Tom and I had one of our rare outings alone yesterday. In the morning we drove to the coast, where Tom had to meet with the owner of one of the galleries that represents his work. Meanwhile, I walked around town and bought a new hat. Then we reconnoitered, ate a picnic lunch by the sea, had a cherry-pit spitting contest that Tom won handily, and climbed Mount Megunticook in the Camden Hills. From the top we could look far away into the coastal sea, out to the islands of North Haven and Vinalhaven, and then down the coast as far as Rockland. The sky was clear, clear; the blackflies were sullen; we sat on a big rock and watched bumblebees pollinating the wild blueberry flowers. Later I said to Tom: this is what our life could be like once our children leave home. Which is a comfort. I will miss them terribly, of course, but then again, as I wrote in Tracing Paradise,

I didn’t fall in love with Tom because I thought he’d make an excellent father of sons. I fell in love with the way the backs of his knees looked as he walked away from me down a dormitory corridor, the way his hair stuck straight up from his forehead in the mornings, the way he never bossed me around or made me play softball, the way he entered into the private lives of housepets, the way he stared up at the sky.