April and an Old Truck

 It’s a gradual awakening. For me and the house and various machinery as well as the lobstering business I insist on staying in contrary to any common sense.

Here at 33 South Road, Matinicus Isle, Maine, the Easter vibe comes not in pastel or fluorescent pinks, oranges or yellows, crocuses, daffodils or forsythia blossoms, but in dirt-crusted black. 

The truck Megan paid $800 for in 2014 is now in its 11th season here. Hundreds of trips have been made up and down the island with as many traps as would stay stacked on the bed. The black Mazda pickup truck has had its share of malfunctions and breakdowns, but picture tightening battery terminals after lugging the battery up out of the basement, tipping some fresh gas in, sweet talking the dodgy starter until she comes to life and then watching the black beauty rise up out of the dead grass as the tires are inflated. That is resurrection. 

The lawnmower obliges, though it feels wrong to just about need mittens to cut the grass. Buoys get inspected for weak bridles and cleaned prior to this year’s fluorescent blue and orange coat. A few need my initials and license number re-branded into them.

So it goes with me as well. I really do my best to adapt to the mainland, but once I’m boots on the ground here I realize how much I need the crazy that comes with this remote island; how much I need the raw connection to the environment; how good it feels to be picking up dry broken limbs off the yard and warming myself with them a little later by the stove. I realize how much I cram down and out of sight the suffocating sensations of the suburbia that the mainland coast is becoming. As wonderful as it is, it’s usually not working for me by April, and I don’t consciously realize why I’m such a drag. Then again in November, the fear of cold man winter will have me grateful for a comfy nest. 

Thinking further out than just the yearly migratory cycle, this place reminds me I need the wildness and impracticality, if for no other reason than to remember how showing up here one April long past felt like being released from confinement. I felt there was adventure ahead in life and I was right. I often do not feel that way these days, so it’s good I came out and fired up black beauty one more time in April.