When my mother and father met they were working at the same department store in our town; she on the fourth floor in girdles and bras and he in the mezzanine in sports equipment. She bought a baseball glove for her brother from him and was shocked when on the same bus going home that night there was the tall handsome salesman.

As recent lengthy obituaries in national newspapers attest, Anthony Lewis was a remarkable journalist. What always struck me most about his writing was the clarity of his thinking, the forcefulness of his prose and the directness of his voice. A legal journalist and columnist for The New York Times, he made the complicated decisions of the United States Supreme Court understandable to lawyers and non-lawyers alike.

As a painter, Pablo Picasso had nothing on me. Sure, he had a Blue Period, but it lasted only three years. My Blue Period has lasted almost 25 years. Every time I’ve had a painting project it’s made me blue, which is the color of the master bedroom and the adjoining bathroom.

Ray Hopper died the day our first child was born. It wasn’t a natural death, or a peaceful death. At the time Ray was the husband of the storekeeper and he had a daily ritual. He would load his antique dueling pistol and his muzzle-loading rifle, roll up a couple of dog-haired, dust-bunnied, washashore joints and head out looking for deer. His route was exactly the same every day, so when he did not show up by dark, the island went looking for him. They found him, still warm, with his much-loved antique guns, pack, wallet and one joint neatly stacked on a rock nearby.