Commentary
The other day, on a wet and chilly morning, I suggested to my daughter Pickle, recently turned three, that she wear a coat for going outside. Giving my children suggestions about what clothes to wear has been an ongoing battle for me ever since I became a parent. That at age eight I chose to wear the same green T-shirt every day for an entire summer mocks me from my past.
Handing Off for Life
There will be burgers, pancakes and silly stunts — people wearing crazy hats, walking backwards, eating s’mores and collecting playing cards around the track of the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, hoping for a winning hand by lap five. It is the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life, and the poker run lap is apt, for every day involves high stakes when you find yourself in the casino of cancer.
BANISH BIGOTRY
Editors, Vineyard Gazette:
I was dismayed to read about the anti-immigrant blog that is spreading poison about our Brazilian Islanders. I hope our Brazilian immigrants know that you are most welcome on Martha’s Vineyard. All of you whom I have met are hardworking, honest people, who are also warm and easy to talk to. It has been a pleasure to get to know you, and I believe the vast majority of Islanders feel the same.
Oprah Winfrey’s show on May 4 honored the Freedom Riders on the 50th anniversary of their historic bus ride to desegregate public areas in the South.
Thirteen young people, many students, both black and white, boarded two Greyhound buses in Washington, D.C., on May 4, 1961 with the goal of riding to New Orleans. They were organized by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).
One day last month close to five inches of rain fell on Martha’s Vineyard. In Chilmark alone it caused a five-foot wide, four-foot deep sinkhole on State Road, the collapse of a two culverts and the dirt road to Lucy Vincent Beach, the collapse of an old granite bridge and the closure of South Road near the Allen Farm due to an impassable puddle.
Suddenly it’s flooding everywhere, all over the world — and it’s no fluke.
A long time ago, in another life, I recall how my stomach cringed when I heard a colleague saying, “Oh, I have all the Macs and the O’s. How is anyone supposed to teach them math?”