Fall

     When I retire and have my own vacation home in Maine, the thing I look forward to most is driving up there in the middle of September. After getting all my affairs in order in the city (attending doctors appointments, fixing the powder room faucet, changing the newspaper delivery address), I picture waking up early on a Saturday morning and driving out of the tiny garage on the ground floor of my building, gliding up the Henry Hudson Parkway with my husband, and listening to the sounds of easy jazz.

     We’ll make as many stops as we want on the drive up, perhaps enjoying lobster rolls in Kennebunkport like the tourists do, without any lines or unruly children. We'll let the windows down. And eventually we’ll turn onto our small driveway, packed with dirt and gravel and a smattering of burnt orange leaves wet from the rainstorm the night before.

     I’ll revel in the sound of those car tires crawling over that gravel.

     Our house guy, Tom, will have done such a great job keeping up the place since we were last there that we’ll just turn the key with our bags in tow, throwing them down on the bed and immediately walking the short walk down to the pond to “make sure it’s still there.”

     The water, like glass, will greet us like an old friend. We’ll take off our shoes and sit at the edge of the creaky wooden dock, dip our ankles in, and observe the tiny bugs dancing on its surface.

     We’ll talk a lot, or, better yet, not at all.

     We’ll cheers our glasses of red wine to a “very successful drive up.” After dinner I’ll fire up the wood stove and we’ll each crack open a new book. We’ll go to bed early and bathe in the silence of the woods.

     And such it will be for all of fall.