HOLLY NADLER

508-274-9239

(hollynadler@gmail.com)

At the Oak Bluffs School Christmas Bazaar, I noticed a run on twins in our youngest population. Apparently the up-tick of fertility drugs has generated extra babies, and who among us would be so churlish as not to agree that the only thing cuter than a little kid is two little kids?

To make sure I wasn’t seeing double or outright hallucinating, I contacted school principal. Laury Binney (whom my O.B. alumnus son describes as “awesome”), to find out if this trend in twins is real. Sure enough, Mr. Binney e-mailed me that the student population of 407 includes eight twin sets and one team of trips. Far out!

That being said, I’d like to add to the record my own family’s twin story: Back in the 1930s, my dad and his three brothers, two of them twins, Fred and Bob, lived with their parents and grandma in a pleasant two-story house on DuMerle Street (now a Cambodian neighborhood) in Lowell, Mass. The twins were renowned for performing their ablutions within 12 minutes of one another, the result of both their twinsy-psychic connection, and of Fred having been born 12 long minutes ahead of Bob. Here’s how it worked: If Fred entered the kitchen and peeled a banana into a bowl, Bob arrived 12 minutes later and peeled his own banana into a bowl. The same schedule applied to showering, bannister sliding, and finding the hidden tin of macaroons.

Well, one day in November, Uncle Ted came to town for a funeral, so the then-nine-year-old twins bunked with their older brothers so the visitor could have Fred and Bob’s tiny bedroom tucked into an upstairs corner. It being the Depression and all, Uncle Ted possessed only a single suit, so this he removed at bedtime, tenderly folding it over a chair so that he could don it again in the morning for the service.

Around 2 a.m. as the household slumbered, Fred got up for his nightly perambulation to the john. From his own room this always entailed seven steps to the door, hook a right, nine steps to the bathroom, hook another right, take aim at the toilet, finish up, return to bed, all of this achieved in the deepest sleep cycle. On this particular night, Fred rose from a cot in his brothers’ room, executed his seven steps, hooked a right, proceeded nine steps into the chamber occupied by Uncle Ted, hooked another right, and voila!

Uncle Ted was awakened by the sound of an intruder in his room. In the dim light drifting in through the window, he saw a boy facing the wall. The visitor watched as young Fred peed, freely, on the jacket and trousers neatly placed across the chair back. Moments later, the elder twin left the room. Uncle Ted lay sprawled in bed as his mind reeled through all the possible scenarios of how he might wash his suit in the bathroom sink, and get it dry — or at least semi-dry — before the funeral. After 12 minutes of profound brooding, he heard another set of footsteps. Younger twin Bob entered the room, hooked a right, and urinated on his relative’s suit.

Which just goes to show that, if we are indeed entering a Second Great Depression, how much fun we can have living with extended family, especially now that there are so many more twins and even triplets (or octuplets!) in them.

Oak Bluffs residents Peter and Annie Palches are so pleased at their son, Jakob’s new academic trajectory. Peter explained to me recently in a phone call, “Jakob got through high school by the skin of his teeth. After we moved here from Newton, he worked at the Gannon & Benjamin boatyard for two years, then signed up as a counselor at Camp Jabberwocky. After a month of this challenging work, he announced, ‘I’m going to college!’ His first year at Mass Bay Community College was a bit of a struggle but now, in his second year, he’s made the honor roll.” Jakob’s parents and, undoubtedly, the young scholar himself, are inspired by his new focus.

Okay, citizens of Oak Bluffs, I’ll miss you terribly, but I’m out of here. I’m off to California to spend a few hopefully balmy weeks with my family. Please feel free to go on e-mailing me with all the latest gossip, but for hard-breaking news, send it on to my buddy and colleague, Tom Dresser, at thomasdresser@gmail.com, telephone 508-693-1050 (easy to remember; just 16 years before the Battle of Hastings). And if you haven’t read his latest book yet, go out and grab yourself a copy of Mystery on Martha’s Vineyard, published by the History Press, all about that long ago dark and stormy night on East Chop when murder came to the Rice Playhouse.