Ben McCanna, Staff Photographer, Portland Press Herald

I woke up this morning to no power and no heat for the second time in two weeks. A Nor’easter snowstorm hit the Maine coast and knocked out the power again (last time it was an ice storm).

Despite what you may have heard about Maine, my experience of winter in Portland isn’t much different from my last home in suburban Boston. This was another mild winter. But the spring has been vicious, and the trees and the wires aren’t getting along right now.

I had a Zoom call scheduled with an author client about his book idea, and that required me to be able to see documents and connect. I couldn’t do that on a phone. I was supposed to meet a few people in Cambridge, Mass. tomorrow anway. So I made a hotel reservation in Massachusetts and carefully drove down here in the snow. My car is wet. My feet are wet. My pants are wet.

I did the client call in socks and pajama pants. If you wear a shirt, they’ll never know.

He needed help and I helped. He was on the wrong track, now he’s on the right track. For that 90 minutes or so, all I cared about was him and his book. It was fantastic and fulfilling. It always is.

Everyone who loves their work has a story like this — about some sort of beyond-what’s-expected thing they did to get into position to just do their job for the customer, and how it was all worth it.

If that’s not you, what would it take to get a job that would make you feel that way?

I sure hope the people working for Central Maine Power feel this way.