Give me a New York minute: I need to find my formal flannel

I read Cindy Adams’s column Sunday in the New York Post regarding her vacation in Maine and just shrugged it off as another person from away making fun of our beloved Vacationland.

“Some folks just don’t get it,” I thought, and exited the website.

I wouldn’t say Adams’s column, "My summer vacation in 'polite,' 'friendly,' 'inexpensive' Maine,"  is breaking the internet, but it seems to be having a moment. After seeing multiple references to it today online, I felt I, too, must comment.

In the beginning of the piece she uses a bunch of one and two word exclamations to describe Maine: “Clean. Airy. Fresh. Ocean. Shoreline. Beaches. Open sky. Green. Trees. Lighthouses. Boats. Harbors. Coastlines. No litter. No trash. It’s polite. Friendly. Inexpensive. Seafood.”

Not bad. I like the place I live being thought of as clean, polite and friendly; and airy and fresh are kind of like bonuses.

But then, she gives us Mainers a kick in the behind.

“Realtors could establish an entire campsite on the average ass,” she said.

And if one butt joke wasn’t enough, later on she states in her fashion comments, “Fishing? Great. Fashion? Forget it. There’s not enough fabric on NYC’s Seventh Avenue to cover any local behind. Mainers consider flannel formal.”

I think she might be projecting a bit, because later on in the column she says that she wouldn’t go up to the top of the Portland Observatory with its “millions of steps” and would wait until an escalator was installed. Why is she butt-shaming us? You’re certainly not going to get buns of steel if you think stairs are too exhausting.

And who’s to say the butts she allegedly saw were Maine tushes? Old Orchard Beach swells from about 9,000 to 75,000 people in the summer. That’s a lot of out-of-state, and out-of-the-country, behinds.

Adams muses that Mainers must bathe in beer. I’m going to take that as a back-handed compliment. Beer is great for your hair. If you don’t believe me, do a Google shopping search and see how many beer shampoo products there are.

Back to fashion. Apparently, Adams thinks we don’t have any.

 “Forget shopping. Skirts, necklaces, socks, ties, footwear, knife-pressed longpants went out with the first settlers. L.L. Bean jeans, drawers, plaid shirts, crappy sweaters, sweats, sneakers and backpacks are considered black tie,” she said.

I have to admit, I had to look up what knife-pressed pants were. I do own a few skirts and necklaces, and I think I saw my husband wear a tie a couple of times. I’m not sure what she means by drawers – if she means underwear, I must be a true Mainer, because I wear underwear every day. Maybe she means the elastic waist gym shorts I’m wearing right now that have never seen a gym.

But there are a few things that make me question whether Adams is a credible source of information. She didn’t use any vacation photos. The photos with the piece were indeed very nice photos of Maine, but they were Getty Images taken in July, a month before her alleged trip.

Does she not know how to use a cell phone or iPad camera? Did all the junk in people’s trunks crowd the photos she took and make them unsuitable for publication?

And then there’s the use of the phrase “down coast,” which she interprets to mean “far north.” I’ve lived in Maine since 1999 and have never heard that term. Does she mean “down east?” If she does, she sounds like that uncool parent who is trying to keep up with their teenager’s lingo and just doesn’t quite get it.

And well, being a nice Mainer I wasn’t going to mention this, but because she made me feel ashamed that I have more than one flannel shirt in my closet, I will.

“There’s yachts, boat restaurants, great food,” she wrote. Umm, it should be “there are.” They teach grammar in school here in Maine. Plus, Word has a spelling and grammar checker. They do have that in New York, right?

In closing, because Maine is such a friendly place, I’d like to invite Ms. Adams out for a cup of coffee, cocktail or ice cream cone if she ever comes to Maine. I just ask her to give me a heads up, so I can go wash up in some beer and press my best flannel – the one that hides my derriere.

Publisher Liz Gotthelf can be reached at newsdesk@sacobaynews.com.