Quincy Bay, looking out to Peddocks Island and Boston Light
For the next few weeks we’re going fishing!
I wrote Stripah Love in 2004 and self-published it in 2005. It’s my favorite book of fiction. There are only four, and I claim none of them as literary masterpieces. This is the one for which I have the most affection.
For many years this was my spring ritual: On the first day when it seems that the back of winter has been finally broken, that the pipes will not freeze when the water is turned on, I travel from home in Vermont to Quincy, Massachusetts to open the cottage on Post Island. Winter is still making blustery noises in the Northland, but I know as I drive south I will see tinges of green, the occasional bunch of daffodils, and the triumphant splash of forsythia.
Post Island is a small, private community on the shore of Quincy Bay on what was once the estate owned by John Quincy Adams. Over time the summer community was absorbed into the sprawl of Boston. It is only eight miles’ drive from Post Island to downtown, less as the crow flies. My grandfather, who lived on Saranac Street in Dorchester, bought a shack that had been used mostly by duck hunters, as a summer refuge. Later he built a more substantial dwelling on the road for my grandmother’s comfort, but she preferred the shack, tucked into the back, surrounded by marsh.
I’ve been making the pilgrimage every year of my life since I was born in Milton Hospital, adjacent to Dorchester, delivered by my great-Uncle Arthur. That’s since 1948. I’m now bordering on old manhood, and stewardship of the cottage has passed into my hands. I exit the Southeast Expressway, now Interstate 93, for Neponset, cross the bridge that spans the tidal river, finally glimpsing Quincy Bay when I turn onto Wollaston Boulevard. Now, the memories start clicking by as if fired from a Gatling gun–Squantum Yacht Club, Quincy Yacht Club, the Clam Box, the site of the Beachcomber, Tony’s.
There’s a song on the car radio, familiar yet elusive. Like Proust’s madeleine (no, I’m not comparing myself to Marcel Proust as a writer, just comparing moments) it strikes a deep and resonant chord, one that is pleasing, but with complexity of a fine wine. It will take me more than a decade to piece together the chronology of the song and my associations with it, but it takes only about a year to complete the fictionalized version of my love affair with this unique place called Post Island.
The song has a lovely finger-picked guitar into, followed by a male voice, solo voce,
Well, I’ve been out walking
I don’t do that much talking these days
These days
But, rather than reading about it, give it a listen.
One day, this song gave me a story, one that I’m about to share with you.
Tomorrow, the backstory of the song, and to come … we’re going fishing!
Stephen Morris