I blame Barbara Cooney for much of my love affair with Maine and, in lesser part, the rest of New England. I met my grandmother, principally, in the pages of “Miss Rumphius,” and envisioned myself as a child of the simpler life in “Island Boy.”

A childhood in the suburbs of New York City left me feeling rushed, like I had been born in the wrong century. My feet ached from racing toward my future until one fated weekend in Bath, Maine.

I slept in the camp of a friend twice removed, built model boats with the agile hands of a future surgeon by day, and heard Ms. Cooney read her stories at the public library. Lives aren’t always changed so quickly – but then again, not all little boys get the chance to spend the weekend in Maine.

I was in Bath once again one recent weekend for the first time in decades; I found my heart aching for Ms. Cooney as I was cast into the old love affair.

The coast invited me to slowly explore fingers of land reaching down into the sea. Local business owners took time to stop and talk with my daughter and babble at my infant son. As they turned their eyes to me, we engaged in conversation spirited with invitation rather than fleeting salesmanship.

I found myself at once pitting the odds of Maine’s slogans against one another: Was this merely a whimsical encounter in Vacationland or truly a proclamation of “The way life should be”? I’m planning my next trip up in either case for truly I feel that I am, in Maine.

Michael Hildebrandt

Beverly, Mass.