In 2008, friends said I mustn’t visit Syria. It was much too dangerous. But I wanted to see the walled Old City of Damascus.

Calendars have been telling us since March 21 that spring is here, but most calendars hang on walls or are perched on desks indoors.

I am addicted to snow. Sadly, I missed the best part of it on the Vineyard because I was stranded in Rhode Island by the winds that canceled Vineyard ferries.

'Twas Christmas Eve and Santa Claus was readying for his trip to see his Vineyard friends, of course, but traveling not by ship, nor ferry boat nor freight boat nor on the Island Queen. He comes by air each Christmastide thanks to his reindeer team.

Shirley Mayhew’s affectionate recollections of West Tisbury chronicle the years from 1947, when she arrived as a bride to a community of 239 residents, to 2013, when the book was written.

Autumn is not my favorite season. And not because it signals the end of summer swimming and sailing, or because it presages the cold weather. For me it’s just that fall’s vibrant colors — the glowing golds and startling crimsons — mark an end rather than a sunny beginning.