I see you Gus in the eyes of the Snowy Owl as it wings by windshield high

On July 4 at the Tabernacle, I joined two dozen neighbors in reading Frederick Douglass’ speech, What, to the Slave, Is the Fourth of July, which he delivered on July 5, 1852 in Rochester, N.Y.

After a jolly family supper at my daughter's, I strolled home down a dirt road at twilight.

The Lost Letters from Martha’s Vineyard by Michael Callahan, Mariner Books 2024, 304 pages, $30.

It was one of those days that had me wishing the pain others carry didn’t touch me so deeply. Driving along a beach road, the scent of rosa rugosa infusing the breezes, the pain in our world began to ebb.

A few years ago, I was chatting with my mother, who is now 97, at her house on Menemsha Pond in Chilmark. At that point, the egrets on the Pond and her dog Lizzie were her principal interests.