Commentary
The H.M.S. Bounty which sank in the waters off Cape Hatteras during Hurricane Sandy on Monday, was an occasional visitor to the Vineyard. When she was home ported in Fall River in the 1990s, she made a number of 40-mile trips to Vineyard Haven, where she would spend the weekend tied up at the Tisbury Wharf, her gangway lowered to allow sailors of all ages aboard.
Forever in our memories
Will be the house once surrounded by trees
Remember the day in 1970
Dad built a home for his young family
Where no other houses could be found
Just Aunt Louise’s who was always around
A place for his family to live until grown
A place where memories would be sown
A time when the neighborhood was good
A time when we knew where our home stood
A time when dad was still alive
A time when dad could still drive
A time when mom was happy and free
Every two years, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission reviews its standards and criteria for developments of regional impact — commonly referred to as the DRI checklist. This is the list of thresholds that delineate which development applications towns must refer to the MVC for possible DRI review prior to towns approving or denying the applications. Last week, the commission released its proposed revisions to the current checklist and invites public comment before adopting the changes.
These proposals come out of an in-depth review of the checklist that started last year.
Every once in a while, a trap door opens and another world of knowledge and experience disappears forever. Or almost. We’ve all seen it happen with the passing of a friend — particularly those friends who have been so curious about their surroundings that they unearthed wonders and made their patch of ground seem as exotic as any place on earth. The Vineyard just lost such a man, Preston Gray Harris, who many of us knew as P.G.
As I write this from afar, I can picture the long tables in the Chilmark Community Center, the town clerk’s volunteers overseeing voter check-in and the old oak box where voters deposit their ballots. It’s a long way from where I sit now, in a bustling, fluorescent-lit campaign office in Seattle where we are working to defend the state’s marriage equality law on the Washington ballot this November.
My absentee ballot has already been stamped and mailed.
You’d think with all the technology taking over our lives we would understand more about our surroundings and stumble over them less. But since we are all looking down at some device most of the time, with earbuds keeping out all distracting sounds of humanity, it’s little wonder we don’t crash a tea party or fall down a rabbit hole every so often. I suppose an even bigger distraction now are cyber security threats that could compromise our way of living, zap the national electrical grid and empty our bank accounts.