever 1970s country record had been playing at closing time the previous night. Whenever this happened, Dad would walk over and reach behind the jukebox to lower its volume. He enjoyed music, only not so loud so early.

    While Dad swept the floor with the push broom, I retrieved my Big Wheel from the dance floor and went for a cruise.  I rode giant loops around the building's first-floor, pedaling down the middle of the two-sided bar and continuing down the hall.  I took a sharp right after the liquor closet and drove through the hotel lobby, past the ladies' room and the men's room and the staircase and back into the bar through the main entrance. Dad moved tables and chairs as he swept, providing me with a brand-new obstacle course each time I came barreling through the door. I zigged and zagged as fast as I could peddle, and so long as I didn't drive through any dirt piles, he never seemed to mind.

    When he'd finished sweeping, Dad took the change drawer out of the safe and placed it in the cash register. I climbed onto a stool and watched him count the money. “Daddy?”

    “...eight, nine, ten, yes, dear?”

    “Can I have a Shirley Temple?”

    “...thirteen, fourteen, fifteen--what do you say?”

    “Please?”

    “...seventeen--sure, give me just a minute, Trav, and I'll make you one. Eighteen, nineteen...”

    He finished counting and filled the ice bin, then made my Shirley Temple, spooning cherries from a gallon jar. He tossed a cardboard coaster in front of me and set down my drink. “That'll be fifty cents.”

    “Daddy, you know I don't have any money.”

    “Well, that's alright,” he said with a wink, “your credit is good.”

    I drank my Shirley Temple and stabbed the cherries at the bottom of my glass while Dad restocked the bar. He filled the reach-in cooler with fresh bottles of Budweiser and Miller and lifted each liquor bottle from the rack and held it up to the light to check its level. If one appeared low, he jotted it on a piece of paper. Next, he placed red hot dogs and fresh hot dog buns in the steamer and filled the chip rack and wiped down the bar with a wet towel. Hot, soapy water helped erase rings of congealed beer. Finally, he fetched the string mop and metal mop bucket from the closet. He filled the mop bucket with hot water and poured in a splash of Lestoil, and as he waved the mop back-and-forth across the gray painted floor, the strong chemical pine smell filled the room and signaled a brand-new day.

    This had not always been my father's life, laboring in a barroom.  He’d been born in Greenville Junction, directly across Wiggin stream from the hotel, in a little apartment above his parent's restaurant, in the spring of 1915. The only of Jack and Annie Wallace's five children to graduate high school, Bill Wallace earned two college degrees during the depths of The Great Depression before marrying his first wife, Maxine, in the spring of 1937. The couple settled on Long Island and raised two boys, my half-brothers Bill and Maury.  By the time their sons had graduated college, my father and Maxine--still in their mid-40s—had a nice life but longed for a simpler one, and so returned to the hometown they loved. In doing so, my father had--nearly a decade before my birth—already lived his own version of the American dream.  From him I heard of life in New York during America's golden age.  He told me of The Rockettes and Rockerfeller Center, of watching baseball players named DiMaggio and Berra and Snider.  He told me of living Long Island and travel by train, of the views from atop The Empire State Building and The Statue of Liberty.  And he often told me of his favorite dessert, New York Cheesecake, which he said, “is about this thick,” while holding his thumb and index finger about 3” apart so I'd get the idea.  Smiling, he clicked his cheek and—as if recalling an intimate ecstasy—lowered his eyelids and said, “Oh boy, you talk about good!”  Through these tiny windows into my father's past, I gazed with fascination upon a world far beyond Greenville Junction, Maine.

    Dad finished mopping, pushed the mop bucket down the hall and out the back door.  He emptied the dirty water in the gravel parking lot and leaned the wooden handled string mop against the side of the building to dry in the sun.  Back inside, he pulled the metal chain on the neon OPEN sign, then walked behind the bar and called me over.  I stood next to him as the cash register opened with a loud “ca-ching.”  Dad took two quarters from the drawer and dropped them into my waiting palm.

