Scenic Sunday - Fort Popham on The Kennebec River, Phippsburg, Maine

 

   Fort Popham on the Kennebec River, Phippsburg, Maine in autumn. I took this aerial view in 2010. Hunnewell Beach is in the foreground. The view is looking north up the Kennebec River. Atkins Bay is to the left or west of the fort. Cox's Head is in the background to the left or west of the fort. Gilbert's Head is just north and to the right or east of the fort.

My Memorial September 11, 2011 9 AM

Waving from a driftwood beach shack, Popham Beach Phippsburg, Maine

Snow Is Here!

I had you going there for a minute, didn't I? No snow yet, but it's getting cold at night. Doesn't it look like this Snowy Egret is dancing on the water? I took these three days ago on Atkins Bay on the mud flats. It's just a gorgeous, gorgeous bird, even if it is called 'snowy.' BBbbbbrrrrrrrrrr

No Lesser Lesser Yellowlegs

There are two types of Yellowlegs, Lesser and Greater. "How do you tell the difference," you ask? Obviously, one is 'greater' or bigger than the other. So, you sort of have to see them side by side to know which is which, right? Not so. The Lesser Yellowlegs has legs slightly longer in proportion to its total body than the Greater, though the Greater is taller. This gives the Lesser a more graceful overall form, which makes it, in the grace department, greater. Don't you just love birding? I have just enough birding experience to make really big identification mistakes. So, I could be wrong about which bird this is in the photos. I'm going partly on what birder's call the gestault or gut take on it. I once knew a wonderful man, Ed Gamble. Long ago, I was the weekend baby-sitter for his children. He was a fantastic carver of birds, especially Maine coast shore birds. His license plate said "Yellowlegs." Every time I see Yellowlegs, Greater or Lesser, I think of Ed Gamble. Each of the Yellowlegs share the same feeding behavior. In the second photo you can see that the bird has its bill in the water. They swoosh the open bill back and forth, close it, gulp, and do it again. They get so carried away with this that they jump around and chase prey across the mud. They act like chickens with their head cut off! I took these photos at Atkins Bay. It is a small, enclosed bay across from Fort Popham in Phippsburg that is actually part of the end of the Kennebec River, though it's thought of as ocean. It drains almost completely when the tide goes out. I go there regularly to see shore birds feeding like these Yellowlegs. It is a small birding paradise. Almost everyone who goes to Popham heads for the beach or the fort. Few bother with the Atkins Bay clam flats. Look what they have missed!

Destroyers And Rabbits

Lathyrus japonicus-Beach Peas


The Vietnam War and the Sexual Revolution flavored the background for my teenage development. I entered the sixties as an innocent five year old and came out a jaded fifteen year old. By the time the decade closed, I had done drugs and had sex. So, as 1970 dawned, I was sure that war was wrong and that everybody should have sex whenever they wanted. Now, forty years later, I’m not so sure. Theoretically, the more years a person lives the wiser they should be, but for me, the opposite is true. With every breath taken I’m less certain because the older I’ve become, the more times my core values have been tested. When I walked in on my son, then later, my daughter having sex the test was huge! Each of them was older than I was the first time I had sex, but still - I was appalled. How dare they! Not my children! They may disagree, but I think I was cool about it. There weren’t any dramatic scenes and they were each suitably mortified. I was ultimately, more taken aback by my own gut reaction than about what they were doing. First, I was sure that my generation had invented sex. Certainly, this was true because my parents never had sex. Ugh! Oh shudder and wince; what a revolting thought! And my dear sweet little children would never have sex because now we know: I would kill them! So what was my horror about? Wasn’t it perfectly natural and to be expected? It was very okay for me when I was a teenager, why wasn’t it okay for them? Many nights I wrestled with that crocodile; hypocrisy floundered in a swamp of dreams. I concluded that natural as it is, teenage sex is not sanctionable (easy enough since I’d already had my teenage sex!). When children have sex, they are not prepared to be responsible for the consequences of their actions. I know I wasn’t, even though I thought I was. After all, I knew everything there was to know. The life altering fallout of disease and unwanted pregnancy seemed even manageable to my naïve mind.
Now that I wrapped that up with a nice bow for my psyche, that brings me to war. I wish that was as clear. Ideally, I would like to say that I’m opposed to war. I’m opposed to the death penalty so it should be clear, right? But, what if somebody intends to do harm to those precious children having sex like rabbits in your living room? Do you stand back or do you fight back? My response to hurting the ones I love would be damned primal; I’d hurt the other guy if it came right down to it. I’d mangle the beast that messed with my kids. I know this because I’m the mother of the rabbits. That’s taught me that I’m capable of things my intellectual mind thinks repugnant or just impossible. I’d like to think of myself as more evolved than the aghast mother who stood slack jawed while her daughter and the pimple faced boyfriend scrambled for clothes. But, I’m not. I’d like to think that I’m sophisticated enough to rise above my fear for my own losses to not wage war. But, I know I’m not. After all, I did have sex in my parent’s house while wearing a training bra. The drives are basic.
Fort Popham, built of granite in the 1840s, sits where the Kennebec River meets the Atlantic Ocean. At the end of the school year, teachers take students there for a last dose of history, a romp on the beach and at the old fort. These kids were throwing sea weed, screaming and daring each other to go into the cold water when this destroyer appeared. It’s a Bath Iron Works Littoral Combat Ship, the U.S. Navy’s first Trimaran war ship. Designed for speed and maneuverability, at 419 feet long, it was awe-inspiring. I wish that we could design a better way to settle our differences on the globe and defend our rabbits. I wish that teachers could tell kids about old forts and destroyers as truly things of our human past. I hope I never am a shocked, bewildered mother screaming “Not my child!” if one is lost to war.


The Spring Azure butterfly is a little guy, only about the size of a nickle. This one was enjoying the Beach Peas at Popham, but usually they prefer woodlands.









Rock Doves (feral pigeons) have nested in the observation slits in the granite fort.

If you zoom in on this, one of the girls on the left has her hand raised in a peace sign. Figures.

OSPREY ANTICS

I took these shots a few days ago at the mouth of the Kennebec River by Fort Popham. There, the Ospreys and seals were busy catching Alewives, not the Sand Dabs that they are after at my house. When the Ospreys were right over my head, looking for fish, it looked like they were checking me out for lunch! They have impressively large, sharp talons which could scalp a girl in no time flat. That is, if they didn't become hopelessly tangled in my hair, which would be bad for us both. Who would you call in a situation like that? The fire department to come with the Jaws Of Life or a good hairdresser? It would be a wound that would be hard to explain in a hospital emergency room, especially if I was in my bathrobe.