Item
St. Croix Courier, July 13, 1944Shiretown Items
Getting Home
Many years ago, I once went on a fishign trip to lake Utopia with Judge Cockburn. We took along Dave Maxwell of St. George as guide and preceptor and, after a long night spent alternately in fishing and toasting our shins at a blazing beach fire, we returned home with a string of twenty good sized speckled beauties. As we came over Humes Hill behind the Judge's finely matched pair of blacks and caught the first glimpse of the town and the sparkling blue waters of the Passmaquoddy, my companion turned to me and said: "One of the finest features of a fishing tip is the getting home!" I was so forcibly struck with the truth of the statement that I have never forgotten it and have often wondered if it does not apply equally well to any pleasure trip. We pan for a year enjoying our trip all the while in anticipation, we visit our friends or dear ones and enjoy every minute of it, yet there is something in that moment of arriving once more at our very own home which touches the deepest of our emotions. It may be the most unpretentious of homes, the house may need painting, the roof may leak and we may be in need of a new kitchen range, but neverthelsss it is Home. The most unhappy character I ever met in fiction was a lad who had been transpanted from a little town in the South Seas to a large city in the United States. The charms of the city meant nothing to him, he contantly longed for his own grass hut, the simple carefree life to which he was used—and home. No truer words were ver spoken than those of John Howard Payne, "be it ever so humble, there's no place like home."