A collection of essays about life in Castine, Maine and environs written by writer and educator Todd R. Nelson. During his six years as principal of the Adams School in Castine, and twenty year relationship with the Blue Hill peninsula, Nelson wrote frequently for Maine Public Radio, The Christian Science Monitor, Bangor Daily News, Maine Times, Bangor Metro, and other state and national publications. This book is a collection of those writings.

A Must-Read for any Mainer . . . or anyone who dreams of becoming a Mainer. Giving up a life in Chicago, Todd R. Nelson moved with his family to the stark contrasts of Castine, Maine. What began as a leap of faith turned into a family epoch of wonderful activity, professional and personal development, an unlimited inspiration, hard work and struggle, friendship and enchantment. "What lucky fools,"Nelson writes in his introduction. Cold Spell is a collection of stories--warm, humorous, and at times cautionary--about living in Maine. Here are stories about the seasons, the critters, the neighbors, the land itself, and the community that Nelson calls home.

columns about teaching writing in middle school from a veteran teacher and school principal.

Constructivist learning projects make for the best days at school--for both students and teachers. Here are stories of those days of epic learning.

This collection is incomplete. It is also impossible to complete; perhaps undesirable to complete. So these vignettes will have to stand for so much more. Perhaps, like other stories in this genre, they will inaugurate your own echoes and paths of recollection in your family. I hope so.

Christmas is about stories. For my friend Jonathan, it is A Child's Christmas in Wales, by Dylan Thomas, and the family tradition of reading it aloud on Christmas Eve. He passed it on to me. For me, it is about the story that each Christmas tree tells, the tradition of adding train cars to the model railroad, and the etchings in the family table. I'm passing them on to you.

Maine Public Radio commentaries, written and broadcast between 1998 and 2008, by writer and educator Todd R. Nelson.