Notes from Maine - 2026/01/04

I was just touring the neighborhood where I grew up. It’s 600 miles (almost 1000 km) from where I am, so I wasn’t touring it in person. Google Maps Street View took me there. With just the house and street number (we lived on a numbered street), Google is already guessing “Arlington, Virginia.” I grew up about 5 miles west of the Lincoln Memorial. Our house looks nearly the same from the front. The colors are different and the big fir tree out front is gone, of course. The stairs are wooden now instead of brick. I fell down those brick stairs when I was very little and had to get stitches on the inside of my upper lip. I put my hand through the glass of the storm door (no stitches that time). One house to the west, I slammed my head against a cinderblock wall and had to get four stitches in the center of my forehead. Not all my memories of that place are good though. 

Looking at it now, it’s hard to believe how small and tightly-packed those houses are. 

When I would meet my friend Amy to play (she’s 10 days older than me), we would meet at the street-sign pole at the corner. I remember circling that pole, swinging around it and counting how many times I circled until Amy showed up. When my sister had other activities, Amy and I would walk home from school together. We read the same books. Her best friend back then was Michelle. I think they’re still best friends, which is amazing. 

I clicked the arrow just now to go down Wakefield Street. Amy’s house is gone. The camera has caught the crew mid-demolition of the house. Then, when I click the arrow again to go farther south, Amy’s house is back! Google has images from two different times of year for the same street and in one my memory is still there. It’s the strangest thing. I was just getting used to the world with her house gone and now it’s there again.

Just past Amy’s house is the alley. I suppose it was a utility corridor that bisected the block? This wasn’t a big city alley, lined with trash cans and brick walls. This was just a grassy no-man’s-land between houses that kids would use as a shortcut. Further east of our house the alley disappeared, absorbed by the yards on either side.

I’m clicking my way south. A lot of the houses are recognizable even though the landscaping is all wrong. Everything is way more open now than it was back then. We had tall trees hanging over the streets and bushes up to the edges of the lawns. 

If I keep going south on Wakefield, eventually I come to a dead end at the bike path. Beyond the fence, you can see Interstate 66. This isn’t the fabled Route 66 from songs and pop culture. This was a hotly-contested major artery built while I was a kid. This section is called The Custis Memorial Parkway and it slices from the beltway all the way into Rosslyn, which is just across the river from DC. I remember when we used to walk down Wakefield, take the path down the hill to cross the train tracks, and then back up to the drug store on the corner. They sold good candy there. I also remember when I was older that I could take the bike path from my house all the way to my friend Pat’s (across town) and never see a single traffic signal. Of course as soon as I could drive I didn’t bike all that much. Pat and I didn’t hang out much in school anyway. 

When I went to college, I took I-66 all the way to its western end, where it meets I-81. That road that didn’t exist when I was little probably trimmed an hour off of that trip. 

Speaking of shortcuts, the new bridge between Topsham and Brunswick is still named the Frank J. Wood Bridge. I thought maybe they would rename it. I think the new bridge is wonderful. It makes the old Green Bridge look cramped and decrepit. The new bridge is now the eighth bridge in that location, and replaces the Green Bridge that had spanned the river for almost a century. For the first few days, it seemed like there was a lot of traffic, but that was also right during the holidays. Now, everything feels back to normal. Albert and I went to the feed store on Saturday and traffic was light in both directions. I’m sure the people who were mad about the idea of retiring the old bridge are still mad. I’m not nostalgic about old roads and bridges with one notable exception.

When they were repaving part of I-295 they briefly opened an entrance less than two miles from my house. On paper, it didn’t look much closer, but it was amazingly convenient any time I needed to take I-295 south. I guess I wouldn’t use it if it was still there. I hardly ever take the highway south anymore.