Next month will mark 7 years that I have been in Maine, some days I feel like I should get some sort of badge for surviving that long but generally when I feel that way its just an off day. The truth is that once you get over the initial culture shock, Maine is not a bad place to live.
I can honestly say that I know my neighbors here far better than I ever knew any of them in Chicago, Mainers are an odd bunch, in many cases they don’t say much and have a tendency to keep to themselves. Yet in a pinch when you need a neighbor they are there for you. Case in point, as I have written before, my neighbor across the street 9 out of 10 times in a large snow storm will plow us out. I have never asked but its always a welcomed surprise to wake up and see that I don’t have to manually shovel a foot of snow. In the summer they often bring over a treat for my daughter when they see us out in the yard, we did reciprocate this fall by sharing our apple picking bounty over to them.
If you saw my neighbors, you would think they probably don’t speak to folks like me and while I doubt I will ever engage them on their political views, they are decent folks from what I can see. Last summer a local Dominican family tragically lost their teenage son in a river drowning and folks came out to help the family, its that type of shit that makes me remember why I don’t mind living here.
Even my Black friends who live in smaller towns here where they are the only Black person, generally don’t encounter any hassles once folks know you live in town and see you around. I will be honest though and say I couldn’t live in a town smaller than where I live since 16,000 folks is pretty small to my Chicago brain.
All this to say, I still don’t understand Negroes who come to Maine intent on wrong doing, this storybroke last night, now in last night’s story they showed a picture of the alleged suspect and sorry to say he was Black. Look going to a lilly white town and breaking into someone’s house is a sure enough way to get your ass caught. For real, Maine is a small state, only 1.5 million folks in the whole damn state and folks of color and that is combining all of us make up less than 10% of the population so you ought to know if you fuck up and do something shady, your ass is going to get caught.
In my time here, I have noticed an increase in folks trying to come up here and doing shady shit, obviously it pisses me off. When we first moved here the big crime story would be some white boy robbing an convenience store with a knife, I admit that sort of shit used to make me laugh especially in my first year here. Robbing someone with a knife? That shit would not work back in Chicago at all. Yet as the years past, I have noticed the crimes getting more dangerous and scary and sadly at times more folks of color as the alleged suspects.
Now as a sista living in Maine raising my family, that shit distresses me to no end but also reminds me that such stupidity can make it harder for the rest of us trying to just live our lives in peace and quiet. As for Mr Bennett, the alleged suspect I suspect he better watch his ass while he is in the joint.
As for me, well I just plan on doing what I do which is to live my life.
