by Norma Best Boucher

I just spent one of the best mornings I could want. I didn’t set out to do that. I don’t think that life works that way. I do try to start every day with a positive attitude, but this morning God just pointed me in a direction and said, “Enjoy!”

The weather was cool for Florida, a beautiful winter morning, when I took my early morning walk just as the sun came up. I usually walk with my neighbor’s Yorkie, Scooter, but today I was especially early and just took off alone. I didn’t realize that I usually look down or at eye level when Scooter is with me. I have to be careful that he doesn’t step on fire ant hills or disturb any snakes. Today, I looked everywhere and discovered a leafless deciduous tree silhouetted against the morning sky. Suddenly, my mind was back home in Waterville, Maine, walking on Elm Court and School Street on a beautiful cool day.

Florida is filled with beautiful full-leaf and flowered trees that thrive in the winter, but at that Maine memory moment the leafless branches on that tree were more beautiful than all of the other trees combined. Right next to it was a smaller palm tree. The two trees together seemed to epitomize my own life – the majority of my years spent in Maine and the last of my years spent in Florida. The larger tree had the deepest and best root system just like my own life in Maine.

And then – My cat Olivia and I were sitting on the screened-in porch when a beautiful hawk landed a few feet from us. She saw him first. I saw her body stiffen and followed her gaze. The hawk was perched on the roof in a majestic pose. As his head turned, I saw the downward curve of his sharp beak and his proverbial “hawk eyes” sizing up the backyard. Olivia did not move. Neither did I. He was even more beautiful when he took flight and flew past us.

And then – I went for my daily ride along Indian River. The morning was still young. There was a very light rain that appeared on my windshield but was too light to disturb the mirror surface of the river. Hundreds of seagulls were perched on the long river docks, much, I imagine, to the chagrin of the owners. One lady was taking pictures of them. I stopped my car and saw several files of “ducks in a row” at varying distances in the river. All were paddling north.

And then – I saw them, three dolphins. Indian River is quite shallow, so I could see them intermittently breaking the water. They, too, were going north. I don’t know whether they were feeding or just playing, but I never tire of watching them just living their lives for all of us to enjoy.

The first time I saw mammals swimming in a river was when I was seven years old in 1954. My father drove my mother and me from Waterville to Bangor, their hometown, to see the two white whales that had swum to Bangor up the Penobscot River. We drove in my father’s 1948 Studebaker. There was no Interstate 95 highway then, so the trip took two hours up and two hours back. We could go no faster than 45 miles an hour because the car shook at faster speeds. Seeing the whales was quite a thrill. Seeing the dolphins brought back to me another cherished Maine memory.

As I left the River Road area, I stopped at a stop sign and saw perched on a tree limb a different but still beautiful lighter colored hawk. He was watching me as intently as Olivia and I had watched the earlier hawk.

And then – I left the serenity of the scenic river ride to go to a gas station to pump gas into my vehicle. The prices had dropped. Another Maine memory came to mind. Again, my father had driven my mother and me to Bangor to see the gas war.

“Norma,” I remember him saying. “Remember this day. Gas is 18 cents a gallon.” I watched as a man filled the gas tank. We turned around and left Bangor for the long two-hour ride home.

Today, I paid more for my gas than 18 cents a gallon, but who cares? I enjoyed a million-dollar morning and Maine memories.

by Norma Best Boucher

As I ask myself when this journey all began, I must start with my mother in the ‘60s when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had been an older mother when I was born, so I had the advantages of having a mother who was secure with herself.

I remember vividly when she had her mastectomy and radiation. I have never seen anyone with such courage and strength. She couldn’t afford a breast prosthesis, so she stuffed a cotton curtain into her bra and asked me, “Norma, am I even?” before going to work as a first presser at the Hathaway Shirt Company.

My father had told her, “Just live, Lillian.”

For us, who loved her, she lived.

I had made sure that I never took any medicines that might add to my risk of having breast cancer. I had taken every precaution I knew, so when at age 62 they told me that I might have breast cancer, it was a slap in the face.

A lumpectomy revealed an additional lump – now, two different kinds of breast cancer.

My son took the reins and made appointments at a Breast Cancer Center. Within a week’s time I was at the center. Further biopsies showed two additional growths.

My breast was a cancer factory.

After the initial shock of the diagnosis and with the help of the doctors, I realized that cancer was not necessarily a death sentence. Suddenly, I had options, decisions, and hope.

My husband and I went home to Maine to visit. Family members and friends who had survived cancer were the greatest inspiration for me. People I hadn’t seen in years called to tell me of their experiences and to encourage me.

I left Maine with the decision to go through with the mastectomy and with the courage to fight for my life.

