Five years after the recession hit the national economy, anecdotal reports from Island businesses say the local economy is slowly creeping back to normal. Businesses are reporting slightly improved summer seasons, with higher traffic to the Island, especially in August.

Vineyard local restaurants began serving locally harvested blue mussels in July and the prospects for the future look even better. Alec Gale of the Menemsha Fish House said he was pleased with the results. The last of the locally harvested blue mussels were shipped this week but there may be more.

An orchestrated commotion runs the length of Circuit avenue playing the music of summer. Strolling clusters of tourists plan their days as they negotiate the narrow sidewalks, crowd open-air eateries and ice cream shops, hold debates over T-shirts and people-watch from storefront benches. All the while cars crawl up the street stopping and starting.

She is a modern-day Aphrodite. Maternity nurse, wife, Chappaquiddicker and open land advocate, Nancy Hugger has designed and lives a life dedicated to fostering nature and beauty.

On most summer days, Nancy begins her mornings in her large Chappaquiddick garden where she grows everything from lettuce and borage to peaches and plums. This particularly hot summer day is no different. She has spent the morning alternating between weeding lettuce beds and tending 120 or so new asparagus plants and cooling off in the heart-shaped pond her husband Skip Bettencourt made for her.