Booth Bay Blues

[tedwords]

 

"Everyone behaves badly--given the chance." The Sun Also Rises, Hemingway

Writing this at 11:30 in Booth Bay Harbor, Maine. 

This is one of those sleepy tourists towns that seem to curl up and fall asleep around nine at night. Which I find both charming and a bit mystifying.

Corb says it reminds him of Newport, when the streets are empty late at night. Or Flam in Norway. I am thinking of Merano, Italy, which started to fall asleep at six at night, save for late night meals that filled the quiet streets with chatter and laughter. I miss the nights we spent there, in the Venetian hotel with tacky red wallpaper, and an open window late at night that opened up onto the canal where all we could hear was the soothing sound of the roll of the waves and boats passing by every now and then.

We're here for a family gathering. His family. We started off from Eldredge at around two and traveled north til we arrived here at six. By then, his family had already had experienced drama and were told we could enjoy the evening by ourselves. Which, twist our arms, please.

It's an odd collection of folks. His mother, of course, but also, his rebellious brother Greg, his aunt Carole and uncle Paul, and their two Trump-loving sons. Apparently one of the sons, the more brain-damaged one, has been drunk for the past two days and made their travel here a little uncomfortable. Add to that the fact that Greg and the other Trumper are camping while here and wanted to get to their campground before 6:30 and Auntie Carole's bedtime is 7:45, and you have a lovely solo evening for Ted and Corb. 

We're staying at a nice location called The Admiral's Quarters which overlooks the water but isn't exactly the way it was advertised on their website. The view of the water isn't exactly serene and a bit interrupted by parking spaces and a restaurant, but if you tilt your camera upward and crop out all that, you can totally get it to look like waterfront property.

But it is "situated just steps away from the bustling harbor and local attractions," the room is very nice and the bed super comfortable. We had a terrific meal (and I a nice key lime martini) at the Harborside 1901 Bar & Grill, then picked up a bunch of books at the local bookstore, followed by some ice cream. Corb fell asleep on my shoulder but woke up about a half an hour ago and is now watching Tik Tok videos.

There was longstanding drama getting here. This is a long story, and not sure how much my fingers can type. Corb's mom a few months ago had a big fight with Greg about going. It was an awkward (but kind of funny situation). Scott (Corb's older brother) took an interest in his family medical history due to his colon and asked his mom to provide him with a list of family health problems. She complied but for some reason decided to write down the name of "family alcoholics" at the bottom of the page, and listed Greg and Trumpy cousin Patrick. But she took a photo of it and sent it to Scott, who didn't see what she had done and shared the image with Corb and Greg. Greg was less than amused. "Fuck you, mom," was his response.

Scott worked overtime to try and patch things up and get Greg to agree to go away to Booth Bay Harbor, and a few months passed. And then, a few weeks ago, Scott himself had a terrible fight with Corb's mother and declared that what she had said was too hurtful and he could no longer go with us. Greg, who had been strong armed into going, understandably said WTF?

Why Scott is upset is another long story dating back 20 years and involving him and his wife Tina stealing $100,000 from Corb's mom as well as some additional abusive behavior on the part of Tina that rattled Corb's mom, who has had instances of spousal abuse in every one of her relationships. The only reason they patched it up years ago was because of the grandkids but with the kids grown, they chose the past three weeks to start talking about things. For some reason, Scott suffers from memory loss about all of this and thinks his mother is delusional. The end result: Scott isn't here, after talking everyone else into coming.

[In my opinion, Scott is a bit of a dick.]

The whole thing kind of reminds me a bit of my situation with Ashes, who, by way of an update, still hasn't spoken to me since the horrible message she wrote. It's still awkward, I think about it constantly, but I think in some ways it has brought me a bit closer to my two other kids. Still, learning to live with this new norm...and realizing that it may be this way for quite some time to come because I am not sure I can forgive what occurred. It's something I am learning to live with.

Oh! And Corb opened his second store last weekend. It looks fabulous. Very masculine. Did you expect any less?

Anyway, time to call it a night. Corb has gone back to sleep and I really should too, because it is now 12:30. Sleepy time beckons. 

The sun will rise soon, and a weekend of adventure awaits. I cannot wait to see what fresh family drama awaits us then.