{"id":22660,"date":"2023-02-21T15:07:53","date_gmt":"2023-02-21T20:07:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=22660"},"modified":"2023-02-21T15:07:53","modified_gmt":"2023-02-21T20:07:53","slug":"diary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/diary\/","title":{"rendered":"Diary"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"position: relative; padding-top: max(60%,326px); height: 0; width: 100%;\"><iframe style=\"position: absolute; border: none; width: 100%; height: 100%; left: 0; right: 0; top: 0; bottom: 0;\" src=\"https:\/\/e.issuu.com\/embed.html?backgroundColor=%23f0f0f0&amp;d=fm23_final_flipbook_02.10.2023&amp;hideIssuuLogo=true&amp;pageNumber=98&amp;u=portlandmagazine\" sandbox=\"allow-top-navigation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation allow-downloads allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-modals allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox allow-forms\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p><strong>By Paul Desimone<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">August 15, 1975<\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\">5:30 a.m.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p5\">It was a typical humid day in the mountains of Maine. I woke up just like any other day, slapping my alarm clock till it stopped ringing. I was looking out at a small lake, the sun just beginning to pour its light in my face, the cracked window I needed to fix before fall reminding me of my lazy summer days. I had two rods next to the door, and a small bucket of live bait. Two eggs, bacon, and bread was my breakfast. It was a short hike to the lake, with the sound of heat bugs ringing in my ears and the heat coming off the ground like a space heater. It was going to be a really hot day. I looked down at my bucket: my bait minnows were still alive. I was at my spot where I could sit down and relax before I baited and cast. My hands secured my seat, the rocks still cool from the night\u2019s kiss. I dipped my feet into a small pocket of water, checking to make sure no bears were around. I felt the water trickle through my toes. My first cast sizzled through the air, the plunk of water splashing up.<\/p>\n<p><em><span class=\"s1\">Read the full story in the digital magazine above.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-22661\" src=\"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"536\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary-300x157.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary-768x402.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary-200x105.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Diary-620x325.jpg 620w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>New fiction By Paul Desimone<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22662,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,112],"tags":[1272],"class_list":["post-22660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-fiction","tag-february-march-2023"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22660"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22663,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22660\/revisions\/22663"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}