I am a person of words, speaking them, writing them, reading them, I love them anyway I can get them. Especially writing. There is nothing in the world like looking down at a piece of paper and knowing that those words were meant to be there, exactly how you wanted them to be. There have been few times in my life I have found myself without words, they have been my constant friend over the years, getting me into as much trouble as they’ve gotten me out of — and yet every time I sit down to write about Martha’s Vineyard they simply disappear.

I sit down at the coffee shop or on the floor of my bedroom, pens and paper at the ready, and every time I uncap the pen and sit staring at the blank sheet of paper for hours. Instead of my words flowing from pen to paper they tumble together in my mind, creating a tangle of words and ideas of the Island so strong they’re overwhelming. Visions of summers gone by, old friends and lost loves compete with the freedom of standing next to the ocean or sailing over the waves.

I remember blueberry muffins and my grandfather’s hugs, I remember breaking windows and chasing my brother and watching my cousins grow up, spending time with my family and learning to love them for the people they are. I remember my house at two and four and now at 24, its grey wooden shingles greeting me every May and weeping along with me when it was time for school once more.

No matter where I am I can close my eyes and smell the ocean, I see the setting sun staining the water with the same oranges and reds that explode across the sky, like the horizon couldn’t be bothered to contain the colors and instead allowed the sun to drench the world in its blazing farewell. I remember a thousand nights sitting on the shore and watching that show, seeing those amber waves relentlessly rolling across that salty sky and never feeling so connected to the world as I did in those fleeting minutes.

I remember riding on the Flying Horses until I threw up, my first car, my first kiss and my first love. I treasure every day I get up and see my grandmother, and I love laughing with her when the cat decides to let a live (and understandably upset) frog loose in the living room. Birthdays, formal dinners, cocktail parties (and a few less, well, “formal” events) polka dot the years with increasing frequency as old friends don’t visit as often as they used to and new friends discover the magic of the Vineyard.

There are feelings of joy and sorrow, and an overwhelming feeling of love and safety for the Island. It is an uncontestable truth that once you fall in love with Martha’s Vineyard you’ve found your first and last love; from the moment it twines its steady fingers around your heart you’re lost. You’ll be in a long-distance relationship for the rest of your life, spending everyday away from the Island plotting a way back again.

I’ve filled entire notebooks full of meaningless doodles while trying to come up with the words to describe this place. I go around in circles discarding words as quickly as I think of them until trying to describe it gradually becomes impossible, like writing the words to a melody you can’t control, and exhausted I snap the cap back onto place and put the notebook away. Hoping that a new day will bring new clarity, but also knowing that some loves go deeper than even words can express.

Leigh Bower is a law student who lives in Kentucky and East Chop.