Before I read Terry Tempest Williams’ Chapter on the Acadia National Park in Maine I had never really given much thought to what the state of Maine actually looked like. Really the only things that I knew about Maine was that one end of the Appalachian Trail ended there and that they did a lot of lobster fishing. While reading the chapter it was easy to imagine that you were there along with Terry Tempest Williams and her friends as they went around Acadia. Her ability to describe Acadia really made me want to visit and look out over the ocean at the end of the continent.
Although it was a little bit harder to understand the family lineage that was explained through the chapter. For me that is something I would really need to see a picture of to really understand. However, I thought it was so amazing that the first time Terry ever visited the park she felt this sense of connection and belonging. Only to find out that her ancestors were actually the first people to settle the area. It really makes me wonder if that is something that a lot of people feel when they journey to the land of their ancestors, or if it is a feeling that only people with a certain type of attitude about nature and family notice. I was also pretty shocked to read that she was able to talk to some very distant relatives, some more polite than others, that had continued to live on the island like their ancestors. I just find it interesting that after about 200 years that the people still lived in pretty much the same spot as their ancestors.
The above is a reflection on:
Williams, T. T. (2016). Acadia National Park The hour of land: A personal topography of America’s national parks (pp. 83-108). New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux/Sarah Crichton Books.
ORPHE CAPSTONES GATHER NO MOSS 