Norman Bridwell, who died last week at 86, was living proof that there really are no absolutes in life, and that especially includes rejection. The story has been told a hundred times.

In a 2014 essay, Mark Lovewell writes about his father John S. Lovewell, who died on Saturday, Nov. 25, at the age of 96.

I lasted six months without a truck. Now I have two. One of them seems fit for travel off the Island. The other does not.

At a recent event at the Katharine Cornell Theatre I was crowned Martha’s Vineyard poet laureate, succeeding Lee McCormack. I was given a two-year term, a plastic laurel wreath and a toga.

My son’s birthday lands near Halloween, and when he was eight and nine and probably even ten and eleven, for his party I would line our whole deck with pumpkins.

Bless the poet/with the chickens/Bless the woman wracked/with pain