He calls families little monasteries, with children as their great Zen masters; she compares families to a laboratory, an ever-changing joyful puzzle. He is one of the country’s best known meditation and mindfulness gurus; she, a childbirth educator and environmental advocate. Together, Jon and Myla Kabat-Zinn authored a groundbreaking book on family health and happiness called Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting.

“Whose underwear is this?” asks artist Betty Wolfson with a laugh.

“Usually I ask permission to photograph and then paint someone’s laundry line, but I didn’t get the chance when I snapped this one somewhere in Vineyard Haven. Now I’m hoping the owner will recognize her silky panties and step forward.” Surely the unknown laundry-hanger will do so if she happens to see the poster painting for Let It All Hang Out, when Featherstone Center for The Arts presents works this Sunday by the North Hampton and Oak Bluffs artist.

Verdi on Middle Road? You wouldn’t think anything almost subversively original in the arts could possibly be percolating up this country road. You think you might come upon a corn patch or a pen of prized goats, but not a synthesis of dance, theatre and opera combining Broadway actors, celebrated choreographers and, well, Verdi.

Sharon Robinson, author of Stealing Home, a memoir of her family life with baseball dad Jackie Robinson, held court last Friday at what’s becoming the Island’s clubhouse, The Oyster Bar & Grill. From weddings to fundraisers, the trendy eatery at the top of Circuit avenue in Oak Bluffs, with high wooden booths and brown satin curtains that put you in mind of Renoir and absinthe-sippers, has hosted a string of special events. This past Friday it was the scene of Ms. Robinson’s talk, the third in a NAACP series of summer luncheons.

Susanna, a Neopolitan countess of the early 1800s, has a segreto, a secret: she smokes. Her husband, Count Gil, an obsessively jealous man — but a perfectly nice fellow in every other way — sniffs tobacco in the palace and draws a logical but preposterous conclusion: Susanna is having an affair with a man who smokes. The pair is at loggerheads, and more than willing to sing about it, courtesy of the great Enrico Wolf-Ferrari. Thus unravels the 15-minute intermezzo comic opera, Il Segretto di Susanna, to the merriment of all.