We don’t remember how we got this gig. Sometimes things show up for the Hawks, with no memory of their source. This is one. But we’re here, in a turn of the last century sprawling wood frame road house, a bordello that flourished as a speakeasy in the 1920’s and declined gently into the 1960’s. More recently our host Daniel, a rover from Hollywood by way of San Francisco and New York City, bought the place and restored it to its present funky glory.
Towering trees surround meadows, which ring zen shaped flourishing gardens, which surround the house, which contains dining rooms, kitchen, and elegantly stocked small bar, all on undulating old wood floors. A music room filled with cushions, percussion instruments, and guitars, looks out onto a lawn sloping up to our wood guest house, the Hawks bunk for the night.A gourmet dinner in one of several dining rooms, with wine and port, with Serena, an old friend whose family runs the Maine International Film Festival, a gathering whose sardonic title reveals its very modest beginnings in a small Maine village. Now it’s a big deal, with a 30 page glossy booklet and rumors of Scorcese.
The sun goes down, and we gather in the music room, no mics, and play an acoustic set for Dreamaway lodgers, a most appreciative crowd. We swap t-shirts for bar tab with the wily Daniel, and a good time is had by all. PL tries to sleep outdoors in the hammock, but is eaten alive by mosquitos, and retreats to the main house. The band cabin has a wood-fired sauna and naked lodgers wander in and out though the night. But we don’t mind, hang with out friends around lantern light, drink whiskey in crystal glasses from the bar.
The woods are magical, coated in ferns, covered by lush deciduous canopies of maple, birch, and elm. We’ve left the city behind.