4th of July In Maine.
Maine, what the COVID19 virus pandemic has shown the outside World, the locals. Internet technology demonstrates you can enjoy living in four seasons Maine. Get uncrowded nature rich Maine but work online. The best of both Worlds, Maine with all she offers that is unspoiled, rich and real. But promoting it and the providing the window dressing from a keyboard connected to a brain caffeinated on good hot black coffee.
Remember how window shopping a small Maine downtown whether the store is open or not provides entertainment and gives you something to dream about during a day or night time stroll?
These images from Camden Maine during the off season but stores still open and waiting for the summer peak time tourist season.
Mainers are workers, bringing up the following generations to be the same and not get bogged down or depressed.
We’re not standing still or sitting on our hands waiting for the memo to get back to work. We treat life like a sport. Our attitude is everything in the how high do you want to score. It is up to us to be what we want to be. No one to blame for lack of effort but from within ourselves. In business it is all about making sure your online customers can window shop and be served up with what they need around the clock.COVID19 virus pandemic or not. Window dressing is not just fluff or a little thing. It is everything as we work together to prove the point.
If you feel a little divided like the nation with “Us” and over there “Them”. It’s times like these that we learn to live again as Bob Grohl in the Foo Fighters crooned. Let’s try the unplugged, acoustic version. The rest of the band. You guys and gals can take a break. Go make a call, check your email or visit the restroom. Smoke if you must or get a drink, score a snack. Vending machine slim Jim or Little Debbie’s oatmeal pie time. If the pickin’s are slim and everything at the lunch counter is off limits because it’s been closed for months. Hit it Bob.
Teach us how it is times like this we learn to live again video.
Maine, back to Earth and feet on the ground.
Reality time even if I am using a virtual kind blog posting. Your toes in the sand on a beach in Maine. This 4th of July in Maine weekend. More than ever I feel so lucky to live in Maine. This is the right place for all the reasons any season. For me it’s all the boxes checked off especially during times like these when we re-invent and learn to live again. Prioritizing, soul searching, limited in some ways to create space to fill it with what is worthwhile and probably missing. I feel living in small town rural Maine gives us a better frame of mind and healthier attitude because we are prepared for times like these.
The cyber reality of the virtual World when the 4th of July in Maine rolls around again.
Casting your net for customers using a greater reach, a healthy frequency of your marketing message. It was already happening as small Maine town economies struggle with the lack of volume needed to monetize a business. We all know that anything open for business that is not is doomed. Like an operation taking too long and the patient under the knife developing other complications beyond the main purpose of scrubbing thorough and putting on the mask, gloves, surgical gown.
A Maine business peddling a product or a service won’t survive idle and with the front doors locked.
Or even open but operating in the red ink or below capacity needed to make a healthy profit. The stop to celebrate the nation’s independence is a little different this year because not everyone feels so free and easy. Public safety and curbing the COVID19 virus adds a speed bump to the 4th of July festivities. A self imposed governor on moderation times one hundred is something new to the younger half of the population used to go go go. But something easier to swallow when you see the bigger picture and have weathered other life storms in Maine and come out the better for them.
This July 4th celebration in Maine took a step back and was without the local state fair, the parade the way we remember it.
But fireworks happened in my hometown from the top of Drakes Hill. Everyone kept their safe respectful distances and made it work. instead of crowding into community park, it was come as you are. Launched on the highest local peak and small scattered gatherings here and there to see the rocket’s red and other color glare. Capturing some of the tradition and all the appreciation for living in Maine full time.
Here’s what a normal 4th of July local parade in Maine looks like.
Sure I miss our local state Fair, the midway rides and games of chance, the agricultural exhibits.
The two Italian greasy tasty sausages going in and coming out of demolition derby. Served up from carny workers loading them to overflowing with all the onions, peppers, other mystery ingredients. No, they’re probably are not good for your body but once a year can’t shorten your life that much right? You gotta live and life is short. Maine, the way life should be is what the slogan promised. Just easy does it on the back and forth trips.
Shuttered, idled, not everything is live and operating today in Maine.
But the plan is if we all do our part and stay solid, this too shall pass. Better sooner than later. Patience, appreciation for what we still have, what we did have that will return in time. Somethings trapped in time and maybe not to return. It’s all good and up to us to stay positive for the greater good and our own quality of life. We are all going through this tunnel ride and will come out the other side with new ideas, lots of memories and stronger for the experience thrust upon us.