    “Rack 'em up!” he said.  

    Time to play pool.

Game Time

Previously published by Mainely Agriculture, Spring 2022

I can still see my father with a pool cue in his hand.  He holds it upright at his side, its rubber bumper pressed to the floor.  A Chesterfield smolders between the fingers of his other hand.  He’s waiting for his turn to shoot.  More than that:  he’s watching me play, watching me learn.  The game of billiards is probably the thing we shared most often during our time together.  I grew up with a pool table in our living room.  But it’s those quiet afternoons at The Long Branch I remember best.  

Dad taught me to play pool before I could see over the table.  I learned while standing on an empty Budweiser case turned upside-down.  He provided helpful hints, telling me which ball to shoot first, how hard or soft to strike the cue ball, and where to strike the object ball to cut it at the proper angle.  He taught me bank shots by placing his index finger on the rail and saying, “hit her right about here.”  He referred to billiard balls as “she,” and “her,” the way people refer to boats.  Dad possessed his own unique billiards vernacular.  He called striped balls “the big ones,” and the solid balls, “the little ones.”  Leaving yourself without a follow-up shot meant that you had “stitched yourself,” and his announcement of “game time” meant you were about to lose.  Sometimes, he said things I did not understand, such as the idea that shooting pool was all geometry.  Geometry, he said, was about angles, and I would learn about it in school.  He told me that when he studied geometry, he once solved a problem for the class by sketching a theoretical bank shot on the chalkboard.  

Dad played pool very well, having honed his skills as a youth while hanging out at the local pool hall during the 1920s.  He played with finesse and was a master of the bank shot.  Most impressive, though, is that he played for position—that is, he knew just how to make each shot so the cue ball would line up perfectly for his next shot.  The game offered competition and camaraderie, two things he greatly enjoyed, and I suspect he viewed playing opportunities as a major benefit of owning a bar.  On slow afternoons, he often played against customers, and if his opponent wished to wager some cash, even better.  During the early 1960s, he and his friend Teddy, a local forester, regularly bet fifty dollars per game.  That was a lot of money for the time.  It’s still a lot of money for Greenville.

When Dad and I played, he allowed himself to take only one shot at a time—a voluntary handicap meant to give me a fighting chance.  This ended abruptly one day when, at age six, I beat him with a bank shot on the eight ball.  I’d driven the cue ball the entire length of the table where it ricocheted at a steep angle and rolled back seven feet to gently nudge the eight along the last foot of rail and into the pocket.  Mind you, this was no accident.  I’d called the shot.  Dad knew I’d made it as soon as he saw the cue ball’s trajectory.  “Well I’ll be go to hell!” he exclaimed.  The eight was still rolling to its resting spot inside the table when he looked at me with one eyebrow raised in mock incredulity.  Then a big grin spread across his face and he chuckled.  “I guess it’s time to end that ‘one shot’ rule.”

In my mind’s eye, he moves around the table, calling his shots with a point of his cue, then gazing down the cue’s shaft with concentration and determination deep as the blue of his eyes.  He always tried his best, but was never a sore loser, even when playing for money.  He sometimes muttered an “aww, shit,” upon missing a shot, but never anything more.  Winning meant nothing to him compared to the thrill of competition.  He just loved to play, and he never beat himself up or put himself down when he lost.  This is surely what he wished for me when I struggled with my own failures.  When I shot too quickly, he would say, “Take your time, dear.”  When I grumbled at a missed shot, he would gently tell me to be patient with myself.  Only when I struck the cue ball out of anger would he speak sternly.  “You didn’t hit it hard enough,” he’d say.  He never had to explain what he meant.  And yet, I kept getting angry.  At myself, always.  Not every game.  Maybe not even one in three, or one in five.  But often enough that I can still close my eyes and hear him say, “You didn’t hit it hard enough.”

