October 3

Last night there was a going away party at the town hall for a couple who were long-time Bowdoinham residents and had been immersed in town life for years, participating in everything from the library to grave digging, town manager to town historian. About a hundred people showed up, and they were duly roasted and toasted, receiving official kudos from the town (official Proclamation of Honorary Residence and Key to the Town…) and au revoirs from townspeople of all sorts. It was a warm and friendly gathering with much love and sweet sadness, a recognition not only of the contribution they had made, but of the community spirit they had inspired in others.

This morning I am off to a Housel Raising, getting together with a number of local folks to hoist into place the pieces of a timber frame house a young farmer couple are building, having just taken over the old Steen Farm on the River Road. They’ve already started working the farmers’ markets with a minimal crop and lots of energy and creativity. In the slack time last winter Ian cut and trimmed the mortises and tenons of posts and beams, joists and braces for their simple new home. Today up goes the skeleton with friends and neighbors persuading the heavy timbers into place with mallets and come-alongs and muscle. It’s raining hard. The wood is swollen and all are soaked. The fits are tight but it all comes together and the lines are level and plumb.

There is a feel to this town that is different, and I have often questioned not only what it was, but where it came from. Sometimes I think much of it is the influence of Merrymeeting Bay: the boat building industry that flourished here in the 1800’s; the rich bottom land along the rivers that join in merry meeting; the eagles and ducks and ospreys and herons that share our airspace; the ebb and flow of the tide. Sometimes I think it springs from a few strong families that came here and stayed mixing farming, artistry and hard work with community spirit and a good dose of fun that became the norm, overriding political pettiness and tempering mean-spiritedness when it arose. Maybe some of it goes back to the early religious rebels who set up in town, or maybe it’s some remnant of the Abenaki spirit. Or maybe it’s just happenstance. It’s here, though, and worth honoring from time to time to be sure it remains.