Maine has more second homes for vacation and rental use than any other state.
Many flocked to those Maine homes to quarantined for two weeks all my their lonesome and to shelter in place while working online from these Maine locations. Or producing your COVID19 negative test done in the last 72 hours for admission across the big green bridge. My philosophy is any of the customers I need are only 15 seconds away. Logging on and plugging in to tap the selection thanks to websites and blog posts and video channels. To learn about the simple Maine lifestyle. To appreciate the resourcefulness of down to Earth and life seasoned true Mainers. More people than ever have discovered the secret of Maine’s magic. It starts on short vacation exposure, ends up with buying Maine real estate.
The full time, possibly a life long native Mainer.
A little crusty, a lot outspoken but sharing the wisdom learned from personal experiences and meant without malice. Distilled in the heart. Common sense, Yankee ingenuity still reins supreme and life goes on. Steady the course and see the other end of any life struggle. Me In Maine blog post readers, thank you for your loyally and tuning in to follow our work. Stay tough, stay tuned and share what you have learned from this COVID19 virus pandemic experience. A sense of humor helps and banding together proving we are not in this alone.
Comedian Bob Marley helps NewsCenter 6 with the Maine weather forecasting video.
Most I know figure we are the lucky ones when you add up the score at the end of the day.
Compared to most, Maine is the place you would want to be harboring while the World adjusts to new events and health protocols that impact our economy in new ways. The worse thing you can do is perpetuate the “Us’ and “Them”. Search for unity and build something worthwhile should be the focus and channel for all our collective energies right?
If Maine tourism is not slammed and raking in the out of state dollars, retool and work on your operation to prepare for when “it’s BBbbackkkkk”. Adjust your sales and create new markets to take the place of dormant ones. Lots of local Maine businesses are right out straight but the focus is live and local. Supplementing with online virtual scores where you may doze but you never close as the sole proprietor and many family home grown operations.
Small town Maine is back, reversing the migration.
Everyone realizing everything you really need and cherish is right here in Maine. Small town Maine is grass roots, intimate and built from scratch by your friends and neighbors banding together to create something unique. Blood, sweat and tears invested when corporate dollars are no where in sight. Because this is too small an economic landscape to exploit dollar wise. In small Maine towns, you don’t pay your price of admission and just attend an event.
You are working months before behind the scenes and sleeves rolled up laboring to make it happen along with others in your small Maine town.
Meeting year round and when snow banks line the roadways or leafs are piling up needing to be raked. That is Maine home town pride that runs deeper than what you feel lost in the city and sharing everything with just too many people. Large scale is not small town Maine where you know most of the people. Maine is like you are one big small town family. So COVID19 does not defeat the little Maine towns that dot the landscape in Vacationland.
Long before the Cononovirus hit Maine a few months back, other economic struggles forced the focus on looking for waste, taking up slack.
Reducing duplication of services and studying school education services in new and not so popular ways. This Coronvirus just added a new wrinkle and hammered away at the important point of Internet connectivity is everything for survival in Maine. I like to think our set of life skills is greater, our attitude more positive to avoid getting bogged down and discouraged. We don’t stay down long and have experience with setbacks.
Money does not grow on trees and barter for exchange of goods and services happens all around us.
It is cheaper to live here when your shelter is paid for, your food is home grown and local and money is not so darn important. Not used to impress anyone because we know better. Parked for a rainy day you expect to happen makes you better prepared and not flying by the seat of your pants. Our entertainment is low or no cost too here in Maine. It’s unspoiled, pure and all natural. No make up or spin needed. Drop dead gorgeous all day long.
Folks now more than ever want to telecommute to their online job working remotely in Maine if the connection is loud and strong and consistent.
Enjoy the rest of your 4th Of July whether in Maine or wherever you are.
Keep Maine in your thoughts if you had to stay away and lose a turn. Remember your fond memories of Vacationland if you are parked out of state. If you are one of the lucky ones who live here full time in Maine, you know we’ll tough it out. Hunker down, making the most of it. It’s still wicked good in Maine. Happy 4th of July from Me In Maine.