Up is Down. Down is Up. Or Something Like That.

I like knowing where I am. Navigation is one of my strong suits (except on a boat, but that’s a different story).

For a long time, I was – actually, still am – confused about Downeast.

Although sometimes disputed, it’s commonly put forth that Deer Isle is a part of Maine known as Downeast, an identifier that derives from the nautical. Because prevailing winds blow from the west, it’s been customary for more than a century to say that you’re headed downeast when you’re going in the general direction of Canada. And so it would seem, but still confusingly, that there’s not much need for “north” or “south.”

Early on here, a native islander friend attempted a simpler explanation. You go “up to” Boston or Portland or any other place westward – never mind that it may seem you’re heading south. And when you drive north off the island, you go “down to” the mainland. If not exactly clarifying matters, she at least provided me with some necessary lingo. And actually, this sort of that’s-the-way-it-is-and-has-always-been explanation more or less worked until I was forced back into reconsideration with the discovery that America’s easternmost frontier with Canada is West Quoddy Light.