Commentary
See the cellar’s Copper bottom Turn the house Into a ship
Sometimes a person is awakened from a dream by the very thing he is dreaming about. For some veterans I know, the deafening chop-chop of helicopter blades takes them back to Viet Nam. For us, the din of the blades and the intensity of lights so bright they bathe the island in daylight means someone is in trouble.
The rain that fell last week
pounding against the skylights and windows
should have been snow,
whispering the secret of Winter.
But here we are,
Only Islanders — all Islanders everywhere — can truly know the ordeal of coming and going from their sheltered grounds to the mainland with its big-box stores, opera houses and airports.
If a contest exists to measure the misery quotient of such a trip from Island to city and back again, I’d like to enter my recent ordeal as a perfect example of the worst of all time.
The Vineyard waterfront community lost a friend last week. Michael J. Syslo, 60, of Chilmark was always at the bow when it came to the biology of lobsters and the science that goes with the waterfront.
When word of his death last Tuesday, Jan. 29, reached the Island, the news passed quickly by phone and by word of mouth. The waterfront community is close. Everyone agreed; Mike was too young to be crossing the bar.
The other day I was watching the umpteenth news item about how the flu bug is everywhere. Midway through the story I think I may have missed a crucial piece of information because the dry cough I’ve so far endured for every single day of 2013 decided to go into its impersonation of a garbage disposal and drowned out my TV. I’m not sure what triggered the cough. Maybe it was brought on by multi-tasking. There I was watching the TV at low volume, half listening to Chopin on an iPod and admiring a print of a Modigliani painting on our office wall.