The tail end of a bountiful summer here in New England. My parents are in town for a few weeks, a somewhat impulse visit from California - missing their grandson whom they haven’t seen since late April, and putting in some work on the lakeside cabin in Plymouth. We take them on a two-night getaway to coastal Maine for Labor Day weekend - along with, seemingly, most of the region’s summer denizens. For our little train boy, it’s his first ride on the big train (“Amtrak, Amtrak, Amtrak!” he cries out excitedly upon seeing the Downeaster at North Station). He skips his nap, gets increasingly delirious on the two-hour ride north - but it’s all fun and games with Ah-Ma and Ah-Gong sitting across the aisle. We ply him with a cheeseburger; he throws a tantrum after Jane refuses to let him stay indefinitely in the train-car lavatory. Travel with the family, these days, is all about making little memories and being present for the precious moments - in between copious amounts of the no-simpler-than-usual parenting and caregiving. At the Portland Transportation Center, we catch a rideshare to our hotel on the waterfront. Jordan is stokedto set up his hotel Pack-n-Play (旅館! “Lǚ guǎn!” - hotel! he cries in Chinese). In the late afternoon, my mom and dad head out for a little walk and to buy us takeout dinner from Gilbert’s Chowder House on the waterfront. I take a swim in the hotel pool with Jordan; after his bath, we enjoy our lobster rolls, fried seafood, and bowls of chowder in the hotel lobby.
On Sunday, Jordan is up at his usual time, which means we (and one other toddler plus his toddler dad) are the only ones eating breakfast downstairs at 7 AM. Jordan wolfs down three cups of milk and multiple plates of potatoes, scrambled eggs, and sausage patties (no one to accidentally eat his breakfast sausage this time!). Two cruise ships have docked in the harbor this morning, and Jordan gazes down at them from our window, along with the inflatable advertising tube-man (“Balloon man! B’loon man!”) in the parking lot across Fore Street. In the mid-morning, we take a little ride with the grandparents on the narrow gauge railroad by the water, and walk along the waterfront while sharing fruit bars. Before lunch, Jordan takes another dip in the hotel pool with Ah-Ma, trying on his kid goggles and (BaBa’s fault) getting dunked underwater for just a tiny moment. In the afternoon, we board the 4:30 PM ferry to Peaks Island, enjoying airy views of Portland’s skyline (and the distant Portland Head Light, which we visited last June) on the brief ride across Casco Bay. Peaks Island feels like a prototypical New England summer spot: golf carts and bikes are the predominant modes of vehicular transportation; the roadside stands of beach rose have finished flowering, their hips fully red and plump; and a rocking reggae/ska band is blowing up the outdoor restaurant/bar terrace just above the ferry terminal. We (and maybe all of the other recent arriving ferry passengers) line up for root beer floats and scoops at Down Front Ice Cream. I photograph the flowers in front of the nearby inn, while Jordan and mom and grandparents poke around. At 6 PM, we join what turns out to be a packed crowd for the evening ferry back to Portland - not enough room, boo. We hop over to Island Lobster Company to get takeout dinner while awaiting the next departure. It turns out to be a rather eventful, mad rush to board the 7:45 PM boat; I stop to tend to a peri-syncopal woman and we get nearly trampled. Fortunately I manage to reunite with the stroller prince and his retinue, and we all make it safely back to the city.
On Monday morning, we have another early morning breakfast; Jane teaches me the art of using the hotel waffle maker. While packing for our return trip to Boston, she notices she’s missing her wallet, which is usually stored in the backpack with the kid essentials. She has no idea where it is; maybe it fell out sometime during all the runny-nose wipes and sunglasses/sun-hat placing and replacing, or was snatched during the frantic crush of the ferry boarding last night. Jane calls the railroad company, the ferry company, the hotel front desk, the Portland police department. No luck. Four hours later, we arrive back home in Brookline (Jordan once again a sleepy pile after deliriously bouncing his way through the return train ride). The wallet’s on the piano in the living room. She hasn’t had it in three days. She didn’t realize she didn’t have it for three days. I feel like I ought to win some kind of marital achievement award. Jane’s already cancelled all our credit cards. She says I’ll never let her live it down. She’s right.
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For this little weekend trip, I went out with a slightly different photographic vision than my usual, which is quite journalistic in composition and post-processing. I wanted to shoot a little more free-form, partaking more intentionally in street/travel photography rather than my usual fare (landscape comps with family portraits on the side), and accordingly I wanted to process this set in a way that captures the nostalgia of late summer, the season’s ending, the feeling of bidding goodbye to the slow times, the golden afternoons, and the escapades on the water - a feeling that I think we as tourists shared momentarily with everyone else traveling in New England this weekend. In the photos, you’ll notice crushed blacks, de-saturated tones, warm highlights, and even a bit of grain. I hope to build a little more variety - and a little more intention - as I keep experimenting and practicing with different styles of photography.