Experiences with my mother, God, and the love of my husband and son got me through the operation.

I was overjoyed to learn that the cancer had not spread to my lymph nodes. In fact, I was told that I wouldn’t need chemotherapy. I went to the oncologist prepared to take a preventative medication for five years.

Further tests, however, showed that one of the cancers was an aggressive type. Chemo was now on the table. This decision was more difficult than deciding on the mastectomy.

This was a setback. I had already moved on with my life, and, suddenly, I was grabbed back into the world of cancer.

The question was, of which was I more afraid: the cancer or the chemo?

With the guidance of doctors, I opted for the chemo.

My husband and son took turns taking care of me. I exhausted them. They had put everything they had into saving me, and now I needed them even more.

The chemo treatments were worse than the operation. It was an intense three months, but my family never waived.

Each person’s experience with chemo is different. Suffice it to say, “I wouldn’t wish this on an enemy.”

I did the treatments. My hair fell out in clumps after the second week. I wore bandanas most of the time because my wig was so loose that it slipped to my nose when I tilted my head. Some days I just wanted to heave it across the room.

The first time I slept for days after the treatment, I was scared. The next treatments I prayed to sleep.

Every time I had a treatment, I swore I wouldn’t take another, but then I felt better and tried again.

Finally, they were over.

I survived. I am alive and cancer free.

When I look back on this experience, I laugh, and I cry. God, everyone’s prayers, and my family’s love got me through this.

I am truly blessed.

Sometimes, when I’m dressed and ready to leave for work, I take a long, hard look at myself in the mirror.

In my mind’s eye I see my mother, smiling at me.

I whisper, “Thank you,” to her and to God.

Then, I pull back my shoulders, smile right back at her, and ask, “Ma, am I even?”

Norma Best Boucher is a freelance contributor to The Town Line. A former Waterville native, she now lives in Florida.

by Norma Best Boucher

I have always loved raspberries. My earliest memory of the sweet seedy globules was on my aunt’s farm, in Bangor. In the summer my father and I visited his older sister’s family for a week filled with the softness of feather beds, the smell of sweet peas, the taste of fresh garden produce, and the succulence of ripe red raspberries.

I had been too young to go berry picking before that summer. Apparently, it was more work to watch me than to pick raspberries, but that year I became of age, four. With the index finger of my left hand gripping the handle of the small tin cup and with all the fingers of my right hand grasping my father’s fingers, I was off on an adventure into the Maine woods.

The year was 1951, so television hadn’t educated me. The only animals I knew were dogs that bit, cats that scratched, and an array of bugs that did God knows what. I was a typical city girl about to be introduced into the wild.

My father, my aunt, and I walked for what my short legs felt was forever but for what my imagination thought was a second. I was introduced to chipmunks, to birds, to wild flowers, to fallen trees, and to peace.

I never got the hang of berry picking that summer because I saw an unidentified bug on a bright red fruit and refused to touch any other berries. I did behave, though. As long as they filled my cup with juicy berries, I stood quietly and contentedly in one spot watching them and eating one red berry at a time.

In a short time, they exhausted the area and moved farther away. I stayed on my spot to avoid the scratchy bushes, but I never lost sight of my father. As soon as I had eaten that last berry in my cup, my father refilled it, each time promising me there were no bugs.

My aunt eventually moved much farther away, and I heard her voice fade into the distance.

Becoming more relaxed with my surroundings, I began to take in the sights – trees, birds, and new sounds. Quite at peace with the world, I reached into my cup for another berry. As I did, I looked down past the cup to the ground.

Just then a long, slender, green creature slithered across the top of my bright red canvas sneakers. I let out one long, loud, blood-curdling scream. In the distance I heard the sound of my aunt’s yell and an avalanche of gravel.

Of course, my father ran to me first, and after calming my tears, he explained that I had seen only a harmless snake. Even today the words “harmless” and “snake” are never used by me in the same sentence.

Back then I stuck out my pouted lips and begged to be carried. I decided then and there that my feet would never again touch the same ground as that “harmless snake.”

Carrying me, my father set off to find my aunt. We discovered her at the bottom of a gravel pit. Hearing my shriek, she had lost her footing and had slid feet first, stomach flat all the way down to the bottom.

After relating my episode with the reptile, they both laughed hysterically and did so for many years later with the memory. Only later in life did I fully grasp the humor of the situation.

I enjoy daily walks now but on the side of the road. Lately, I have seen red raspberries ripening. With no one watching, I walk into the brambles and pick a handful of berries. They are just as sweet as on that first day in the woods at my aunt’s farm. Each day I take a handful noticing that others are doing the same. Soon they will be gone and a cherished memory will fade with them.

