"Sculpting"

For the past three years or more, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning, my good friend Lynn and I meet at our town's community building to exercise.

We start the ordeal with a one-mile walk. Usually Bob, the custodian, is at the building doing some maintenance, mowing the lawn, or whatever. Bob is a true Mainer, so when Lynn and I say, "Good morning, Bob," he replies with, "Mawnin."

After our walk (outdoors unless it's raining hard or bitterly cold, in which case we walk in the building's basement, round and round, talking non-stop), we go into the building to use the exercise machines. There are six or seven old and tired machines, donated by community members who couldn't bear the thought of using them anymore, but they do the trick. Lynn and I are partial to three or four of the machines and ignore the others.

Then it's mat time. While Lynn prefers various stretches done on her back, I like to do some yoga: the sun salutation, half-shoulder stand, full-shoulder stand, etc. I've been doing these stretches almost continually for almost forty years, and they keep me limber.

Once the mat routines are behind us, the fun begins: We use this workout DVD, and I love it. I'm surprised to hear myself say I love it, because I truly hated it when we first began working out with it about six months ago. We do weights and cardio, alternating between the two, and we do two of the four segments on the DVD. Several others, mostly retired ladies, have joined our workout class, so it's fun to suffer in a group. I use 3-lb and 6-lb handweights and, the newest addition to my workout toys: a weighted 5-lb ball. That thing is brutal, but I know my arms, shoulders, heart, and lungs are getting a great workout. (I told the other ladies earlier this week that if I should ever lose my grip on that ball, I'd surely take out one or two of them in one fell swoop. Let's hope I don't lose my grip.)

Lynn and I leave the community building with sweat dripping from our brows but feeling energized. What's more and equally importantly, she and I have had a chance to get caught up on one another's life. That's probably the most motivating factor that gets us to the community building three mornings a week but hey, it's doing the trick (although I can't say I'm exactly now "sculpted," despite the exercise DVD's constant assurance that I'm getting there). And to think, this workout costs us a big, fat, ONE DOLLAR per session! Not a bad deal.

Irene's aftermath

Tropical storm Irene wasn't too hard on us here, in that no lives were lost. Several homes in Maine are still without power, however, and our home is one of them.

We do have a generator, thank heavens, so we have power off and on throughout the day. When the generator isn't providing power for us, it's providing power for our neighbors directly across the road. Ken has been working hard since noon on Sunday to keep both houses going. After we've had a few hours of electricity, Ken wheels the heavy generator across the road to our neighbors, hooks it up there, gives them a few hours of power, then wheels it back to us. I think he's getting tired of the ritual.

And here is the culprit: a downed tree at our neighbors just up the road. What gets me is this particular tree has lost a limb in a storm THREE TIMES in the past couple of years. The lost limbs always fall on our electric lines, resulting in a power outage. I think it's time that particular tree was put out of its misery.

I got my hopes up a couple of hours ago this morning when a Central Maine Power truck finally visited the site of this outage. Come to find out, it was here only to remove the downed limb. The power lines are still severed. Who knows when the lines will be replaced? Today? Tomorrow? Next week? According to news reports, there are so many power outages that some could take several days to be restored.

We lost a couple of trees in the storm. This limb broke off the tree where a pair of Baltimore orioles nested last year.

I know the damage could be much worse, of course. I've seen evidence on t.v. of washed-out bridges in western Maine and of terrible flooding in Vermont. We could have it a whole lot worse.

Bits and pieces

No particular reason for the new header photo, except that I took that picture in early July at the Ossipee Valley Fair and have been meaning to use it as a header photo. I'm still a farm girl at heart.

I decided a week ago to give Molly a major tune-up. It was long over due. So I took her outside, secured her leash over one of the pickets of our little white picket fence, and began the procedure: ear cleaning, Frontline treatment, etc. Molly knows this routine well, and the picket fence has long been our location for the procedure.

Ken helped with the ears and the Frontline, then I told him I'd give Molly a major brushing and didn't need his help. He went inside.

Just as I began brushing Molly, she began thrashing. Usually she likes to be brushed. I was confused...until I noticed the hornets trying to attack her. She thrashed, I tried to keep ahold of her leash, she darted (yanking me out of one of my sandals), and we both made for the kitchen door. We got inside the house, me with one bare foot, and Molly continued her frenzy. I couldn't blame her: she'd been stung by one of the hornets, just below her right eye. It took her quite awhile to calm down.

I told Ken there was a hornet's nest in the little flower garden in front of the picket fence. He waited awhile for things to calm down outdoors, then he did an inspection. Sure enough: a HUGE hornet's nest on the picket fence, tucked neatly under the clematis vine. Can you see it just below and to the right of the ceramic bird house in the second photo?

On a happier front, in June one morning as Ken and I watched the news, drank our coffee, and I checked my e-mail on my iPad, I opened a message from a garden center.

What especially caught my eye was the lovely trellis, selling for $150. I handed the iPad to Ken to show him the photo, and I said, "Here's something I'd like to have some day," as I pointed out the trellis to him.

Later that morning I wandered out to Ken's workshop to see what he was up to. He was busily working with strips of wood.

