Oak Bluffs have you no pride? This is a town that depends on tourism and yet our beaches are a mess. Even on a good year they are covered with unsightly seaweed.

To get into shape for my upcoming wedding in May, I joined the YMCA. On one of my first visits, I stepped off the treadmill, stumbled over my brand new gym shoes and fell with a loud thwack! against a nearby piece of equipment. I assured the gathering crowd that I was okay.

Last weekend, I had the pleasure of experiencing the new complimentary bus service to Boston. It is a perk that comes with the purchase of a round-trip ticket on the Seastreak fast ferry to New Bedford. The bus meets the Seastreak ferry in New Bedford and proceeds nonstop to South Station in Boston.

It’s the busy season. We all know and feel it. What do we love about this Island? We love that even in June, on a Saturday, we as a community find time to honor accomplishments and celebrate!

A giant thank you to Islandwide emergency personnel for greeting the state champion Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School boys’ tennis team in such a special way on Saturday evening.

Thank you to the Tisbury police department and officer in the school, Scott Ogden, for an amazing Bike Rodeo at the Tisbury School on Saturday, June 15. Dozens of students came with their families and passed the safety course. Many received new helmets donated by the police department along with free backpacks, hotdogs and hamburgers cooked by their principal John Custer.

For almost a third of my life I was a world traveler. I kept a journal from every trip I took and made an album of all the places I went. I visited over 25 countries, and I tried to bring home a souvenir from each — everything from a Japanese yukata to a stone found on the Great Wall of China. I have a bow and arrows I bought from a Sanjo boy in Tanzania, sand from the Sahara and an Alpaca blanket from Peru. A small rug from Morocco is on my bedroom floor and I drink my morning coffee from a small mug I bought in Wales.