The following two sentences don’t go well together:

It’s moose hunting season in Maine.

We ate something called “Autumn Stew” at the Fryeburg Fair.

“Hunting is a part of life here,” my husband, Bob, said. “You go clamming and crabbing. It’s the same thing.”

“Crabs are ugly. That makes it OK.” I picked out something termed “sausage” from the stew. “I just hope that porcupine roadkill is still there when we leave the fair.”

We spent 3 days camping on the Saco River in the town of Brownfield. There, the lawns are decorated with stuffed deer statues, which are lovely if you can overlook that they’re for target practice, with hunting arrows sticking out of their vital organ areas.

We saw “Brake for Moose” signs. “What would people do here instead?” I asked Bob. “Yell, ‘We’ll see who’s chicken!’and floor it?”

I told the woman at the campground office that we couldn’t find the center of town, where I had hoped to find a Thai restaurant.

“The gas station,” she said, and showed us to our site.

“Oh, I love wilderness camping,” I said to Bob.

“A camper with a TV doesn’t fall into the roughing-it category.”

I sat on the banks and watched the leaves float down the river, wondering why I never sit still like this at home. A young Husky dog ran up to me and licked me on the nose. Her tag said Kiya.

“KI-YAAAA,” our neighboring campers called, and as quickly as she came, she left.

That evening, the Fryeburg sub shop delivery truck arrived. We’d had a long day. Cooking was simply out of the question for Bob. The roughing-it mode would commence in the morning, when we planned on going canoeing.

We rose with the birds at 10. The campgrounds offered a chauffeur service where we’d be dropped off with our canoe up the river. That way we’d float back with the current. Why would anyone say no to this?

“Turn right at the pines,” the driver said and drove away.

“Hey!” I yelled. “Maine, as in Pine Tree State. Hell-ooo?”

We canoed around the first of a billion little pine islands, then got stuck in river muck.

An hour later when the driver was dropping off another unsuspecting couple, I caught his attention, which was relatively easy since I was screaming.

“Those pines,” he pointed.

And so we found the right way. But we also found the current. And like two big idiots, we flailed along at breakneck speed. Before we reached the end, I threw up in the Saco.

That night Bob built a fire, with wood I gathered from the camp store for $2 a bundle. Kiya sauntered over and put her head on my knee. I felt a kinship that I all too rarely feel with people.

Kiya’s parents had a propane light in their tent. I could see inside. They were naked. I didn’t know that Bob was gazing at the stars.

“I don’t believe this,” I said.

“I know. You never get to see them so clearly.”

I was stunned. “Do you do this at home too?”

“Only after you’re asleep.”

I realized then, he was talking about stars. He realized I wasn’t. “You’re very, very sick,” he said.

And sadly, our wonderful trip came to a close. Early in the morning, I hugged Kiya. “I’ll never see you again,” I said. I closed the door and we slowly drove away. “Have a good life,” I whispered, looking back. I felt the stinging pain of knowing that we’ll both grow old and gray and lame, in separate lives.

Yet, how lucky I was to have come. The sadness of parting was due to the joy of connecting, if only for those few brief moments, when the autumn leaves floated down the Saco River.

In the beautiful secluded village of Brownfield, Maine.