But in the warmly lit dining room, there are no doubts. Our chatter cuts through the otherwise still and peaceful evening. Claire offers me a bowl of ginger fried rice with shiitakes, a recipe Sam made up that I simply had to try. Though I slammed fried chicken from the Popeye’s at the Kennebunk travel plaza a mere hour before, I accept. We catch up over bowls of Sam’s cooking, well past what should be our bedtimes. A warm air mattress waits for me in Sam’s office, which will be my home for the week.
When it comes to staying with friends, I am a veteran practitioner. Having friends who live close to you is a gift, sure. But if you have the means to visit them, having friends scattered across the world is a treasure. And if you have friends as great as mine (you don’t, but just imagine!), they are the greatest hosts. For me, they’ve blown up air mattresses and stacked blankets on couches, making spaces in their homes for me. I’ve loved every one of these spaces: the couch in Sophie’s apartment in Vancouver; the floor of Tim’s dorm room at the IES school in Freiburg, Germany; the spare room in Brittney’s childhood home in San Luis Obispo, California. One more: the attic in Anna’s mom’s boyfriend’s barn in Vermont, where, one morning, Sam was sleeping in a hammock outside and was awoken by a cow who got out of its gate. Treasures, all of them.
When I wake up the next morning, I’m alone. It’s a weekday, and Claire and Sam have gone to work like other worthwhile members of society who are not on vacation in their friends’ cities. I’m here for five days to see not only them but the autumn leaves too, and to try the city’s now well-known food scene (yes, there’s more than lobster). But since I don’t have a car, my plans are limited to their neighborhood and their schedules.
