Summertime in Maine
It was easy to be back at my parent’s home in Maine this summer.
Even though I was only back visiting for a couple of weeks, it was easy to daydream and feel the normal burdens of my current life fade away. I guess that’s why Maine’s state motto is “Vacationland”. Time slipped by much too quickly and we didn’t get to do all the things I was hoping to do like visit with old friends I had hoped to see, but I wouldn’t change it if I could. It was perfect. So perfect.
I found myself daydreaming of someday living back along coastal Maine, telling my daughter to come home when it starts getting dark and listening to the sounds of nature while on a sitting porch. A garden rich of hydrangeas and the air smelling every so sweet from the trees, grass and local fresh & ocean water sources. Like I said, it was very easy to daydream of all the could-be moments.
However, what really gives me pause about this daydream is that durning my teenage years I had a love/hate relationship with the state. I often wished to live and make life for myself in Southern California. Never in a million years did I think it would happen. It was too far away from the life I knew on the East Coast. But still, I often would daydream about bohemian beach gatherings, laying by a pool in Palm Springs, and spotting blue whales along the shore while watching the sunset on the Pacific Ocean. I wrote psychic love notes to California almost every night, especially in the month of March when New England winters became tiresome.
All my dreams came true too. All those moments mentioned and more, beyond my wildest imagination, came true. I love love Los Angeles and Southern California. The friends I have made, hardships I have had to overcome and the human spirit I have grown into has been beyond any expectation. Southern California has made me fall more in love with life and more importantly myself. California will forever be my first love. Which is why this mental pause is such a moment for me personally and spiritually.
I think what it boils down to is time. Time with family and family being together. It’s a funny fork in the road, time.
