Fourteen days.

I have exactly two weeks here in Maine. Two weeks! Can you believe it? That’s only fourteen days. Fourteen days to finish my project. Fourteen days to make a scientific poster. Fourteen days to present what I’ve been working on for 80 days. Fourteen days to say goodbye to some good friends. Fourteen days to kiss Maine goodbye. It will be a crazy, bitter-sweet, don’t-know-what-to-do-with-myself fourteen days. While I am dreading the flight I have to take back at 5 o’clock in the afternoon. It will all be okay because I’m excited to go home and see family, friends, sleep in my own bed, and see my PUPPY! 

This past week has been a busy blur. Like I think I have mentioned before, the days are long here but the weeks are short, the weekends even shorter. I berry-ly had time to pick blueberries (see what I did there). There are wild blueberries that grow everywhere here at the Bigelow lab. While it takes a half an hour to pick all but a half of a cup. Making my Aunt Cindy’s with fresh berries, and taking a break from looking under a microscope for 3 hours, makes it all worth it. 

The best thing that happened to me was my dearest mama came out to see me. She was teaching face painting up here in the east and she went out of her way to come see little old me. And just in time for my works annual Lobster Bake. Or for those who don’t like eating Maine States Bird of the sea, annual “you got chicken?” Bake. For all of those who are wondering. Yes I did try lobster, and yes it tasted exactly like I thought it would. Even dunked in butter, I couldn’t do it. Sorry to disappoint all those lobster loving hippies out there.

 I couldn’t even watch as my mother tore into the body of the poor little lobster. I just can’t look at face of the thing I’m about to eat. I need it to be decapitated. The other night my roommate bought some live lobsters and left them in the sink. All I could see was the hopeless lobster in the sink saying “save me Emma, don’t let him eat me”.

NOOOO GEORGE!

We finished strong with a hustled game of mother/daughter corn hole. “What we’ve only played this a couple times…what?” Then I showed my mama the place I’ve been living in. We went to this place called Ocean Point that has the most amazing rocks, and if anyone knows my mama she loves her rocks, just look at my front yard. If you don’t believe me, maybe you’ll believe the many pictures she took of the rocks on my phone. 

Look at this rock..

What about this rock

Another rock? Quelle Suprise!

Unfortunately the weather wasn’t behaving for the weekend. It was MAINly rainy (see what I did there..I’m on a roll) But the best part of the whole weekend was my mama got us a hotel room nearby for a night. It was like walking into the pearly gate of heaven greeted by two very nice gay men who own it. The bed was like a cloud that smelled like “clean” and the bathtub was small but it covered my knees.  We explored everything, my mama even got to see Maine’s “summerfest” which was just a flea market ran by the local church. But we met a nice lady who invited us for dinner and sold us some homemade maple Maine syrup. At leas the drive there was pretty.

"We saw the 7 darfs driving in"

It was hard to let my mama go home. It was nice to have a little piece of home in my little piece of heaven. That Monday she left, I became very homesick that day. I should not of been in the lab that day. It was hard to concentrate. But I had work to do. Instead of getting sad and moping I often launch myself into work and make myself very busy. 

The week went by within a blink of the eye.

The best accomplishment was I ran 4.5 miles. I don’t know if it was my desire to escape “The Real-World Boothbay”, or the fact that I was brave enough to wear shorts. But I found myself just running and running before I know it, I was at Linken Preserve. “I’ll just run the short trail”…famous last words. An hour later I finally made my way through the complex trails of the preserve. Don’t get me wrong, I took a picture of the map, I just didn’t realize my boob sweat covered the camera lens when I took the picture.  But running in Maine is really motivating. You can’t stop running or you get attacked by mosquitos, but you need to take breaks and look for ticks on your ankles. Getting lost did have it’s advantage, I found a lake. Beautiful lake, that I enjoyed for 2.3 seconds before I was treated like a blood bank for the devil’s little bugs.  Once I got out I had another 1.5 miles until home and it was starting to get late and that brave decision to wear shorts, turned into waddling as I tried not to rub my thighs raw. WORST CHUB RUB EVER!! 

Yyyuuusss indeed"

But before I know it, it was Friday. Bigleow has an annual open house where the public is allowed to come, explore and harass the people who work here. For part of the open house though I got to work at the photo booth. The children were timid and scared to take a picture, it was my job to make them feel like a real scientist. I learned that allowing them to wear my lab coat was the best way to do that. I loved every minute teaching and talking to those little kids. The curiosity in their eyes, and excitement in their voices.

“Do you make things explode” –Charlie “No but I set things on fire sometimes”  “CCOOOOLLLL”. The rest of the open house I talked about my project to the public and performed my experiment. That wasn’t by choice, I had planned to finish my project that day and Jose made me do it in front of 20 people. Talk about pipetting with shaky hands.  

Right now as I’m writing this, the sun is shining and the weather couldn’t be more perfect. I’m sitting in lab, avoiding doing my presentation. At least yesterday I jumped into the Ocean for the first time since I’ve been here. Yep it was freezing and scary, but refreshing and I felt so alive!  

Some days,

I feel everything at once.

Other days,

I feel nothing at all.

I don’t know what’s worse:

Drowning beneath the waves

Or dying from the thirst.

-o.m. via Pintrest