Sylvia's Journal

It is Monday morning, August 18. I am in Maine, looking out over a sweeping beach, from one far corner that is called Isaiah’s Head. The distant shore on the other side of the bay is shrouded in fog, the same fog that has kept me from flying to Owl’ Head for months now.

I am trying to write while an orange cat is trying to lick my glasses, my typing fingers and rub the screen of my laptop, all in a frantic attempt to get more attention than anything else. This includes the coffee I just made. The cat glared at the coffee maker and tried to put his paw into my mug, everything to stop me from paying only attention to my computer screen. This intimate cat experience reminded me of our childhood cat, named Poes, who died in our house fire in the early 60s, together with her daughter, a cat that never got a name because we could not agree on one. They were both in the attic, one of their favorite places, and had not been able to get out. Since we never found any remains we think that is what happened. Maybe she was smarter and fled to never come back to us, who had such a flammable dwelling. Both mother and daughter Poes would exhibit the same behavior as this orange cat. Once you gave attention, the heavy purring would start, like a motor. I used to put my ears to her belly and catch the vibrations. The orange cat has the same motor. The vibrations raked up lots of childhood memories.

It took us the entire Sunday morning to depart for Maine. That is not unusual for us because leaving is always an occasion for putting our house in order, quite literally. For me that also included the garden. I harvested chard, carrots, tomatoes, zucchini, basil, and lettuce and dug up a pan full of potatoes. All we have to do is buy a daily dose of fish for the next few days so we can enjoy the beach and whatever it is we will be doing instead of planning meals.

We ended up having lunch on our own beach that was the most glorious place to be at. On those moments we do wonder why we get in a car to drive for hours to another glorious place. While we were having our lunch we listened to a radio interview of the new guru and ego chaser Eckhart Tolle, who became famous with his book about Now. He has a new book out that Joe gave us. It is quite striking how much of what he is writing about is the same that Jill Taylor wrote about in her book about her stroke (of Insight) that we just finished. They are both talking about the unhealthy hegemony of the left brain (Tolle calls this the ‘ego’) and what to do about it. Of course it is all about awareness, catching the chatter brain in the act, the repetitive thoughts, the comparison of past and future and with others, the wanting of something that is not (now). These writings have much meaning for us because they resonate with our experience of last summer when we were able, more than any other time in our life, to live in the now, may be forced to do so because of our circumstances. We were not always good at it but when we were, everything changed and we were intensely happy despite our many pains, aches and handicaps; we could truly be with and enjoy our friends, family and each other; we could enjoy the beauty of Lobster Cove and each other’s aliveness, even in all our defectiveness.

We arrived at Isaiah’s Head just a little ahead of the cocktail hour and went for a stroll on the vast low-tide beach and for a short swim in bracing water. We rewarded ourselves with a gin tonic on the deck looking out over the waning activities of a summer Sunday: kids schlepping their toys home, firewood being collected for a beach cook out and the slow congregation of small people shapes on the far side of the beach, into clusters for the activities of the evening, whatever they were. Ours was an Italian dinner, prepared by a niece who had returned from Elba, at the main house of the Lee’s extended family. This family has summered here for generations. The summer homes, added to over the years, have been divided among the siblings who used to be the small kids playing here but now have their own grandchildren. It is fun to imagine that these small children are now creating their own childhood memories of summers in Maine and producing the stories that they will tell their grandchildren 60 years from now. Even as outsiders to this family, we are enjoying the stories the grandparent generation is telling now.