Category Archives: public life

Channeling Frederick Douglass

Posted on July 4, 2018 by

I just got back from participating in the annual reading of Frederick Douglass’s “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” speech at the Inkwell.  Abigail McGrath of Renaissance House organizes it; Makani Themba stage-manages. There were 30 readers … Continue reading →

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Finding Light in the Darkness

Posted on June 30, 2018 by

Originally posted on hecatedemeter:
If it feels like the dissolution of much of what we hold dear about the United States is accelerating, that’s because it is. This has been a particularly dire week: SCOTUS has decided that racial gerrymandering,…

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Families Belong Together

Posted on June 25, 2018 by

The Martha’s Vineyard Peace Council has called for a standout at Five Corners at 11 a.m. on Saturday, June 30, to oppose the Trump administration’s policy of separating children from their asylum-seeking parents at the southern border. All welcome — … Continue reading →

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Registering Voters

Posted on June 17, 2018 by

Yesterday — a perfect sunny, almost summery Saturday the likes of which we’ve seen few of in recent weeks — I spent six hours at the West Tisbury library sitting behind a “register to vote” table. This was part of … Continue reading →

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Democratic State Convention 2018

Posted on June 7, 2018 by

Right up to almost the last minute I was thinking of skipping the 2018 Massachusetts State Democratic Convention. Last year’s convention, my first, was eye-opening in all the wrong ways. You can read all about it, and about how I … Continue reading →

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Positively Pro Postcards

Posted on May 25, 2018 by

Back in early February I blogged about writing postcards to Democratic voters. At that point, I was writing for my seventh campaign, for Conor Lamb, running for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District. This was, by my count, the 54th … Continue reading →

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New Station on the African-American Heritage Trail

Posted on May 22, 2018 by

NOTE: I sing in the M.V. Spirituals Choir, part of the U.S. Slave Song Project, and also manage its website. This post is a reprint of one I posted there yesterday. If you’re on the Vineyard and like to sing, … Continue reading →

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Rally for Gun Safety

Posted on May 20, 2018 by

Note: This post first appeared on the new website of the Women’s Committee of We Stand Together / Estamos Todos Juntos (WST/ETJ), which I manage; it has been updated and revised. If you live or spend time on the Vineyard … Continue reading →

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Not Stranded

Posted on May 8, 2018 by

For days I’d been planning to head off-island this past Sunday afternoon for State Rep. Dylan Fernandes’s 2018 campaign kickoff in Woods Hole. The venue, the Captain Kidd, is an easy walk from the ferry dock, so no big deal, … Continue reading →

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Z is for Zoning #AtoZChallenge

Posted on April 30, 2018 by

When I moved to Martha’s Vineyard in 1985 I was as ignorant about zoning and land-use planning as I was about refuse disposal. (See “Unsustainable” for more about that.) My education started PDQ: In January of my first winter, I … Continue reading →

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