It’s a beautiful sunny day today, something fairly rare this rainy summer in Maine. But I’m inside, sticking to my resolve to sort through and shred old papers that have been lurking in storage areas for years. Among the many things I found and have had no reason to keep: my first credit card, from Rines Department Store in Bangor – from 1972 or thereabouts; my reading materials from the NTL lab in Bethel almost a decade ago; and a find I’ll hold onto longer still – one of my occasional writing attempts from over a decade ago.
On this sunny day, this little view of having popovers at Jordon Pond teahouse brought me back to how much I love Mt. Dessert Island, but am not so fond of dining out alone. I usually bring a book with me, but this time I brought a notebook and pen and made up this little vignette with a semi imaginary character named Ellie. So next time you are faced with dining alone, take in your surroundings by capturing them with a descriptive writing exercise.
Ellie sat in the tea house waiting for the young man assigned to her table to return. According to the card on the table he was from Dublin and named Mick. The wait staff typically came from far away places to spend the summers between their college years in Maine.
It was a wonderful place to be for someone lunching alone. The huge windows looked out over the garden, providing vignettes of families and couples as they wandered in their striped and sneakered tourist finery through summer scents and colors. Ellie had stopped once and spoken with the gardener, asking the names of the different plants. Some had amusing names like gooseneck with its high stem topped by a graceful curving white cluster of tiny flowers, giving the impression of a goose just bending its head down.
Mick dropped off her order and she now dawdled over her coffee. The smell of hot popovers slathered with butter and strawberry jam that had brought fame to the teahouse wafted through the air, and she was enjoying the entertainment beyond the panes of glass.
Hundreds of bees hovered upwards from the flowers like tiny helicopters, moving on to their next conquest. Hikers coming in from the network of nearby trails hovered as well; pointing, oohing and ahhing at the gardens, the view of the pond and the wonder of being somewhere other than where they spent their real lives.
The people who visited the teahouse now were different than those from long ago, and this was reflected in the changes to the restaurant. The original had been a primitive dining room with walls covered with birch bark. Diners waited in a closed entry room until the dining room doors opened to reveal a spectacular view of the pond and the hills rising like two giant bubbles on its far edge. Set at optimum perspective, the effect was breathtaking. Everyone was seated at the same time with an air of some special expectation, almost as if the tea house were holding its breath, suddenly releasing when the wait staff fanned out to the semi circle of tables, listening to orders and getting them perfectly right without benefit of paper and pen.
Now the restaurant was pleasant, light and airy; and much the same as other yuppie restaurants in tourist resting spots.
The effect of the location though had not changed. Ellie was on the last few days of her vacation. Never before had she taken three weeks together – at least not without it involving a job hunt. The stress of a life spinning fast, combined with turning 40, called for something special though like this extended vacation. For an introvert, the anonymity of being just another tourist, with no expectations placed on her, no demands on her time, no one projecting their needs onto her, brought relaxation and a centering back to some core place in her spirit. At this particular place and time, alone was a good place to be.
Another great vignette, love your writing.