What I remember most is his left hand, the way he curled his index finger around the cue, with his thumb and other fingers fanning out across the felt.  Whenever he shot, I always watched that hand.  As a boy, I could not articulate it, but in that hand I saw strength, and elegance, and supreme confidence.  My dad looked as in-charge with a pool cue as Ted Williams looked with a bat.  To this day, whenever I encounter someone playing pool, I watch the person’s lead hand.  It tells me all I need to know about their knowledge of the game, their comfort, their confidence.  Or their lack of all three.  I have always held a pool cue in my father’s fashion.  But for too many years of my life, I would stare down my cue’s length to my own hand and know that I was faking everything it meant.

My Hometown

From Bangor Daily News, 5 June 2015

This spring, after 20 years residing in the burbs of a state to our south, I moved back to my hometown in the Maine woods. It’s a vastly different place than I remember. The veneer mill is gone. The lumber mills are gone. Log trucks no longer rumble through town. Locals try to compensate for these losses by selling T-shirts and hats to people from away. It helps, a little.

The good news? The town is still the gateway to God’s Country, a place where you can open your front door and walk in Thoreau’s footsteps. In the village you can still borrow a book, sit on a park bench, rent a canoe, visit two museums, order a Slush Puppy, fill a prescription, attend a church service and eat breakfast, lunch and dinner — all within sight of the lake. I’m grateful for all of these truths. But most of all, I’m grateful for the people.

Before I share my story, a qualifier: I believe that people are the same everywhere. Bangor or Boston, Brunswick or Bakersfield — it makes no difference. And so, despite the occasional rumor to the contrary, there’s nothing in the water that makes the residents of my hometown especially friendly or kind. Indeed, I’ve known a few who were neither. But the people of my town are all special, and they’re special in a way unique to small communities: They’re inextricably connected to each other.

Counting the snowbirds, the population of my hometown hovers around 1,600, a number that has varied little for more than a century. Grow up in a town this size and you’ll know most people by name. You’ll know their parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, cousins and classmates. All these people will know you, too. You’ll encounter each other at the post office and the hardware store, the grocery store and restaurants. You’ll attend the same church services, baked bean suppers and high school basketball games. Over the course of years, you’ll learn about each other through your intersecting lives. In a small town, everybody is a neighbor. The community makes the people, not the other way around.

Now, my story:

A week or two after relocating to my childhood home, I drove into town to run errands. I parked on Main Street and walked over to the bank to deposit a check, then stopped at the library to check email and the headlines. From there, I headed for the drug store to buy some postcards, only to realize en route that I didn’t have my wallet. Believing that I’d left it at home, I turned around and headed back to my car. (That I’d been to the bank only an hour before failed to cross my mind.)

On the way home, I stopped at a local convenience store and ordered a small veggie pizza. The store owner said it would be ready in about 35 minutes, say 4:30. “I’ll be back,” I said, “Gotta cruise up to the house and grab my wallet.”

I looked for my wallet on the kitchen counter, my desk, the dining room table and in the pockets of the previous day’s pants. No luck. Thinking it might have fallen onto the floor of my car, I went outside to have a look. I heard my cellphone chirping as I opened the door. I had a voicemail. The message went something like this:

“Hi Travis, this is Sierra at the bank. You left your wallet here. We’re closing in a minute, but rumor has it that you’re picking up a pizza at 4:30, so we’re sending your wallet over there.”

A man I had not seen for more than two decades found my wallet on the floor of the bank and handed it to the teller. This man had the presence of mind to telephone the convenience store where he recalled that I often stopped. When the store owner said I’d be back at 4:30, the finder of the wallet turned to the bank teller and offered to drop it off. The teller, in turn, started to ask the branch manager’s permission to hand it over, but the manager waved off the question. “Oh, that’s fine,” she said, “Go ahead.”

It’s good to be home.