the silence of a falling star lights up a purple sky

A couple of weekends ago M and I stayed with friends in Blue Hill, and it was such an idyllic day-and-a-half that it's been fueling our longstanding folie à deux about moving up there. Zillow is my most pernicious online habit. We have proed and conned it many times, and there are far more pros to staying where we are (walkability, closer to everyone we love, etc etc etc). But I do adore that peninsula with all my heart!

Down under the Deer Isle Bridge

I swam here in the clear, cold water, looking up at that pretty green suspension bridge from below. It was supposedly "where the teens hang out," but there was nary a scrap of trash to be seen, and only one demure graffiti scrawl. The next day Anna showed us another deserted beach, and I went for a second crisp, salty swim.

Inside the barn at Tinder Hearth

M and I went here for breakfast (to go, because they don't allow dogs, their only flaw); we took our breakfast sandwich, cinnamon roll, coffee, and Clover to Caterpillar Hill, our favorite scenic lookout over blueberry fields and forests down to the reach and the bay, dotted with islands, and the Camden hills in the distance. Later, we went back to Tinder Hearth with Matt and Anna for pizza night, which was almost a mystical experience. Pizza: sublime. Setting: huge vegetable and flower garden illuminated by a crackling fire pit and trailing fairy lights, picnic tables with candles flickering in the dusk. Absolutely perfect produce in the beds, artichokes exploding in purple blossoms, lettuces like illustrations in a glossy cookbook. Towering yellow oxeye sunflowers, marigolds everywhere. "Why don't the deer eat the vegetables?" we asked one server, who smiled and shrugged. An enchanted place. Oh, and I forgot to mention the sundae we shared at the end, with soft serve and chai caramel and local plums and cinnamon whipped cream.

And then walking to the car afterward I looked up at the sky — moonless — and saw more stars than I've seen in years. The Milky Way was so obvious (like it was saying "I've been right here this whole time!"), the sky was just thick with stars, there was so much depth to it. It's like when you can see enough of the horizon over the ocean that you imagine you can see a hint  of the earth's curve. I could just feel that we were standing on a planet, in a universe. Stunning night sky, I counted two satellites and one shooting star. And I kind of yearned to live somewhere with so much sky, so much silence, and so many places where you can just pull your car over and jump in the ocean.