Last night, I glanced out my first floor windows to see a young man peering into my car. My stomach lurched as he opened the door (which I swore I had locked). I sprinted to the porch, “Hey, that’s my car!” and crossed my arms for strength and warmth.
He turned around, surprised, having just slammed the door shut, “Sorry! I heard a bell dinging. It wasn’t shut all the way.”
My muscles unclenched, and my jaw dropped. “I …” I sputtered, “Thank you …” and coming finally to my senses, “Thank you! Man, I … it sometimes gets caught on the seatbelt … Thank you!”
My battery was safe. And so were the laptop and $800 camera lying on the back seat.
I love where I live.
Walking around the Eastern Prom has become a favorite activity. On summer days I smile to dog-walkers and lunch-breakers sitting on park benches. On autumn nights I crunch leaves on the edge of the sidewalk to the light coming from Peaks Island across the harbor. On winter mornings I trudge down the sled-marked hill to the snow-ban parking lot next to the boat launch and beach.
The Good Theater Company in the beautiful stone St. Lawrence Arts Center brings the arts to the East End, and the small local shops lining the western slope of the Hill — selling yarn, used furniture, blown-glass — are consistent with the small, homegrown feel of downtown Portland.
Colucci’s, a convenience store which also does take-out pizzas and calzones, has recently been joined by Fat Baxter’s, a small (and somewhat expensive) market offering wine, some groceries and even household hardware.
The Snug, at the corner of Washington Avenue and Congress Street, offers a comfortable pub-atmosphere and friendly bartenders — perfect for chilling out with a group of friends when the craziness of the Old Port isn’t what you’re after. At the top of the Hill, Bar Lola offers higher class and a pricey menu, while across the street the Front Room — which doubles as one of the best, best priced and most popular breakfast and brunch joints in town — is full of more casual patrons, as well as the local sports fans who are perfectly happy with the small television in the corner. The Front Room does dinner as well, competing with the popular Blue Spoon, which offers a smaller, classier setting and better service.
The Hilltop Coffee Shop, which brews Coffee by Design, usually has a throng of people (and dogs) relaxing on the bench outside, and the Laundromat is clean, decently priced and friendly, though the owners have been known to preach.
Parking is usually easy, except for Sunday and Monday nights when everyone fights for one side: parking is banned from one side of the street from 8 am until noon on Mondays and Tuesdays. You’ll almost always get a ticket if you forget, and if the city is plowing or street-sweeping that morning, you’ll have to pay $65 to get yourself out of the impound lot.
Most of the Munjoy Hill neighborhood is residential, and a majority of the buildings are three-unit multi-family residences. Rent is comparable to the rest of Portland, running $800-$1,000 for a two-bedroom unit.
The Hill is no longer a dangerous place to live. The neighbors are friendly, the shops and restaurants welcoming and the community feel is strong. It even seems brighter up here, somehow, than the dark, brick-lined West End and downtown neighborhoods, and because it’s surrounded on three sides by the water, it stays breezy and cool in the summer, when the rest of Portland is sweltering.
It’s Sunday morning, and my neighbors are out — a flock of children are running down the street carrying sleds; a dressed-up couple is carefully avoiding the slush as they walk toward the Front Room; and the old woman next door is standing on the sidewalk, shovel in hand, talking to the hunched-over old man and his labradoodle. From my first-floor windows, I can see the ocean. I can see my neighbors. I can see the new, revamped Munjoy Hill.
Sarah Trent is a student at the University of Southern Maine, where she writes for the Free Press. This semester she will serve as the executive editor for the campus newspaper.