'Like living on an actual ship'

"Northeaster' (on the Maine Coast), by Winslow Homer.

"Northeaster' (on the Maine Coast), by Winslow Homer.

“Say the words ‘New England,’ and one person will think of a white church spire and a village green; another will see a covered  bridge or the Vermont hills in autumn; and still another will conjure up a farm along the Connecticut River. For me, the words evoke the sounds and smells of the sea, and the storms and fogs that make life along the New England coast a good deal like living on an actual ship, subject to the whims of the weather.’’

Nathaniel Benchley, in “The Sea,’’ in New England: The Four Seasons.