"What are you making?" I asked.

"That trellis you like," he replied.

"How do you know how to make it"

"Oh, I did a couple of sketches of the trellis in the photo you showed me, did a little calculating,...."

So now I have a first-class trellis, which I've wanted for a long time. I hurried to a garden center and bought a thunbergia to grow inside it and climb up it. These photos were taken long before the thunbergia had done much climbing, but it's happy in its new climbing corral and has almost reached the very top of the structure.

A day on Peaks

Last Friday a group of friends and I decided to take a trip to Peaks Island. It's a small island not far from Portland, accessible by a 15-minute ferry ride.

We couldn't have chosen better weather for our little excursion: sunshine, wispy clouds, no humidity.

The purpose of our trip was, supposedly, to visit the Fifth Maine Regiment Museum, which we did, indeed do.

But we also stopped to check out the "famous" Umbrella Cover Museum, which is "dedicated to the appreciation of the mundane in everyday life," because its door was open and its curator was welcoming.

We couldn't leave there without joining the curator in song as she played a catchy tune on her accordian. I'm serious!

From there we sought out a little general store and purchased sandwiches and chips. These we ate as we sat on benches and watched island residents and day visitors go about their business.

The Fifth Maine Museum opened promptly at noon, so we walked over to it and had an interesting tour. Along the way, though, we spotted two yard sales, so we felt duty-bound to check them out. I'm still regretting not buying a Dick and Jane reader. I'm sure it was the very edition of the reader I learned to read from, and I still remember many of its catchy sentences: See Dick. See Jane. See Spot. See Dick chase Spot. See Jane chase Dick and Spot. Why didn't I buy it? I'm wishing now, too late, that I could take one last trip through the Dick and Jane Reader and remember the fun and excitement of learning to read.

After the yard sales and the museum visit, we had a two-hour wait for our return ferry to Portland, so we decided to walk the circumference of the island. It's a four-mile trek, and the views out over the ocean, up and down the coast, and of Portland itself are spectacular.

I was especially interested in the cairns being erected at one point along the coastal road. Apparently folks passing by who have the time and the inclination can stop and build a cairn. Some of them are quite imaginative and even resemble sailing ships. My header photo is one that I took of the cairns.

We got back to the ferry terminal with a little time to spare, so we dashed into the ice cream shop and treated ourselves to a treat. I chose Gifford's Moose Tracks, which is one of my favorite Maine ice creams. I almost went with Deer Tracks but decided this was a day for Moose, not Deer. I also spotted a flavor with "lobster" in its name, but somehow "lobster" and "ice cream" do not belong together.

We were lucky to board the ferry when we did, because after we'd made our way up to the top deck to enjoy the sights on the trip back to the mainland, we heard an announcement that the ferry had reached its maximum passenger capacity and anyone not aboard would have to wait an hour for the next ferry. Phew. Close call.

We returned to Portland somewhat sunburned, definitely tired from all of the fresh salt air, but yet refreshed from our day on Peaks Island.

New friends from far away...and bubbles!

Yesterday we were invited to the home of my niece-in-law's mother (Naomi) for a barbecue and to meet Naomi's good friends from Tokyo, Yuki and her son Rintaro.

Naomi and Yuki have been friends for many years; Naomi is a psychologist and author here in the States, and Yuki, also a psychologist, has translated many of Naomi's books into Japanese.

Eight-year-old Rintaro and our almost-six-year-old great niece, Violet, have become fast friends. They greeted us in their kimonos (Violet's was a gift from Yuki and Rintaro), and Rintaro immediately handed us as gifts the two origami birds shown in my header. He made these birds himself.

It was a pleasure to get to know Yuki, a very gracious and friendly lady. Since she is a clinical psychologist, she has traveled to Sendai and surrounding areas where the earthquake and tsunami were so devastating. She said there are two distinct groups of survivors from that region: those who face what has happened and have moved to whatever accommodations they've been able to acquire and are getting on as best they can with their lives, and those who still cling to their damaged homes, refusing to believe what has been thrust upon them. She told us of visiting the home of one lady. The house appeared to be intact, that is until the lady pulled back a curtain that she had hung along one side of the house. Behind the curtain her home was little more than rubble. Yuki says the situation in the Sendai region is still extremely critical, and she spoke harshly when saying she feels the government is not doing enough to help its people.

As we adults talked about the earthquake and tsunami and the aftermath, it didn't occur to most of us in the room that young Rintaro is still very much traumatized by the earthquake that shook Tokyo and, no doubt, by the news reports out of the Sendai region. I saw Rintaro gently shake his mother's sleeve cuff. He was asking her to change the topic of conversation. Who can blame him? I'm sure there are many thousands of youngsters in Japan still troubled and frightened anew each time a new tremor is felt.

Our visit with Naomi, Yuki, and Rintaro wasn't exclusively serious, though. Ken had helped me prepare a "Super Bubbles Kit" to take along for Rintaro and Violet to play with. While I mixed the bubble solution (water, Dawn dish detergent, corn starch, baking powder, and glycerin), Ken shortened some retired broom handles and dowels, put eye screws in one end of each handle, and left it to me to thread the eyes with heavy cotton string with a washer or two on the longer string, for weight.

