Gray, Maine. Little Sebago Lake.
We’re there.
Three and a half days of blazing across the US of A and we’ve been at the camp for a week now. “Camp”, not cabin, I have to keep reminding myself, though I think I’m getting better.
This particular camp, like many others in the area, is seasonally occupied. It’s a perfectly wonderful get-away in the summer, but you’d certainly freeze to death in the winter.
That said, there was some work to be done to get the place up to snuff and though I like to think of myself as a friend to all creatures great and small...anyone with four, six, or eight legs within the camp property lines will say hello to my little friend...
My new very best friend...the Oreck Handheld Canister Vacuum from 1962.
We’ve taken this place to new levels!
Inside anyway. Outside, it’s rustic anarchy. Beautiful and terrifying...or maybe I’ve just been in L.A. for too long.
I have only one remaining concern in the realm of varmints.
It began in the woods...
A young birch tree had fallen during a late winter storm and was half floating in the lake, partially draped across the bushes, and barely attached at the roots.
Steven braved the poison oak to saw the base free and I waded into the warm water to drag the tree along the shallow bank, around the dock, and up to shore so we could chop it up.
Easier said than done as it was knock-your-beer over windy today, but Steven had no trouble with the saw, and I was able to drag the thing to the dock where David and Nancy were waiting to help maneuver the 20’-0” growth with some leverage from above.
Geri, Nancy’s friend from New Jersey, was beaming with muted moral support, a safe distance away on dry-land.
Pushing the sinking 800-pound tree against the current whilst sinking into the waist-high boggy lake weeds really brings out the best in a person...
A wet tree branch had just whipped me across the face when I looked down to see a monster inches from my hand.
Dolomedes.
Mainers call them dock spiders or fisher spiders, but they dwell and hunt in wooded areas as well. It had a brownish-gray body with striped legs and pure hatred in its eyes.
Sorry folks, I’m out. Should the dock spider decide to spring into action, I was helpless: no chance to run, no chance to swim...just no chance.
Still a team player though, I climbed up onto the dock and continued to help lug the tree around to the shoreline. At least from up there, I could easily run to the car and drive straight to the airport if need be.
Dock spider had vanished...
Until we cleared the slip and the tree began to sink.
From the shoreline, Steven had waded into the water with some rope to assist in the dragging of dead weight (the tree, not me).
I was still on the dock and spotted Emmanuel-Arachnid literally walking on the surface of the water above the submerged tree.
Unfathomable.
The thing was a terrifying six inches splayed and apparently, because dock spiders are covered in waxy hairs, they can run on water.
Once again, as a warning to you all, the giant hairy spider can run. on. water.
Steven has been talking about getting a small, electric chainsaw to manage the growth in the woods, but my vote is for a large unregulated flame-thrower to burn the state of Maine to the ground.
I yelled at Steven to stay back. I yelled at Jersey Geri to get inside. I yelled at the children 200 yards across the lake to get out of the water.
They all just stared at me. Their nonchalance impossible.
Nancy said it was just a baby, or she said I was being a baby, tough to recall the exact dialogue in the moment...
Death on Sebago ran toward my production designer. It ran on water toward him.
I yelled again, pointing with fervor.
New-York-City-Steven just looked at me, nonplussed. Dock spider furiously approaching.
With one fluid motion, he waved the creature up and out of the water, like Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter or The Bible, or something, and into oblivion.
No big deal. No problemmo.
But it was a huge deal. It is a problem. Run on water ... GET OUT OF HERE. I’m not overacting, AM I???
The stuff of nightmares. My God...I love Maine!
So...yeah, beyond some sprucing up and one near-death experience, we’ve made near-daily pilgrimages into the town of Gray to visit the grocery store, the post office, the dump, the laundromat...all scintillating and completely noteworthy.
And, of course, decadent meals have been concocted and consumed, the aromas drifting out of the kitchen enough to make the dock spiders drool.
We’ve sipped martinis each night, played cards, all while the lake sparkles in the background, the cool breeze pacifying any lingering work-nerves like long, communal sighs of relief.
It is not lost on David and myself, just how fortunate we are to have friends like these.
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