Young drivers on Martha’s Vineyard would benefit by having a traffic light to negotiate. Traffic lights are a mainland reality, and we should make sure our children are prepared to encounter them. I always thought that the blinker intersection would be a great place for a traffic light, but it looks like a roundabout is going in there. Could we consider installing a light at the intersection of State Road and Edgartown Road in Vineyard Haven? No one seems happy with that intersection.

Things have changed in our quiet, country neighborhood since the new, taller, bigger White-Lynch asphalt tower was built at Goodale’s ever-expanding pit. We are awakened to the asphalt plant machinery at 4 a.m. Black soot, spewing from the tower, stains our roof. Sensitive Vineyard wildlife habitat is placed at risk and destroyed. More trees have been cut and thrown on the side of the road. Machine guns echo through our neighborhood from the free-for-all firing range allowed at Goodale’s pit.

This past Memorial Day commemorated the 20th year of our Avenue of Flags at Oak Grove Cemetery in Tisbury. We started with 50 flags; we now proudly fly 425. Each flag represents a male or female veteran who served in the military, living or deceased. These flags are raised and taken down each Memorial Day, Fourth of July and Veterans Day by a group of dedicated volunteers. The time has taken its toll and we will need to start to replace some of these flags.

I was filled with deep joy and appreciation when I read the article Students Lead Conversation On Race, Diversity, Tolerance in your May 25 edition. Discussing issues of race, diversity and tolerance in an open and caring way allows for healing the wounds caused by race and other forms of discrimination, oppression and exclusion, and develops empathy.

Like a teenager who seems to grow a foot overnight, change has a way of coming slowly, then presenting itself all at once.

West Tisbury, the town that has been the symbol of the Vineyard’s agricultural heritage for hundreds of years, has been absorbing population steadily since the 1970s, but seems suddenly to have lost some of its rural character.

West Tisbury at a Crossroad

Like a teenager who seems to grow a foot overnight, change has a way of coming slowly, then presenting itself all at once.

West Tisbury, the town that has been the symbol of the Vineyard’s agricultural heritage for hundreds of years, has been absorbing population steadily since the 1970s, but seems suddenly to have lost some of its rural character.

It often begins with tears, the dropping off of a young child at preschool. In the classroom it is the little boy or girl whose tears flow. Later, in the car, it is mom or even dad who cries, the strongest of souls moved to mush at this new beginning. The end, high school graduation, is so far away at that moment as to seem impossible. But as every parent knows, it all goes by so fast.