E.B. White, Maine, and Home-Coming

The Penobscot Narrows Bridge across the Penobscot R., a couple miles before
Orland & the Narrarmissic R. 

"What happens to me when I cross the Piscataqua and plunge rapidly into Maine at a cost of seventy-five cents [1955] in tolls? I cannot describe it. I do not ordinarily spy a Partridge in a pear tree, or three French hens, but I do have the sensation of having received a gift from a true love. And when, five hours later, I dip down across the Narramissic and look back at the tiny town of Orland, the white spire of its church against the pale-red sky stirs me in a way that Chartres could never do. It was the Narramissic that once received as fine a lyrical tribute as was ever paid to a river --a line in a poem by a schoolboy, who wrote of it, 'It flows through Orland every day.' I never cross that mild stream without thinking of his testimonial to the constancy, the dependability of small, familiar rivers." 

                                                                        -E.B. White, Home-Coming

                                             Polar Bear Swim, Center Harbor  ©2013 Basha Burwell