Orienting North East

I’ve spent the past two weeks spinning a bit. Who are we now? What are our new priorities, and how do we fit them in to a pattern of living? At least that pattern – a daily and weekly routine - is now starting to take shape. Zach used to always leave before dawn; now he helps the kids get ready in the morning and even sometimes has a chance to read to or play with them before they head to school, while I am making their lunch and cleaning up from breakfast. Right now I am doing both the pick-up and drop-off since my schedule is more flexible. The kids get out at 4, and Zach has to work till 5, so I can spend the extra hour taking the kids to the lake or doing errands in town. On Thursdays I have the whole day with the kids. Jack is retired, so yesterday (our most recent Thursday) he took us on a hike up to the top of a hill that was covered in wild low-bush blueberries. The berries are small but intensely flavored, and when you tickle the leaves they fall right into your hand. The road to the blueberry stand is lined with raspberries and blackberries. We gathered as many as we could of all three, hoping for pie, but only amassed enough for generous toppings on ice cream.

We asked Jonah the other day whether he liked living on a boat or living in a house. He thought for a moment, then like a good politician framed his answer in terms of the question he thought we should have asked. “I like this place,” he told us. Then, “It’s different here.” He couldn’t specify what was different, exactly. Probably more things than he could list. I wondered if he is aware of the cultural differences; the relaxed, straightforward, old-fashioned sensibility of the townsfolk here. But both kids seem to be happy and responding well. Upon meeting his Montessori teacher for the first time, Jonah spontaneously and enthusiastically hugged her. This wasn’t even after they had spent time together – it was an immediate connection, and such an unusual response for him that I was completely surprised.

Zora has grown up quite a bit over the last 1 ½ months. She’s now running at full speed, talking up a storm, and asking questions that start with “why?” A recent exchange:

“Time to get dressed, Zora.”

“No!” She wails and bolts, then pauses, pointing at a picture of a monkey on the floor. “Monkey no clothes.” She looks up earnestly, trying to make sure I understand her point. “Why monkey no clothes?”

In Bangor, after shopping for a sofa, we ate at a restaurant that has a robotic talking moose over the bar. The kids loved it, but Zora was stumped. “Why moose talking?” she asked while the moose was telling us about the “avalanche of flavor” we were about to experience. Then, when the moose went into his 10-minute shut-down mode, she tugged on me again. “Why moose no talking?”

Zora seems to love the Montessori, where she has lots of new “babies” to play with (both plastic and real). Every time I pick her up she looks tired, happy, and her shoes are drenched from water play. For both kids, four full days a week, this costs less than half what we paid in the Bay. Jonah will get to enjoy the worm-digging, teepee-building and butterfly-hatching for one more month before he starts kindergarden. I went to enroll him at the town superintendent’s office yesterday, which is located on the ground floor of the Masonic Temple. I thought I was late signing him up (shopping around for kindergardens in Berkeley starts in January, and the lottery is in the spring), but they told me I was too early. I need to go directly to the school, just two weeks before school starts, and they’ll take care of it then. The receptionist at the office (Lisa) who explained this to me is the daughter-in-law of the hospital’s ultrasound technician, Karen. Karen is also the person who cleans the local hospital and Jack and Pat’s house – and who is scheduled to clean our trailer’s carpet *sometime* so we can start moving in. Lisa lives across the street from her mother-in-law, so I asked her to ask Karen when she plans to clean the carpet. It would be nice to know when she is coming, so we can either set aside the weekend to move in or take off and go sailing. I realize now this was pushy of me to ask, and in combination with the school sign-up, it became clear that I need to slow down to the pace of Maine. Karen will come when she can, and we should just plan to go sailing.