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Happy birthday gardengnome, my first LJ "friend", and the person who drew me to this place a little over a year ago.

So it's all her fault ;)

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My grandmother has been in all 50 states of the US. It's my goal to repeat that, and I found out recently that my sister has the same goal. Must be something in the genome.

The only state on the Atlantic I hadn't been to yet was Maine, which I took care of today on a technicality. Biz ended at noon, my flight was supposed to leave at 4:35, so I hopped in my car and drove North. I wanted to go to the sea, to Kennebunkport, to smell the cold ocean that I still remember from my Connecticut/Rhode Island childhood. The rocky beaches and mossy crags smelling of mussels and cold water kelp, so different from the organic, tropical fecundity that I now identify with the ocean.

Unfortunately, I just didn't have time. I cruised up I-95, blew through New Hampshire in about 12 minutes, and crossed Portsmouth into Maine. I pulled over at the first exit, stepped foot on the soil of Maine, then stepped into a 7-11 bathroom I had sorely been needing, hopped back into the car, and flew like a bat out of...Maine...to Boston Logan.

I made it with about an hour to spare. I probably could have made Kennebunkport, snapped a pic or two of the sea before bolting, but I was traveling under instinct -- I had no realistic idea how long it would take.

The girl next to me on the plane had just flown in from England where she had been studying this semester. She hadn't been home for three months, and has to go back after New Year's. I heard her talking in Spanish, rapidamente, to her folks, excited to be back in the States and on her way home. I hung back in the airport, trying to catch a glimpse her when she just saw her parents, but she disappeared through the crowd to the baggage claim, on the other side of the airport from where I parked.

Maine makes the first new state I have been to this year. Kind of rare -- last year I hit three new states. I guess I'm running out -- the Pacific Northwest, Dakotas, Alaska, and Hawaii are really the only ones left. Last year I posted all the states and countries I hit in 2000. I'll do the same New Year's Day for the travel I did this year. Should be a pretty dense map.