A friend stopped by the other day, masked and at my partialy-opened door, and as we’re all wont to do, I asked, “How are you guys doing?” the unfailing question we open every exchange with these days. (Of course, we know the real answer – “crappy”, as well as the requisite polite answer – “fine”) and she said, “oh we’re fine….if hearing your mother cry on the phone every day is OK. And trying to keep your son out of trouble.”

You’re in the sandwich generation I told her, the filling between the two slices of bread, the person in the middle trying to placate your elders and your offspring. No wonder mothers are falling apart. I was only a day away from joining the sandwich myself, only not in the middle. All it took was one careless twist while rounding a corner right in my own house and my knee went POP!

Try this:

Your mother-in-law, whom you’ve vowed to help into old age, is suddenly incapacitated, she’s hobbling around on crutches and whining about it to anyone who’ll listen, while upstairs your kids are having their own individual melt-downs (too much screen time including daily zooms with teachers, missing their friends, cooped up for nearly a year). And then there’s your husband. Somewhere in the middle of this sandwich your spouse dwells. And broods.

Downstairs there are woodstoves (2) that need tending, dishes that don’t wash themselves, and, oh yes, a flock of hungry hens begging to be fed out in the back forty.

Forgot to mention two large dogs, four cats and an aquarium of fish all clamoring for your attention.

And oh yes, we’re in a pandemic, a highly contagious disease that could kill any one of us, but most likely the old lady.

Does every bit of this fall to the mom? No, not really, but she’s the one who assumes the command. And the guilt. She’s female. It’s in her DNA.

Take the 77- year- old, the downstairs Grammy, who quite boldly has been living her life just as she pleases. Comes and goes, has a boyfriend (as the D-I-L calls him – he’s 82), and is pretty much used to having things go her way. When suddenly that elderly knee gives out, the whole thing comes tumbling down. Can’t walk, carry a log to the stove, barely get from couch to bathroom. A woman who rarely sits from before dawn to collapsing in bed at 9 is relegated to the couch.CALENDAR 

“You’ve got to rest it, ice it, don’t keep getting up.” Damn.

The BF, who can’t drive anymore, is collateral damage. A very reluctant, determined-to-be-independent victim of that aged, wonky knee, not even his own knee. The D-I-L cheerfully (apparently) takes on driving duties.

While the elderly couple stays upbeat for her sake, underneath there’s a chaffing to keep doing what they’ve always done, i.e. to stay independent. To do things exactly the way they want when they want. To ignore the kindly advice of the D-I-L.

Meanwhile, upstairs and a couple of generations below those two secretly cranking seniors, the three kids, and especially the 13-year-old, are struggling to break free. Free of rules, of chores, of expectations. They’re growing up, and naturally, itching to break boundaries, to assert themselves.

At the very time a brand-new teen should be forming bonds outside the family she’s relegated, if not to the couch, to the confines of one quite crowded house. Like a hive of bees, the place hums with energy, and these days it doesn’t always feel like productive energy.

Who’s in the middle of these two rebellious factions? Naturally, the mom. The D-I-L. The wife. And all the while, every week, the dad, son to the incapacitated Grammy, brings home the paycheck that keeps this whole ship afloat. And gets up extra early to start her fire.

Fortunately, no one in this house is reticent about their feelings. Nothing stays bottled up for long. We each know exactly who to steer clear of and who needs a hug. Or not.

Most of us exist in some sort of sandwich, even if our in-laws aren’t living upstairs. The phone, that great tool of communication, carries, long distance, the constant pleadings of the sandwich generation: “Mom, did you remember to take your pills?” “Dad, it’s time to start thinking about selling that big house and moving into the new retirement village I’ve seen on TV.” “Mom, you’ve got to convince Dad to stop driving.”

Fill in the blanks.

