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MARY

THE MORNING FOG HAS PAINTED EVERYTHING WHITE It’s exactly like one of et trapped, suspended in a cloud, and I can’t seem to wake myself up

Then the foghorn blares, thethe horizon just like in one of Aunt Bette’s paintings

That’s when I know for sure that I’ve done it I’ve actually come back

One of the workers ties the ferry to the dock with a thick rope Another lowers the bridge The captain’s voice coers Welcoings”

I’d alotten how beautiful it is here The sun has lifted above the water, and it lights everything up yellowy and bright A hint of my reflection in thestares back at me—pale eyes, lips parted, windblown blond hair I’rade I’ed When I seeMaybe even pretty

Will he recognize me, I wonder? Part of me hopes he doesn’t But the other part, the part that left my family to come back, hopes he does He has to Otherwise, what’s the point?

I hear the ruet ready to drive off There’s a bunchline that reaches the entrance to the parking lot, waiting to pull aboard for the return trip back to the mainland One more week of summer vacation left I step away froo back to s The seat next toaround for what I know is there His initials RT I remember the day he carved them with his Swiss Army knife, just because he felt like it

I wonder if things have changed on the island Does Milky Morning still have the best blueberry muffins? Will the Main Streethas the lilac bush in our yard grown?

It’s strange to feel like a tourist, because the Zanes have lived on Jar Island practically forever My great-great-great-grandfather designed and built the library One of my mom’s aunts was the very first woman to be elected alderht in the center of the cemetery in the middle of the island, and some of the headstones are so old and moss covered, you can’t even see who’s buried there

Jar Island is made up of four small towns Thomastown, Middlebury, which is where I’m from, White Haven, and Canobie Bluffs Each town has its ownthe summer the population swells to several thousand vacationers But only about a thousand or so people live here year round

My es It’s its own little universe There’s so about Jar Island that lets people pretend the world has stopped spinning I think that’s part of the charm, why people want to spend summers here Or why the diehards put up with the hassles that co here year round, the way my family used to

People appreciate that there isn’t a single chain store, shopping mall, or fast-food restaurant on Jar Island Dad says there’s so like two hundred separate laws and ordinances that roceries at local et prescriptions filled at soda-shop pharmacies, pick out beach reads at independent bookstores