MISQUOTED

Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

Maybe you have had this experience: a reporter from one of the local newspapers calls you and asks your opinion about something — for example, how you’re finding this season — is it slow, is it strong, whatever? Maybe you are even flattered that you’re being asked. And maybe you’re naive enough to think that whatever you candidly say will not be distorted.

Here we stand at the beginning of August, the maw of summer where the maelstrom of Vineyard life swallows us whole each year. Instead of the mythical long lazy days of summer we all secretly hunger for, we are faced with the prospect of plunging into the morass of fund-raisers, silent auctions, galas and champagne receptions. It is August, the season of flaring tempers, traffic jams and major event overload. August, the month that requires a wall-mounted dry erase board, a date planner, a Blackberry and at least one personal assistant to keep it all straight.

At a dinner party recently, I listened as the person next to me answered my standard dinner party question: what brought you to the Vineyard?

The response: “I wanted to go someplace where I could walk a little slower.”

It made me stop and think.

I myself am a fast walker. And this time of year, I walk on the street because the sidewalks are clogged with summertime dawdlers and packs of window shoppers. They slow me down.

Island Baseball

The big turnout for the Cape Cod Baseball League game held two weeks ago at the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School is strong evidence that the league and Vineyard baseball enthusiasts should seriously explore creating a league team for the Island, or moving a league team here.

Shine a Light

On an Island where the dire lack of low and moderately priced housing is a perennial issue, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission is right to require a public hearing on an affordable housing proposal from the developers of the Field Club in Edgartown.

Sheriff’s Meadow: Tracking the Future

This has been a painful summer for the Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation, the venerable Island conservation organization that was rocked at the outset of the season by the revelation that two of its signature sanctuaries had been dug up by an Island landscaper who was transporting native plants to a private property on the West Tisbury North Shore.