50 Comments
User's avatar
Pranay Somayajula's avatar

this was absolutely incredible, maybe my favorite thing you’ve written ❤️❤️

Expand full comment
charlie squire's avatar

tysm pranay!! 💌

Expand full comment
Tasha Schumann's avatar

Looking out at the Toronto snow and thinking about New England snow and about moose as plural entities now 😌🤍 thanks for this

Expand full comment
Hāns's avatar

One of the things in my toolkit for depressive episodes, has been to put my finger on a map - ANYwhere, then research where my finger landed. The distraction being the therapy.... spiriting me away. THIS piece of writing was like doing that: in words, emotions, social history..... a viscerally vicarious feel for place.... thank you. I feel deliciously informed

Expand full comment
K Barnes's avatar

Can’t stop rereading it. Such a powerfully evocative string of images and observations, so swiftly and lightly brushed that this reader is stunned by the real 1-2 punch, once done. My thanks to whomever forwarded this to me.

Expand full comment
charlie squire's avatar

thank you so much :’)

Expand full comment
rayne fisher-quann's avatar

this is amazing charlie!! Also one of my fav things you’ve written <3

Expand full comment
charlie squire's avatar

thank you rayne!! solidarity from the northest of north americans :)

Expand full comment
skyler's avatar

as a lifetime new englander who voluntarily fled to CA to escape cold family and cold climate, just to ache for familiarity, this hits the spot.

Expand full comment
Alan's avatar

This was so good. So much of it spoke into existence things that I've known my whole life, but never really stopped to think about. I also appreciate the stark honesty with which you write. Stay awesome.

Expand full comment
Jelly Weasel's avatar

This was such a beautiful thing to read. I’ve never been to new england, but i felt it so strongly. I’d read thousands of pages of this

Expand full comment
taylor's avatar

there is something different here that shapes people into the way they are more so than anywhere else in the world it feels like. I’ve been trapped in western massachusetts since the day I was born but more often these days I feel grateful for how it’s formed and is forming me. thank you for writing this Charlie, it makes the stupid town I live in feel special

Expand full comment
Emery's avatar

i'm gonna end up reading this twenty more times. i'd love to move far far away but i think i'd implode if i left new england.

Expand full comment
asha's avatar

this is beautiful. i’m bad at descriptors but this is so good.

Expand full comment
mac's avatar

strange how most of this is very unfamiliar to me, as someone from central appalachia, and still yet, so familiar.

Expand full comment
Kathy's avatar

‘A terrible beauty…’ - W.B. Yeats

Brava! Charlie Squires! Brava!

Expand full comment
Mo's avatar

jesus christ i love new england

Expand full comment
laura's avatar

babe wake up evil female posted

Expand full comment
charlie squire's avatar

:0 <3

Expand full comment
moira's avatar

the last paragraph is incredible. you write so well wow

Expand full comment