It is blissfully quiet this moment, except for the drone of the Harbor Patrol boat in Edgartown Harbor. I am sitting, at this minute, on the veranda of my friends’ home overlooking that harbor.
Yesterday, I arrived on Martha’s Vineyard. I am here for awhile, that while yet undetermined. My friends, Jeffrey and Joyce, own the Edgartown Bookstore. About six weeks ago, reading “All The Light We Cannot See,” a book I purchased last year at their bookstore, it occurred to me they might need some help at the beginning of the season. So I volunteered. And here I am.
Yesterday, I left the cottage and had a giddy thought. If I should decide not to teach in the fall, after the Vineyard, there is no place I have to be for the rest of my life. It was both liberating and frightening. I felt like my head was filled with helium. I have acknowledged, at last, I am adrift in the world and that the boundaries I am now setting are the ones of my own choosing and no one else’s.
I took a picture of the rhododendron as I left the house.
I
As I also took a picture of the creek before I left.
As I was sitting in my car on the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard, Jeffrey texted me: don’t eat! They also own “Behind the Bookstore,” a restaurant that has a great reputation on the island. We were treated to a tasting course of everything on the dinner menu and dinner service begins tonight. It was all extraordinary, with the exception of the sweet pea gnocchi, which is still a work in progress.
The young chef is fresh out of Chez Panisse in Berkley, Alice Waters’ signature restaurant.
Tonight, after my first day in the bookstore, where I did my best to earn my keep, I am sipping a martini and looking at Edgartown harbor and thinking how fortunate I am to have this experience.
I am enjoying the moment.
Unbelievably but not perhaps unpredictably, Donald Trump has cinched the number of delegates he needs to be nominated. I am appalled and don’t want to think about it. So I am enjoying my view.
Let’s admit it. I am scared to death if he wins the election. Scarred to death. He has no credible credentials to be President of the United States. And I must decide if I will engage in this fall’s election to defeat him or stay on the sidelines and pray to all the gods in all the universes. I suspect I will do my best to defeat him.
But Hillary! As we were driving to “Behind The Bookstore” last night, Jeffrey said, and rightly, that there was no problem that the Clintons couldn’t make worse.
And it is so effing true. They stumble into things and don’t claim responsibility and just manage to make things worse and worse and worse. And the polls are showing that Hillary could lose to The Donald.
Oh my! Lions and tigers and bears… Oh my!
I am going to focus on the moment right now. I have to. I am sitting on a veranda on Martha’s Vineyard, looking out on Edgartown Harbor, calm and peaceful. The storm may be about to erupt on our heads but not tonight. I will savor tonight because not to do so would be foolish.
Letter from Claverack 07 22 2017 Still in the land of off, praying for souls…
July 22, 2017It is Saturday afternoon; I am sitting where I have been sitting every afternoon since arriving on Martha’s Vineyard, on the veranda of my friends’ home, gazing out at the harbor, listening to the sound of boats motoring. There is almost no wind and so the sailboats, if moving at all, are using their motors.
It was early that I woke this morning, nudged into wakefulness by a text on my phone. A second text banished sleep and I laid in bed and read the NY Times, edging into the day with the Food section. Hard news seemed too much for the early hour.
Joining my friend, Jeffrey, we went over to Behind the Bookstore to pick up some things to take to their outpost up in Vineyard Haven where Igor made me a powerful coffee drink with a hint of lavender. Back at BTB with some needed ice, I soothed the caffeine edge with a mimosa.
Now, I am back in my favorite spot, reading science fiction short stories before starting the mystery I purchased at Edgartown Books this morning, “Moriarity,” about which I had read good things earlier in the year. Yesterday, I finished a trifle of a mystery just before a marathon nap.
Jeffrey calls this the “land of off.” It is; I am very “off.” It is a comfortable house in both physical terms and the graciousness of my hosts. As I wandered into the kitchen to make myself a sandwich, I appreciated that.
Later in the day, I looked at the news and winced. Today’s twitter storm seemed to be all about our President telling the world that he absolutely has a right to pardon anyone he wants, including himself.
Witnessing these things results in some attitude I have yet to describe, a mélange of incoherence, amusement, fear, incredulity and amazement. There must be a word for it somewhere.
A friend forwarded me an article today; it is a portrait of the man who is leading a prayer group that includes most of our President’s cabinet. It seems he believes God only hears the prayers of Christians. My friend is Jewish. Her only comment: Oy!
I concur.
Sean Spicer left the building yesterday, resigning after the elevation of Scaramucci to the office of White House Communications Director, a move with which Spicer had vehemently disagreed. But he was named and Spicer left, replaced by Sarah Huckabee Sanders. It is hoped Melissa McCarthy can do as good a job with her as she did with “Spicey.”
The NY Times published a scathing, oh, really scathing article called, “The Mooch and the Mogul.” You can read it here.
Googling for an article that praised Scaramucci’s appointment, I found little. The closest was this, an article in Forbes, by Nathan Vardi. You can read that here. It’s not that great but best to be found. Apparently, the NY Times called him “the mooch” because that’s his nickname on Wall Street.
Meanwhile, Congress has put together a package of sanctions against Russia that our president is not going to like. It has broad bi-partisan support. Imagine that?! Insiders think the president won’t veto it despite how much he dislikes it.
John Heard, the father in the “Home Alone” movies, passed away at 71, while recovering from back surgery. R.I.P.
And R.I.P. to Jamel Dunn, a disabled Florida man who drowned while five teenage boys recorded his demise, laughing and taunting him, doing nothing to help him. They posted the video on YouTube and didn’t bother to alert authorities. Florida police are searching for a statue by which to charge them.
It is a story which saddens me, sickens me and causes me to wonder about my fellowman.
Tonight, I will say a prayer for Jamel Dunn and for the souls of the young men who laughed while he died and light candles next time I am in church.
Tags:Behind the Bookstore, BTB, Edgartown Books, Florida drowning, Forbes, Home Alone, Jamel Dunn, Jemal Dunn, John Heard, Land of Off, Martha's Vineyard, Nathan Vardi, NY Times, President's Cabinet, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Scaramucci, Sean Spicer, Spicey, The Mooch and The Mogul, Vineyard Haven
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