I have spent the better part of the last year trying to gently (and okay, sometimes not so gently) convince my mother that perhaps it is time to hand her car keys over. When her car died last summer, I was so relieved and thought the issue took care of itself. In the city this past winter, she learned to use Uber to get to appointments and ordered her groceries online.

But on the Island, where she has been coming since she was a child, it is different. Painting is her passion. I remember as a child watching her draw on the back of envelopes when we were riding the subway because she saw someone’s profile she had to record. She would rummage in her old worn leather purse for whatever she could find to draw on and with. The Vineyard landscapes captivate her the same way. She is a plein air painter and drives to different spots — depending on the light, the wind, the time of day — using the back of her car as a mobile studio. Most recently (past 10 years plus), her muse has been Menemsha, and the lights and darks that are created when the summer sun hits the pilot house of the Little Lady.

The Little Lady is not in the water this summer, thanks to the efforts of the Martha’s Vineyard Fisherman’s Preservation Trust and the campaign to restore the historical boat (built in 1929) to become an educational tool for the Island community. But Menemsha still beckons. And so, my mother, with no help from me, has gotten herself another car, and is now driving to her regular spot along the channel to continue to record the beauty she sees around her.

Today I followed her to a new painting spot (the light was not right in Menemsha) and helped her set up under the canopy of a sweet tree which protected her from mist that started falling. As when we were in the subway, I saw the moment her eyes locked on the image she wanted to capture, and I had barely secured the canvas to her easel before her loaded brush touched the surface and began wayfinding. I and the rest of the world disappeared as she started to paint.

As I drove away, I realized, my mom as a driver is not the problem. She is careful and solid on the road. I fear for her safety because of other drivers on this laden summer Island. The speed at which vehicles careen down South Road contradicts what I presume to be their purpose in being here: to slow down, to look around, to relax, to appreciate the beauty of the landscape.

The Island of my childhood was one that was safe for my grandfather who liked to drive at a crawl and talk to us about the historical homes in Chilmark, often slowing almost to a stop and gesturing, turning to the backseat to make a point to us. He too was an artist and found the world captivating and something more than a thruway to a destination. While the days of a driving history lesson are over, perhaps some of the folks trying to get so fast from here to there might want to sit next to my mom while she paints and learn how to be still, to see light and dark, form and line, to notice details and color, to feel which direction the wind is coming from and to appreciate the beauty of the landscape.

Liz McGhee lives in Chilmark.