Memories

It's light at 4:00 a.m. now. I know this because I was awake at 3:00 .. again ... and thought I could get back to sleep. But after laying there for an hour the morning light and all the troubled thoughts pounding around in my head had me feeling that I should just get up and see what I might accomplish versus laying there thinking about all this stuff.

There is much to do around this house as it's summer in Maine and I have found myself very busy with a lot of weekend mini-trips away. It's been really good, though I'm actually looking forward to having a weekend at home soon. Last weekend I went to my youngest sisters camp which is an hour out of Bangor along Route 9. I loved her directions - "after the funky little Airline Snack Bar and rest stop look for the weird radio tower and the NEXT double passing lane look for our camp road on the right, East Gish Road, the one with mailboxes and For Sale signs. I think it's East Gish Road ... anyway you can't miss it. " As my brother once said "whenever they say 'you can't miss it' you know you're in trouble!"

Route 9 actually runs from New Hampshire to Canada. The leg in Maine from Bangor to Calais is known as the "Airline Route" and was named long before any airlines actually existed. It's a dangerous and lonely stretch of road in the winter and the main route for logging trucks - which barrel down this road at startling speed. There is a two mile stretch in Hancock County that is called the "Whale's Back". I'm not really sure how it got this name but I do remember how my dad would drive along this section of road that had rolling hills; he would speed the car up so we climbed the hills with some momentum and then he would lift his foot off the accelerator just as we crested the top of the hill and your stomach would flip-flop, like it does on a roller coaster. Mom would yell at dad for doing this reminding him that "Mary is going to get sick", while the three older kids in the back would egg dad on. Inevitably we would have to stop so I could leap from the car and throw-up. Fun was over at this point, much to my siblings grumbling and my mothers "I told you so Jay" statements.

Jim use to drive this section of the road the same way come to think of it. I would tell him if I had to throw up I wasn't going to give any warning and he'd be in charge of clean-up. Sometimes this would get him to stop, but mostly we would both just get laughing.

Oh, I laughed so much with that man. I worry I'm already forgetting what his laugh sounded like, what his voice sounded like. How certain memories slip away from us because we just can't hold onto them ....

.... and other memories wake us at 3:00 a.m. and leave us sleepless.

Loving you all back,

Mary