On those daily walks I continue to look for the chipmunks, the birds, the wildflowers, the fallen trees, and the peace.

Oh, yes. I still look for the bugs on the raspberries…but never, never do I look down for that “harmless snake” in the grass.

by Norma Best Boucher

I was backstage opening night of my debut performance peeking through the curtain at the audience, asking myself, “What the heck am I doing here?”

Since I was a little girl, I had dreamed of acting. I had dreamed of dancing and singing, also, but I knew early on that those careers were going nowhere…stage fright and nooo talent. I joined the band.

Now, in my 30s, I was answering an ad for acting lessons. “Call Sam O’Connor and learn to act,” the ad said. “Fifty dollars for five lessons.” It took me all of two minutes to decide.

There were 20 of us at that first class, all eager and all pretty average. As we were leaving, Sam called out to me, “Can you memorize?”

“I am a great memorizer,” I told him.

“Good. I need an actress for a play I’m directing. Can you be here for auditions tomorrow night at 7:00?”

I was there at 6:30, and I got the part. Apparently, I fit the bill. I was a female, I was an English teacher, and I was the only one who showed up for the audition. He handed me a script and told me that I was to play the part of Sylvie in Neil Simon’s play, The Odd Couple, the female version.

The three actresses playing the other character parts were seasoned women, seasoned English teachers, and seasoned actresses, all making a comeback.

I had the smallest part, 75 lines of spicy dialogue. We were billed as the town’s own Golden Girls with my playing the Rue McClanahan type – the sassy one. My young son read through my lines with me every night, and with the patience, the coaching, and the friendships of the director and these women, I went out on stage and did not make a fool of myself.

I had succeeded. I was an actress – an amateur, a one-time flash in the pan – but an actress.

Lack of talent hadn’t stopped me; stage fright hadn’t stopped me; and I had experienced that proverbial 15 minutes, or, in my case, 75 lines of fame.

by Norma Best Boucher

“Drat!” I just spent two minutes trying to save with a piece of paper a nondescript insect that was stranded on my living room floor. The insect finally grabbed the paper. I walked the paper with the tiny creature to the door and opened it. The insect then let go of its grip and jumped to the concrete just in time for my foot to land on it. “Oops!”

What did I learn from this experience? I’m thinking.

This fall, when I was home in Maine on vacation, I visited by parents’ graves. Many thoughts and experiences ran through my head, but the common thread was that I am thankful that I am an everyday, ordinary person. There is nothing wrong with being a celebrity, accomplished, recognized, or even charismatic and adored. I am just happy that I don’t fit into those categories. No one, except those I want, knows anything about me. The paparazzi are nowhere near, and I melt into crowds. Works for me.

Allow me, please, to walk down Memory Lane. My personal Memory Lane began in the late ’40s. I lived on a street with all boys, so I was a tomboy. There were cowboys and Indians, Kick the Can, Red Rover, baseball (I still throw like a girl.), roller skating (skates with a key, of course), and the “Ding Ding” ice cream truck. Ordinary? —Yes. Memorable? —You bet.

The sixties encompassed my high school and college years. I was fortunate enough to live in those times when our world was coming into a new age. I personally missed the drug scene. I was ahead in time of the turmoil or too busy with life to be involved. Later, when I taught high school English, I was thrown into that world with student devastation. Not pretty.

At the present time I have the joy of having three pet animals in my life, none of which are mine. I am their adoptive friend. There is an older, former feral cat, who makes sure that I am well-trained to her needs. There is an 85-pound dog, a three-year-old Rhodesian, who may run away at whim with me on the other end of the tether, and, finally, a two-year-old Yorkie, who runs circles around me, literally, when we walk. Life with these beautiful creatures is free, fun and enlightening.

What will tomorrow bring? I don’t know. I go to bed each night with a “thank you,” and I wake up every morning with great expectations. I may list a number of clichés such as “Stop to smell the roses,” or I may sit for hours trying to think up new, catchy ones. I don’t want to waste that much time. I want to pet the cat and walk the dogs. I want to LIVE, not just be alive.

Back to the bug. What did I learn?

I don’t know what the life expectancy of the insect was. A few seconds of his life may have been equal in time to hours, days, weeks, months, or even years for my life. Yes, he died, but rather than be stuck on my living room floor for the rest of his life, he grabbed the paper. As soon as he sensed the outdoors, he jumped to his freedom. Neither of us knew how long that freedom would be, but the last act of his life was to “Go for it!”

I guess what I have learned from that experience is that all I know is the here and now — life, opportunity, and the freedom to choose — so each day I shall with gratitude say, “Thank you” to the night, I shall with great expectations rise to the day, and I shall with as much courage as I can muster, “Go for it!”