The Punk Meets the Godfather

I don't drive 95 north into Maine very often anymore; there's little need to when Dover centers the universe. Last night, though, I went spoke-to-spoke from work to Jim's house in Wells. It being the heart of summer, I avoided Route 1 as always.

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There are just so many memory lanes along this route. The first segment, along Chases Pond Rd, brings to mind feelings from the summer of 2007, the first period I drove it regularly. At that time, I was working full-time in Exeter and part-time at Wonder Mountain. Fretting about whether I was working too hard or not hard enough and why I cared so much. Coming down with and getting over mono. Trying to put into context the prior fall's relationship and spring's other. Holding out for Rock of Love / Pirate Master Tuesday nights; we were all working too much to see much else of each other. Excited for...actually, not all that enthused about what was next. Mostly, self-awarely trying to capture some "carefree summer" feel and shut out all of the "what's next?" of starting senior year. 40 minutes of commute each way offered way too much time to be melancholy.

Chases Pond is actually a nice road, passing through some set-back houses on good-sized lots and eventually some York Water District land. There are still a couple of anti-tollbooth move signs up at houses that could be wiped out by such a relocation. I remember more signs back when "the tollbooth is sinking!" was fresh; perhaps outcry has died down since there seems to be a good option that doesn't displace any homes. Still, it's funny how things go from urgent to out of the news; of course, sometimes they resurface with a vengeance.

There are also two opposing "Drive like your kids live here" signs. These exasperate me, but I've yet to find a retort that doesn't make me feel like a jerk. Any ideas?

The route jogs right onto Mountain Rd then left on Greenleaf Parsons Rd to continue paralleling the highway. Not much there. A similar jog right onto Agamenticus Rd (this one comes out at the blinking light in Ogunquit just north of the playhouse) and left onto Josiah Norton Rd, which parallels the more often used North Village Rd.

Remarkably, I am the center of a three-car sandwich on Josiah Norton and pass three cars going the other way. It's remarkable because one of my earliest memories is Dad taking me over when it was a barely passable dirt track passing just one house. Through the years, I tracked new construction and paving activity. After dad moved away from the area, it became a near-ritual for me to drive the road every six months and report on what was new. This summer, I found that it was paved all the way through; Emily later said this was actually done last year while I was out west.

These are pretty positive memories. I have to try to really hard to achieve a "another dirt road bites the dust :-( :-(" feeling and it's not very convincing. Still, it's a lot of work to be a road's historian.

Two new additions are one of those solar-powered highway signs on wheels and a spray-painted plywood sign. The former says "CAUTION SLOW DOWN" and the latter "Drive Slower". I hope the plywood sign was put up by someone who had loudly requested that the road be fully paved. It's like Bennett Lot Rd in South Berwick - what the heck did people think was going to happen? People driving fast on a shortcut back road with a new surface and not a lot of houses - shocking, although I keep it around 35 as I still half-expect the surface to turn to dirt.

As an aside, the road passes near the Josias River; my guess is that Josias is a shortening of "Josiah's" but can't find anything on who Josiah Norton was.

Berwick Rd and the northern section of North Village Rd are benign; the primary memories are of long-ago bike rides.

Tatnic Rd, the main road from my mom's house to inland Wells, brings all kinds of memories. Perhaps the strongest were of the summer of 2004. I was smack-dab in the middle of my Wonder Mountain career and learning (not very well) how to manage people, particularly those older me. Enjoying, and drawing strong feelings from my first relationship, which became my first serious relationship. Getting as much as possible our of the few weeks before Kryzak had to leave for Air Force Academy boot camp with the sense that it may never be this good again. Worrying about starting college like everybody does. All good things, but so emotionally wrought.

I was struck strongly by how we gain and lose ownership over public property. In and around high school, we feel invincible; connected to that power are feelings of having the deepest possible connections to the places and things we care about. No other driver appreciated that stretch of road quite like you did that one sunny spring day with the windows down. No other walker enjoyed that stretch of woods road like you did when you spotted that chickadee or shared a smooch.

I imagined meeting current high-schoolers who drive the Tatnic Rd route, telling them how I used to drive it all the time, and having them think "Yeah, whatever." It's their road now. In some ways, they have far more right to it than I ever did. Red, yellow, and green spray paint adorns one tree where there was a fatal crash. I know about that one, but I soon see a similarly-painted tree on Hiltons Lane. Was there another fatality that I didn't even hear about? My clear loss of grip is momentarily shaking. Not only do new kids have as much reason as me to love the roads every year, some have indisputably more reason - and I don't even know why.

I'm a dinosaur and this hunting ground is tapped out. Time to move on. Fresh, strong memories of a great few days in the new, infinite space of Asheville, NC and points west only enhance the wanderlust. It's fatiguing.

Of course, there are ways to fight back. I put on Quadrophenia, a longtime favorite with so much left to give. The storyline (the mental and physical journey of a rebel youth) has a familiarity and happy ending that is easily grafted onto my own constructed story. And then there's the physical release of drumming along with Keith Moon on the steering wheel.

I love Wells, I don't go there often, and I know I can move somewhere totally new when it's time to. It was a nice ride on some pretty back roads, and lord knows it was better than sitting in Route 1 traffic.