Monthly Archives: May 2013
So around 4:15 this afternoon Travvy and I were waiting to cross State Road to go to the West Tisbury post office — waiting at the crosswalk, mind you — and a nice person in an older white Subaru Outback … Continue reading
Benefit Art Show
After reading The Mud of the Place a friend told me, “I’ve never met any of these people, but I feel like I could run into any of them in the grocery store.” Maybe my favorite compliment ever, not least … Continue reading
Tripod in the Backseat
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned as a fiction writer came from a theater director. “Make interesting choices,” he said. What’s an interesting choice? One that opens up possibilities. Watch a good improvisational theater troupe at work. Its … Continue reading
Green Green
The unfolding of spring this year has been unusually entrancing, or maybe it’s just that I’ve been more-than-usually entranced. In winter, I packed my little Canon PowerShot on late-afternoon walks when the gathering clouds promised a vivid sunset. These days … Continue reading
Reality
I still can’t wrap my head around the phrase “reality TV,” or the culture that came up with it, or the way it rolls trippingly off our tongues as if it makes sense. What will scholars from a different space-time … Continue reading
Sign for Summer?
Maybe this sign could go right under the one in Woods Hole that says MARTHA’S VINEYARD NEXT LEFT? Sign courtesy of Shirley W. Mayhew
Drummer
More about the weirdness of writing: In Squatters’ Speakeasy young Mark Churchill has a band, and of course the band has a drummer. Drummers usually sit back in the shadows with their drum sets so until a few months ago … Continue reading
Ghost Trees
I thought I’d missed the ghost trees this year. Their white flowers flicker off in the woods before the oaks start leafing out. They catch the corner of my eye as I drive down State Road. Spring is coming, they … Continue reading
12 over 12 Windows
I’m a fairly rational, left-brain person, but some things reason just can’t explain and one of them is writing. Where do ideas come from? Where do fictional characters come from? How do you find out where they live? Most fiction … Continue reading
Disaster Drill
Whenever a hurricane barrels up the East Coast or a blizzard bears down on New England, a few panicky friends halfway around the country are sure that Martha’s Vineyard is about to be flooded off the planet. True, on a … Continue reading
From the Seasonally Occupied Territories . . . 