Mount Desert Island gets pretty crazy with the large number of visitors it sees over the summer. Throw in a holiday weekend – say, a chance to celebrate patriotism in a quaint New England town – and the craziness can turn into complete mayhem. The crowds over the past holiday weekend on MDI seemed to be in the extreme. After waiting 20 minutes in line to by milk at my neighborhood grocery store, and being bombarded by music blasting at 8 o’clock at night in the middle of – what I thought was a peaceful out of the way part of – Acadia National Park, I was desperate for at least a small amount of time someplace where I didn’t feel as if someone was throwing a giant blowout party at my house and forgot tell me.
I’m usually pretty good at finding places, even at the peak of the season, that are not overrun with tourists, but I’m finding this is getting more and more difficult to do. On this Monday afternoon I headed to a place-that-shall-not-be-named, a relatively remote and primitive place on the west side of the island, to launch my kayak and paddle out to a quite location somewhere along the shore to swim and relax. So it was with dismay that I pulled up to the boat launch only to find there was a slew of (OK maybe three or four) cars already parked there and a “crowd” of people hanging out in the boat launch area. Since I often never see anyone else there, and had sought out this location for that very reason, I was seething a bit on the inside, feeling as if my personal space had been encroached upon, especially as folks set themselves up practically in the middle of the boat launch itself, blocking my way to getting my kayak into the water.
I frustratingly had a broken foot that was still healing, so I needed to get my car as close to the water as possible to avoid carrying the kayak any distance. To this effect, I attempted to inch my car as close the the water as I could, being sure to avoid the couple set up in beach chairs, and squeezed between the brother and sister fishing and tanning, respectively, to one side of the boat launch, and the father and son pulling their boat up on the other side of the boat launch. As I got out of the car I made my excuses to them for driving so close by explaining the aforementioned broken foot. In spite of my attempts, however, I was still blocked from being able to pull right up to the shore.
I started unstrapping the kayak, and before I knew it, a man in one of the camp chairs and the father who had just brought his boat in had lifted my kayak off the roof of my car and were carrying it the short distance down to the pond’s edge! Without saying a word to me or even to each other.
Now, I kayak on my own all the time, and as I lift the boat on and off the car I often get offers of assistance. But I rarely accept these offers and just do it myself – partly because I am perfectly capable of doing so and have a good method down pat, and also because that’s just the way I roll. But this time, given that I had a broken foot – that frankly has been more impacted than I like to admit to myself by the kayaking and getting the boat in and out of the water – and had not been able to pull up right to the water’s edge, this was a huge help to me. And since they just did it I didn’t even have a chance to refuse their help.
I was grateful for the assistance, but more to the point I was so humbled by this small kindness from people whom I had been annoyed with for no other reason than their mere presence. My mood of stress from all the crowds that had been haunting me all weekend immediately evaporated. I thanked them repeatedly; but as much as I was thankful for their small assistance with my kayak, I was especially thankful for the reminder of the basic decency of (most!) people, and that these families were just out there enjoying the great Maine outdoors as I like to do, and in fact even encourage others to do. I chatted with them a bit and then paddled off with such a changed state of mind.
So I apologize to these kind folks for my initial annoyance, and thank them for their physical assistance with my boat as well as for the instant positive change in perspective their good deed gave to me. I sincerely hope they enjoyed the rest of their afternoon as much as I did at my quiet spot along the shore, where I swam, picnicked, listened to the songbirds and loons, and lay in the hammock contemplating the goodness of humankind.
EPILOUGE
The next time I was there a couple days later, I felt an immediate kinship with the woman who said, as I was unloading my kayak, “I’d be happy to help but you seem like a strong woman and can probably handle it yourself.” This led to a conversation about men feeling they need to “come to the rescue” when no rescue is needed. We both laughed when her husband came in from swimming and said to me, “wow you did that yourself, don’t you want some help?!”
Outdoor Explorations ~ Acadia & Beyond 