Endings

"See you tomorow," I whispered to the sun when we were out on the Sebago Marquesas last week. It was putting on its last show of the day, and there were three people on the starboard stern pouring a container of ashes over the rail, embracing and then getting ready to get on with their lives.

We were out with our friend Gene -- with Sassy, the La Te Da bartender we'd seen a few nights before, at the helm of the big catamaran -- and it was the last day of his fantastic visit. (He is one great houseguest.)

And after that, it was button up the house, pack and venture north of Rockland Key for the first time in six months. We visited Malinda and the kids near Orange Lake, finished the 850-mile trek north and got the computer hooked back up.

Uneventful, aside from the dead squirrel in the den.

I send my regrets in retrospect for the last couple of weeks, but for a variety of reasons making the seasonal migration was harder than ever. Consider: As I write this, in the middle of the night, it's in the 70s there and the 30s here.

But hey, the greenhouse looks as tropically good as it ever has, and once again I can think of the ending of one thing as the beginning of something else.