Plenty is reported about kids and remote learning versus in person. My grandchildren—and somehow, when I wasn’t paying attention – there are now eleven of them. Eight of them are living here, the rest in New Hampshire. Their schools? LCS, Montessori, CHRHS, a New Hampshire boarding school, homeschooling. From the youngest, turning three this month, to the oldest, taking a year off from college, the past school year has included quarantined days, cancelled sports, daily zoom meetings with teachers and classmates, packets sent home with work to be done, cancelled class trips, cancelled proms, hours wearing a mask with outdoor mask breaks, and of course, the usual days spent sitting in class, working on projects, taking tests, taking notes, doing experiments.

That teachers have adapted to this new way of teaching is a credit to all of them. They deserve a special place in the pantheon of pandemic heroes, figuring out new ways to relate to their students, often doing twice the work of an all-in-person classroom.

 The two-year-old spent months outdoors at her pre-school until the weather finally forced them in. The CHRHS senior is applying to colleges while winding up her high school years minus so many of the events that used to mark this milestone.

The three high schoolers, three middle schoolers and four elementary students have spent an inordinate amount of family time: cooking together, doing jigsaw puzzles, reading, watching movies, playing video games. Family hikes, hikes with groups of friends have been a saving grace for all of us living a hop away from the nearest trail head. Bald Rock, Beech Hill, Fernalds Neck, the carriage trail are week-end destinations for many. A daily walk with a neighbor has proved to be a pressure-reliever for many a stressed mom or solitary householder, and their dogs love it.

But every hour spent hunkered down in the bosom of the family is time not spent with friends, a mixed blessing most would agree. These kids, several of them rapidly growing into young adults, need to be stretching the bonds to home and hearth. But as my middle son told me years ago and I’ve retold many times, “this is the only childhood I’ve got. Don’t tell me it’s not good.”

And on the other side of the sandwich, the old ones look at the years ahead in a finite way ­– how many more Christmases, how many birthdays? How many family gatherings around a Fourth of July bonfire, how many more Thanksgivings? How many more trips to visit siblings or old friends? Will they ever get to Europe again, or to NYC, or Florida, or their favorite state fair? Even a real meal in a restaurant, eating off plates not cardboard boxes, at a table, not in the car, seems unattainable at this point.

And for so many, not as lucky as I’ve been, when will they get to hug their grandchildren again, watch that soccer game, or bake cookies together? This has been a particularly difficult and, I suspect, unique year for those who live alone, forging each day out of whole cloth with only oneself for company. None of us will emerge from the year the same as we entered it, almost exactly one year ago when they told us to stay home, to wear a mask, to be afraid of each other and the invisible virus they might be carrying.

Town

Nomination papers for local elected office are available at the Town Office during normal business hours.  Nominations are being sought for:

Board of Selectmen, 2 positions; Lincolnville Central School Committee, 2 positions; Budget Committee, 4 positions;  Five Town CSD School Board, 1 position.

Running for a local office isn’t hard. You just need to get at least 25, but no more than 100 signatures of registered Lincolnville voters. Ask your neighbors and friends, go knock on some doors, and corral people when you run into them to sign your nomination papers. There’s no obligation for signers to vote for you, and most people are happy to help the process along by signing the papers. People can sign more than one candidate’s papers if they want. Return the papers to the Town Office by 4:30 p.m. on Friday April 9, 2021.

Please contact the Town Office at (207) 763-3555 with any questions.

School

Find links to the school budget, both this year and the proposed budget for next year here. 

Pie Day Coming Up

Schools have celebrated pi day for years, March 13 or 14….3.1416, pi, get it? The Lincolnville Historical Society will mark the day with a Pie Sale. A limited number of pies – apple, blueberry, quiche with or without ham -- can be preordered and picked up on Saturday the 13th between 1 and 3 p.m. at the Beach Schoolhouse, 33 Beach Road. Price is $15 each. Watch the Lincolnville Bulletin Board  for ordering information. Updated information will be posted to the Pilot.

There are no words

Words can’t express the grief and shock, the sympathy and love that we here in the Midcoast community feel for the Hedstrom family for the loss of their son Theodore, and for the suffering of those injured in the fire that consumed their home last week. I hope they know that we do.