It’s been decades since I lived in Maine, but it still feels like home when I visit.

When I’m there, or even just sorting through photos, I feel a sense of clarity and peacefulness that’s so familiar and predictable it’s almost like slipping into a favorite pair of old jeans.

The quality of light there is different. It seeps into everything and fuels creativity and purpose. Obviously I’m not the first person to write of drawing inspiration from the light in Maine, and I know enough to know that I don’t understand it. But it’s intoxicating and I can’t ever seem to get enough.

It goes beyond inspiration, though. Connection, maybe. Yes, that’s it. Connection. A connection I don’t ever really remember feeling to the City I grew up in. When I left my parents’ home, it was Maine that took me in. And though I’ve made a life for myself some few hundred miles south—a good life where my roots run deep and where I cherish my chosen Community—I do so love the time I spend Downeast.