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Here we are at Memorial Day weekend, our unofficial start of summer.

In towns and cities around Maine, thousands will attend parades and offer prayers. Wreaths will be set up for memorial ceremonies. There will be calls to honor and remember the men and women in our military, and most businesses will close on Monday to give their employees time to be with their families. There will also be plenty of picnics and barbecues, making Memorial Day a mixed time of remembrance and togetherness.

I’ve attended dozens of Memorial Day events over the years, starting in my teens with my high school’s marching band. I’ve covered events in Lewiston, Oxford and lots of other places. Some of the most moving events I attended were at the Buckfield Village Cemetery, where generations of families are buried and where townspeople take enormous care in placing flags and flowers at gravesides.

There is a tremendous sense of community that comes from standing together in gratitude.

Thank you to all who are organizing events this weekend, and my condolences to those who have lost a loved one in military service. And for those of you who have served, like my husband, I thank you deeply for your service.

Please share this newsletter with family members and friends. They can sign up on our website to have it delivered to their own inbox each Saturday.

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The following stories are from other newsrooms. While The Maine Monitor does not place its content behind a paywall, some newsrooms we link to below may. Paywalled stories are followed by a ($). We encourage you to consider supporting local Maine newsrooms.

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Maine libraries are still grappling with the loss of $35 million in grant funding, a year after the federal government canceled the Digital Equity Act | Public News Service

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Tribal language revitalization efforts receive boost with funding | Quoddy Tides

Drought conditions across the much of the state continue to improve thanks to spring rains | WMTW

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UMaine System trustees approved a 4 percent tuition increase as part of the next budget | Spectrum News Maine

Have feedback, a correction or know of something we should look into? Send it to our newsroom. You can reach Monitor Local editor Judith Meyer directly via email:  judy@themainemonitor.org. 

The Maine Monitor is a publication of the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, an independent and nonpartisan nonprofit news organization that produces investigative journalism. We believe news is a public good and keep our news free to access. We have no paywall and do not charge for our newsletters. If you value the reporting we do for Maine, please consider making a donation! We cannot do this reporting without your support.

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