Bringing Maine Home

While I was away on my grand tour I heard that I missed a heat wave of epic proportions in Durham. I saw on Facebook where local friends had posted the thermometer in their cars reading 104° to 110°. Numbers that made me thankful to be up in cool New England. Not that it was cool the whole time I was there and when it was hot they did not have air conditioning to hide in. The hottest day was one when we were in Boston. Carter was at orientation staying in a dorm without air conditioning. I hope she remembers how that felt when she is in the middle of a Boston winter.
I am not sure how I timed this right but I came home to the most glorious late July weather I can remember in 23 North Carolina summers. It was 67° degrees when I woke up this morning. Russ and I decided the most spiritual thing we could do on this perfect Sunday was take Shay up to the Eno for a cool summer walk. Since I need to get back on puritanical eating and exercising plans I thought this was the best way to ease back into real life.
We were hardly the only ones who thought that a nice walk in the woods besides a gently gurgling river was a good idea. But the coolness of the morning and the sunniness of the day made everyone we encountered along the trail just that much kinder and gentler. It was as if the government has suddenly started working effectively, everyone was so happy.
It was not the breakwater walk in Rockport which is my favorite way to get steps, but the climbing up and down the rocks and over fallen trees at the Eno was good for my backside. It was not the hills of Providence, but it was the coolness of a New England summer morning.
After our walk we wanted a healthy lunch where we could could sit outside with Shay. I am still craving New England seafood so we did the next best thing and went and had a salad at Zen Fish. A poke bowl with crab and crawfish tasted nothing like the chowders I had been eating, but then it was much better for me. I am not sure how I am going to substitute something healthy for the orange ginger molasses cookies I discovered in Maine. I may just have to try and recreate them and bake them for my NC friends so I can share a bit of Maine. I can’t afford to recreate the lobster rolls.