Wishing Katie Carroll a Happy Birthday week.
There is nothing quite as glorious as a warm, flat calm, fall day where the sky is brilliant sapphire with a splash of indigo, the tide is extra-low, the colors of fall are almost at their peak, and the sun seems to sprinkle glitter over everything.
May the weather hold at least through Halloween. Even though there won’t be a party in the Community Center, Julie Flanders will be set up at the end of her driveway, and we will be handing out candy, compliments, and good cheer across from the Chilmark Community Church from 5 to 6 pm.
At 6 pm we will join the fun in Menemsha, and settle by the Texaco with Katie and Marshall Carroll.
Chilmark Chief Sean Slavin assured us, “The police department is planning on setting up the usual ‘haunted pirate ship’ in the beach lot, with candy and treats for all the kids.”
Don’t forget to vote on Tuesday, Nov. 3. Our polls are cast in the Chilmark Community Center, 520 South Road, and will be open 7 am to 8 pm.
Only Aquinnah and Chilmark still use hand-cranked ballot boxes that ding when the paper ballot drops and a counter flips. Our votes are carefully tallied by hand.
Some of us still have and appreciate our landline telephones because they clearly carry voices, and work without electricity, where cell phone signals are weak or unreliable, and where connections to satellites are obstructed by hills, boulders, or trees. Verizon wants to end copper landline service, and it will be devastating for those who have no reliable alternative.
The Chilmark library has a new website, and we are encouraged to call with any questions or confusing or broken links. The same is true for the town website.
Thank you, Irene Wong, for ending your six months as lead cook — a title that doesn’t capture the breadth of the work you did while at North Tabor Farm — by hosting a cookie swap fundraiser for the M.V. Ag Society and making a feast of kale salad and enormous pans of lasagne. One was layered with her simmered-for-four-hours meaty Bolognese sauce, and the other was a vegetarian version with butternut squash and pesto. The sheets of pasta were from M.V. Pasta. May we carry on this tradition.
Maybe we will have more community cookie swaps. I think there was one at the West Tisbury library in 2016.
Tuesday Pizza Nights at the Chilmark Community Church start at 6 pm.
And soon we will have Pathways events, hosted and often produced by Keren Tonnenson and Scott Crawford. They start moving into the Chilmark Tavern on Nov. 1.
For those who are grieving, the powerfully supportive and healing Community Grief Ritual led by Marcia Conlon is returning to Native Earth Teaching Farm on Nov. 14, from noon to 5:30 pm.
“Energetic Exchange” is $111, but no one will be turned away due to lack of funds; simply reach out to facilitators. Email rebeccanetf@hotmail.com to register, and check out the event listing on Facebook at facebook.com/share/1C6cBnP2bD.
