As I indicated yesterday, we had a teriffic time in Maine. Any doubts about the fun-ness of hanging out in the boonies with 13 other adults and 2 children for 5 days dissipated by the time we decided which room to take (we went with the North Lodge, as did Kevin and Tomoko, which allowed some privacy yet was still close enough to the doin’s of the big kitchen and activity room of the South Lodge that we didn’t feel too isolated, as we might’ve in one of the three satellite cabins. The more night-owlish of our friends were considerate enough not to play ping-pong on the porch just outside our bedroom window once we’d retired.
When people at work have asked me what we did while we were away, my answers sound kind of boring. Mostly, we lolled on the dock, read, knitted, played cards (poker, 1,000 blank white cards) or board games (Triple Yahtzee was a favorite and got pretty rowdy, irking the geekier sorts who were playing The Settlers of Catan), had singalongs, and competed in the shuffleboard tournament. Some folks went cycling, swam, sailed, and kayaked, though I wasn’t so ambitious. Teresa described her condition as “vacation ADD — I keep changing my mind every few minutes about what I should be doing.” We all pitched in with the shopping, cooking, and cleanup. I made pesto for farfalle with grape tomatoes and broccoli one night, and a huge vat of clam chowder (plus a smaller pot sans bacon for my sweetie) to go with our lobsters another evening. Hot dogs and marshmallows were given the bonfire treatment. Tomoko contributed raspberry pancakes, ginger and cranberry scones, and sole with lemon and tarragon. Teresa made her amazing Caesar salad and sesame noodles. And grilled corn on the cob came standard with most dinners.
I can’t decide if the best part was how well D. and my friends got along (and seeing him actually relax), the absence of high melodrama-slash-heartbreak-slash-raging alcoholism among the Providence coterie, seeing the New Harbor/Pemaquid area after a 12- or 13-year hiatus, or bonding with Enid — almost 2 and quite possibly the most adorable child on the planet. (And yes, I know that it’s heresy to say that when my own niece is a precocious cutie herself. But she, as far as I know, has yet to play with me for an afternoon then go to bed happily saying my name over and over — damn this whole geographically dispersed family phenom, anyway.)
Having finished both Elyse Friedman’s somewhat-meh Waking Beauty and Augusten Burroughs’s trashy-but-compelling Dry the week before my trip, I brought along Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science by Atul Gawande. Nothing like reading up on malpractice and learning how to put in a central line during one’s idyllic getaway.
It’s going on 4:00 p.m. and my boss just left for the day . . . I have a sneaking suspicion that I’ll be heading out soon, too. The weekend looks to be somewhat productive (assuming I get out of bed early enough to open a new account at the local socially conscious bank so I can eventually pull out of the evil, enema-esque conglomobank). If the weather isn’t too gross, I want to do some more baking with the many pints of wild blueberries we brought back from Maine. Oh, and tomorrow, D. and I have a date to see “Kaena: The Prophecy” at the Brattle, followed by belated birthday sushi.