Oops! and Maine memories

Oops; that was a brain-o.  We're not in Bangor, but in fabulous Bar Harbor.  Or Bah Hah Bah, as it's called locally.  (The plane from Michigan landed in Bangor, but we rented a car and immediately escaped.)
 
This is not our first time in Bar Harbor, but it's been thirty years.  Back in 1981 or 1982 we'd been talking with Rusty Hevelin, looking at a map of the U.S. to see if there was anyplace where none of us had visited.  It was Alaska for Gay and Rusty, and Maine for all three of us.

We'd get to Alaska soon enough, but that summer Maine beckoned.  We loaded the van with camping stuff and took off for at least a month.

We camped a few places on the way up, but were really blown away by Mount Desert Island.  (Pronounced like "dessert.")  We put up a tent, I think in late May, and stayed as long as they would let us, twelve days.  

Many small things came together to make that one of the best times in our lives.  Oddly enough, the environment was perfect for my writing -- sitting at a picnic table tapping out WORLDS APART on an antique Royal manual typewriter.  (I had my first computer then, an Apple //, but don't think I trusted it yet for first-draft writing.)  I had nailed together an elaborate portable kitchen that fit in the back of our VW van, and really loved cooking on a campfire.  When I wasn't writing or cooking I was perfectly happy just to stare out over the water, Somes Sound.
 
We shared our campsite with a chipmunk who grew increasingly bold -- actually, we encouraged him by tossing peanuts closer and closer, until he finally was eating out of our hand.  (We know better now.) He took to raiding my precious cook box, where he discovered and gnawed open a bag of rice.  I named him Felonious 'Munk.
  
Before we left the campground I called my agent, Kirby McCauley, and he mentioned that he had another client in the area, guy named Stephen King.  Gave us his number and we called him up, and he said to come on over.  We had a wonderful afternoon with Steve, drinking beer on his porch.  I guess in another year or two that wouldn't be possible, with the success of CARRIE.  Steve is a great guy, but he became so famous that he couldn't have a private life unless he did keep it totally private.

So we're back in Bar Harbor, and find it little enough changed in thirty years.  Of course it's bigger, and there are more tourists, but it seems to have kept its pleasant and mildly exotic nature.

Oh . . . I do have one humbling memory from that trip.  I was sitting in a harborside bar doing a watercolor of the harbor and islands.  A little girl, maybe eight or nine, came up and said, "What you doin'?"
 
"Painting a picture," I said.
 
She studied it.  "You're not very good, are you?"
 
Joe