The Super Bubbles Kit was a hit.

It takes a bit of practice to learn how to make a large, elongated bubble, but soon everyone had mastered the art, and giant bubbles floated around Naomi's neighborhood. Violet and her dad even developed the ability to make simultaneous bubbles, which were especially impressive.

I'm glad Naomi included us in her get-together for her dear Japanese friends. We enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.

Neighbors

My friend Pam is dying. She was told by her doctor last week that she has between two weeks and two months left.

Pam was diagnosed with a tumor at the base of her skull in June of 2009. At that time the tumor was thought to be benign and completely removable. But the biopsy after Pam's surgery revealed something else: a malignant, incurable cancer.

So the past two years have been a difficult challenge for Pam, to put it mildly. But she figured she had another year or two left, maybe more if she were lucky.

In late May Pam and her husband drove to the New Hampshire/ Vermont border to attend a large family gathering which was actually a memorial service for Pam's mother, who died last fall. Pam carried her mother's ashes with her, in a beautiful urn which Pam had kept on her mantel until now.

And here's where the title of this post comes into play...

While Pam and her husband were in New Hampshire, their neighbors got to work. Theirs is a lovely, small, historical neighborhood of colonial homes (and even a large former inn which has a dance hall on its third floor.)

The neighbors built for Pam a beautiful flower garden. And I'm not talking about a small flower patch. I'm talking about a large garden, perhaps 20'x 20', with pathways and birdbaths and various perennials and annuals. The flowers and plants are all nicely mulched with bark chips, and the pathways are lined with wood chips. A split rail fence encloses the garden.

One neighbor, Trish, came up with the idea of building this garden for Pam. She went door to door and enlisted the help of the other ten or twelve families in the neighborhood. It wasn't difficult for Trish to enlist help, because everyone thinks the world of Pam. A kinder, gentler, more respected and loved lady simply cannot be found.

So Pam and her husband returned home from their long weekend to find a beautifully designed flower garden at the end of their driveway.

When Pam's husband went to the gardening shop to pay for the split rail fencing, the owner refused to accept any payment. "I didn't do this because I wanted any money," he said.

But now Pam has been told she hasn't much time left. So she sits for a time each day in her garden, under the shade of a large tree, appreciating the moment and her neighbors and their kindness.

Playing tourists

Yesterday Ken and I decided to pretend we were tourists visiting Maine. It all started when I mentioned earlier in the week that I'd never seen Bug Light in South Portland. I've heard it mentioned a lot lately, with a newspaper photo of kites being flown there on the Fourth, a post by a Facebook friend that he'd spent a day at Bug Light, etc. It was time we saw it for ourselves. It's not as if it's a long drive for us to get to it, after all.

So we found Bug Light and were surprised to see the nice public park surrounding it. We walked the short distance to the light, then we read the many memorial stones placed in the walkway facing the city of Portland across the bay.

My sock went to Bug Light too, of course. I always take knitting along with me on rides.

After checking out little Bug Light, we drove a short distance through the campus of Southern Maine Community College to get to Spring Point Light. Although Ken attended SMCC many years ago, and Spring Point Light was, of course, there at the time, he confessed he'd never walked on the breakwater to get to the light.

The length of the breakwater is deceiving. It's almost a 1/4 mile walk out to the light, but it's fun to choose your path over the huge granite slabs that form the walkway.

After checking out Springpoint Light up close and personal, we then wandered over to the memorial built for those who worked on the Liberty Ships at the South Portland shipyard during WWII. The shipyard itself is long gone, so the memorial provides a tribute to those who worked there, among them Ken's father.

Our next stop was supposed to be Portland Head Light in Cape Elizabeth, but we could hear two lobster rolls calling our names at the Lobster Shack, so we drove past Fort Williams Park, where the Head light is located, to the lobster rolls. As usual there was a long waiting line to order our lunch, but the line moved quickly and we (Ken, the sock, and I) were soon seated at a picnic table overlooking Casco Bay, enjoying our lunch, listening to conversations all around us, and watching folks "from away" snap photos.

Now it was time to backtrack to Fort Williams Park and Portland Head Light. Blogger allows me only five photos per post, so I've put the photo of the Head lighthouse on my banner. It was a beautiful afternoon to be at the park, but then, every afternoon seems to be a beautiful one to be there. I never tire of the view of the lighthouse. This is the first year food vendors have been allowed to sell snacks inside the park, but Cape Elizabeth has set tight restrictions on how many can be there (three). I noticed one vendor selling hot dogs and another selling lobster rolls. I'm thinking a little yarn shop would be just the right addition to the park!

Fort Williams Park has several new walking trails and gardens near the lighthouse, so we wandered around a bit and checked out the views. We spotted two lobster traps in the rocks just off shore near a large mansion. I at first thought the traps had washed onto the rocks, but Ken inspected more closely and decided they were the private traps of a local resident. Probably someone at the mansion was planning a lobster dinner last evening....

We were back home by mid-afternoon, satisfied that we'd done a little coastal sightseeing this early in the summer. We've been known to crowd in a day playing tourists on Labor Day Weekend!