I had a big idea for a blog post, but to quote Greg Brady, “Something suddenly came up.” If you’re of a certain age and watched as much TV as I did, you’ll know what that means.

In any case, given my lack of time, I’m going to post some photos I’ve taken recently that are quintessentially fall in Maine. People ask where we get our ideas. Lots of times, it’s small things. There’s something about fall in Maine that sparks the imagination in me. Maybe it’s because things are getting darker, even with the brief burst of color. In any case, if you’re a writer or aspire to be one, maybe one of these photos will prompt an idea. Or not. No pressure. [Sorry if you’re looking at this on a phone and the photos are all squished in a funhouse mirror kind of way.]

Willow and some Belgrade scarecrows.

It’s always fun when the town scarecrows come out for the season. My dog thinks they’re real people. Unfortunately, they tend to stay a little too long and deteriorate with the rain, wind and freezes, but on the other hand, maybe that makes them scarier? Part of the plot of my book No News is Bad News involved town scarecrows that had overstayed their welcome. It came to me just from seeing scarecrows around towns here in central Maine this time of year.

If you’ve ever been to Augusta, you may have seen the huge cemetery at the top of the hill near the airport. It’s actually several cemeteries, at least four or five I think, with some mini-cemeteries thrown in. We grew up down the hill and it was part of our childhood playground. Graves date back a couple of centuries, and there are even a few plots of soldiers who died at the Civil War hospital that was where the airport is now. This photo is from the Forest Grove Cemetery, in between Winthrop Street and Green Street.

I go up to the cemeteries a couple of times a week now, even though I live in an adjacent town, because it’s a good place to walk the dog on the way to the grocery store. Dogs are allowed, and there are even a couple of waste baskets in what’s officially the Mount Hope Cemetery, north of Winthrop Street.

This relatively unexciting photo is the grave of James G. Blaine, who represented Maine in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he was speaker of the house for six years before serving a term as a U.S. senator. The governor’s mansion next to the State House is his former home. The annoying thing about this photo is that one reason he’s planted here at the top of the hill (along with his wife, Harriet Stanwood Blaine) is that it’s supposed to have a view of the State House dome, but it only does in the winter now because of all the trees. Yeah, I guess the trees are nice, too. Little known fact: The three-acre Blaine Memorial, right above Forest Grove Cemetery, was designed by Carl Rust Parker, a landscape architect from the Frederick Law Olmstead firm, and the same guy who tried to design Capitol Park, which I wrote about a few months ago, but was thwarted by a tight-fisted Legislature. The Blaine Memorial is a nice little park with great views (in the winter), so check it out next time you’re in Augusta. It’s listed by the National Park Service, since they list all U.S. parks designed by the Olmstead firm.

I’ve driven by the Ezra Smith Wildlife Conservation Area in Mount Vernon many times, so one day recently decided to get out and check it out and give Willow some exercise. Ezra was the father of someone that some of you may have known — George Smith, who was head of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine for many years and a newspaper columnist who wrote about the outdoors as well as travel for many more years. The 163-acre conservation area hasn’t been around that long. Most of it was donated to the Kennebec Land Trust by George and his wife, Linda, eight years ago, a little while before George, who had ALS, died. Since it’s small, with just two loop trails, I thought it’d be a nice quick walk for Willow. It actually was kind of a scary one, with very thick woods at some points. A couple of times, she stopped and stared intently into the woods and wouldn’t go fowward without extreme urging from me, which is highly unusual behavior. Still, we came out all right. But there’s definitely something in those woods.

I hope this quick juant though autumn in central Maine has sparked some ideas. People ask all the time where we get our ideas, but mine mostly come from walking around and observing things. Even if you haven’t been inspired writing-wise, I hope you enjoyed this foray into my area of Maine. There are a lot of overlooked places, maybe even near you. We’re not all lobsters, lighthouses and crashing waves. Get out and explore before the snow flies.