Maine is wild.
When we got the text that said there would be fresh lobster it was all over. James packed my bag and we drove up to the Hudson's cottage as soon as I was done with work on Saturday night. They left a light on for us and the door unlocked, at midnight we crawled into a cozy bed.
In the morning light we looked out the windows and realized we had slept on the edge of the world where the forest reaches out to meet the Atlantic. If you look closely at the map of Maine, just south of Bath, you'll see the land breaks apart into tiny inlets, islands, and coves. The cottage is on the tip of one of these small peninsulas, and looks out over mud flats and the joining of river and sea.
No cell phone service. No wifi.
I woke up to the sound of steadily dripping rain that would continue through the entire day. Slowly the whole family got up to have breakfast on the beach, in a tiny cafe that doubles as a convenient store, gift shop, lobster dealer, and local breakfast favorite. We sat in the back room and looked out toward the beach as we devoured blueberry pancakes with real maple syrup.
We drove to church in the rain. Together, with old family friends, we sang hymns out of books in a 250 year old church. On our way home we pulled into a fisherman's driveway to chose fresh lobster out of tanks in the garage. The lobster were moving and crawling and in imagination trying to escape the bags we drove them home in.
We cooked them in a big pot on the stove. They were delicious.
After lunch we sat around the fire, read books, and played games. But the wild in Maine brings out the wild in boys. Soon we were up on a hill above the cottage and ocean with BB guns and fireworks--rain be damned.
Throughout the day the tide slowly went out. I watched it though the big cottage windows. As we left the mud flats that house clams, and birds that seem to walk on water, were exposed--the outline of the river more clear as the rain continued to fall.
