Damariscotta, ME

there is this place called the carpenter's boat shop. it is in Maine. Michael lived there for a year before he met me. Its a piece of land that was given to this guy, Bobby, who is a united church of christ minister who is a quaker at heart but was lead to be in ministry, so he got involved with what he saw as the next best thing. he's also a carpenter, and he and his wife built this place, the boat shop, out of some old farm buildings that were on the land. people come there to learn how to build old fashioned wood boats, kind of, but what it really is is a place of spiritual retreat, communial living, hard work, and commitment to caring for those around us. Michael and I went there on our honeymoon, for part of the honeymoon. i felt like the out-of-place city girl at first but then I met this guy, Bill Grogan, who was building a huge organic food garden on a corner of the land (there are people living in all sorts of nooks and cranies of this land) and I got to work in the garden for a day and I have never felt more like I was right where I was suppose to be. And Michael and I took a huge bushel of fall vegetables from the garden and cooked up a big stew from them for the 16 people at the dinner table that night and working in that big kitchen, feeding folks with a big pot of stew made from the land they lived on, earth that I had broken up and de-stoned myself all day that day, I want to come up for words for that, but I can't right at the moment.

I feel like all I can say is:
that old farm house kitchen, that garden, that soil!, that Maine morning fog, that un-heated old storage barn with wood worn by hand after hand where they worshiped, Bobby, the woods next door, the relationships of care the place had with the whole community.

I felt convicted that we were meant to be there. they had an opening for an carpentry instructor that coming year and could use a hand in the big kitchen and garden. Michael in the first roll, I in the second, it all felt perfect. but it wasn't, Bobby's wife did not want us there and that ended up being that. sometimes things just feel wrong. that felt wrong. we received a copy of the boat shop's occassional newsletter about what is happening on the land today and it took the wind out of me. I read Bill's update on all they are doing in the garden now and my eyes filled up. I read about the new house coordinator, just the role I had wanted to fufill there, and felt such welling sadness. I don't know why this still comes up. I feel like i am where I am suppose to be, as long as I forget the boatshop and its gardens. I wanted to make quilts for those beds, those beds needed quilts.

the one day I was in the garden with Bill, doing the unglamorous work of breaking a new bed and pulling out stones on my knees, each one pulled by hand from the rocky Maine soil, Bill asked me, "so, how does the city girl like digging in the dirt?" and I smiled the biggest smile I had in me and shouted, "she LOVES it!" it isn't just the dirt though, it was that place, those people. it seems foolish and I forget about it entirely, but then a reminder like this comes and I feel like I am suppose to be there, like I am far away from home reading about how life is going on without me back there. but I was never there more than those 4 days and I've never been in touch since. everything looks different since that newsletter arrived. working on forgetting again.

I'd still like someone to explain what the hell it means, this feeling that I belong somewhere I hardly even met.