starting over
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PublishedJanuary 31, 2019
Wesley Burner, Portland: New year, new hope, even in jail
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PublishedJanuary 31, 2019
Larry Dyhrberg, Falmouth: New times after the Cold War
In 1994, as a part of moving into a new chapter in my life, I joined the Peace Corps. Over three decades since my college days, to me the Corps was an enduring legacy of the Kennedy years. Along with 58 fellow volunteers, I arrived in Poland, fewer than five years after the destruction of […]
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PublishedJanuary 31, 2019
Charles Thompson, Saco: It’s never too late
In the early ’80s I was living in South Philadelphia, two blocks west of the Italian market and two blocks east of one of the most dangerous projects in the city. The neighborhood was tired and dirty, but safe. I had moved there after a crushing breakup of a 10-year relationship and marriage that began […]
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PublishedJanuary 31, 2019
Dinah Crader Johnson, Gorham: Saying goodbye to the old house
We sat on the couch and basked in the late afternoon sun as it poured through the huge west-facing windows of our new home. After 31 years in our Victorian farmhouse with almost two acres of land, my husband and I found ourselves starting over. The process of downsizing was ofttimes grueling, especially the recurrent […]
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PublishedJanuary 31, 2019
Ruth Dater, Kennebunk: It takes a while to put down roots
Thirty-one years ago my husband and I moved to Maine from central New Hampshire, where we lived in a small town in the country outside Concord. We had a large garden, and since I was working as a potter and had my studio at home, I spent a lot of time canning the food from […]
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PublishedJanuary 24, 2019
Mimi Gough, Portland: Tutu’s fresh start, a century ago
During decades of family holiday gatherings in Maine, my cousins and I heard a number of versions about how our grandmother got here. We have also uncovered photos, letters and public documents that have given us bits and pieces of her story, since she never divulged all the details. In 2012, a small group of […]
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PublishedJanuary 24, 2019
Jody Rich, Waterville: A soundtrack for the next act
The wallowing was over. The breakup hadn’t been all that difficult to do once I made the decision and followed through on my plan. The anger had subsided or been pushed away. Friends had kept me distracted. Now, I was ready to move forward. I vaguely remembered who I had been before the enabling and […]
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PublishedJanuary 24, 2019
Diane Whitmore, Portland: Falling in love with a high school
The 21st century got off to a pretty wretched start for me. After a fourth miscarriage in four years, the end of my marriage and a defeated departure from a teaching job at a rural school where I was workplace-bullied by a few colleagues, I spent the beginning of 2001 working four part-time jobs and […]
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PublishedJanuary 24, 2019
Steven Price, Kennebunkport: We are the symbol makers
Three months after my wife lost her 39-year-old son to a tragic accident, a family member gave her a special gift – a custom-made chain necklace with a gold star. Embedded in the star was an off-center diamond. John, her son, “was a star,” the family member told her. That was many months ago, and […]
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PublishedJanuary 24, 2019
Lee Van Dyke, Portland: Walking ‘The Way’
The Camino de Santiago begins at Saint Jean Pied de Port, France, and travels roughly 500 miles through four of Spain’s regions, ending at the Cathedral at Santiago. I saw the Emilio Estevez-Martin Sheen movie “The Way”; read Paulo Coelho’s book “The Pilgrimage” and the German comedian Hape Kerkeling’s “I’m Off Then,” among others; and […]
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