Mini-Awe-Polis 3

My name is Maddy Butcher. I live in southwestern Colorado and I’ve worked as a journalist for several decades.  I like to spend time outside and, thankfully, I have spent many years working outside, not just playing outside. I think it’s important to distinguish between the two. In my experience, people’s perspectives, experiences, and philosophies towards the outdoors is different depending on if they are building a life where they’re working, if they become an important part of their outdoor world, or if they’re just passing through. 

So far, we’ve focused entirely on interviews with people working on the land, but that’s not by decree. As I’ve mentioned, I grew up in Maine and I’m looking ahead to interviews with people who work on the water.

Occasionally with this project, I share a few mini-moments of awe. My nickname for these segments – cringeworthy, I’m sure – is Mini-Awe-Polis.

Mini Awe Polis is a bundle of small wonders that have collected in my noggin. Kind of like the hay in my jacket pockets. 

This week, I wanted to share some water-related thoughts, maybe to kind of to prep you all for those interviews with fishermen and lobstermen. Okay, maybe it’s just an excuse to share them. 

The biggest factor in being on the water where I grew up on Middle Bay, anyway, was tide. I’m guessing you know what tide is. But if you don’t, tides are the rhythmic movements of the world’s water, based on the pull of the moon. In Harpswell, the difference between high and low tide is nearly 10 feet. In Miami, closer to the equator, it’s less than three. Heading up the Maine coast to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in the Bay of Fundy, the difference between high and low tide is 53 feet.

Billions of gallons of water flowing in and out, twice a day, every day.

Not exactly, twice a day. The movement of the tide is more like once every 12 and half hours.

So high tide would be at three in the afternoon on Monday and more like six o’clock by Friday.

Tide, at least for us on the mud flats of Middle Bay, meant the difference between heading out to swim or boat or go clamming or fishing or not.  It meant that a moored boat would likely be aground or nearly so at low tide, but floating freely at high tide. It meant the difference between swimming in water the height of a kiddie pool or the deep end.

Living on the mud flats isn’t all bad though because at low tide on sunny days, the mud soaks up the sun and heats up the incoming water. By August, that means it’s actually swimmable. Maybe water temps in the 60s.

In certain areas and at certain times, you do not want to mess with the tide. The flow in tight spaces of the shore creates current that you can’t swim against and often can’t boat against. Maine’s coast is full of ins and outs and wild meanderings. A straight line from the New Hampshire border to the Canadian border is just 228 miles as the crow flies. But the in and outs and peninsulas and islands make it nearly 3,500 miles. 3,500 miles!

If you’re on the water, you really need to know where you are, where the tide might take you, or how it might make things more challenging. And oh boy if you want to start combining tide with fog.

In the coldest of winters, the ice would freeze clear across Middle Bay, a mile wide in spots. But inevitably, tide would break up the ice in chunks, sometimes as big as a yard or as small as a cooler. It was a thing to go iceberg hopping, a really stupid thing that we did as kids. A boy I knew was iceberg hopping. The tide was going out and took him way down the bay. Like miles away from home. The Coast Guard had to fetch him.

I want to say something more about mud flats, since they get so disparaged. I mean, they are not picturesque, like rocky coastlines or sandy beaches. If you’re barefoot or are digging into the mud, that mud will stay with you. It’s so finely grained that it can be hard to wash off. Mud flats have a particularly wonderful but certainly distinctive smell. Earthy, salty, of the seaweed and eel grass and clams and hermit crabs. As a girl, I was riding a bus to summer camp up the coast. There was a girl from New York City who said, ‘pew, what’s that smell? It smells like a sewer! Welcome to the Maine coast, honey. 

AweNice welcomes interviewees. If you have a moment you experienced while working outside and would like to share it, contact us here. at awenice.com. Oh, and AweNice also welcomes your support. You can find a donate button here. 

Music is by my friend, Forrest Van Tuyl,. Find more of his terrific music from a link here. 

Keep your eyes, ears, and mind open. Until next time.