PETER WELLS

(peter@chappyferry.net)

Chappy fire captain Joseph Cressy died a year ago as of last Friday. I prefer to think of him as being on a new assignment. Wherever it is that he’s been reassigned, you can be sure that during this year he has reorganized and rearranged the place to his own liking.

This reminds me of a joke. I don’t recall if Joe liked lawyer jokes, but we will assume that he would have liked this one:

A civil engineer dies and when he arrives at the Pearly Gates, Saint Peter doesn’t find the guy’s name on the list. So the poor guy goes to hell. Upon arrival in hell he realizes that some improvements are in order. Before long he has strung lights in the far tunnels, installed air conditioning in the offices and run cold water to the lavatories. God hears about this and decides that he could use a guy like this in heaven. God tells the devil that there’s been a mistake and the civil engineer is supposed to be in heaven. The devil says that he got the guy fair and square and he intends to keep him. God tells the devil that he’ll see him in court, that he’s going to sue him to get the guy back. And the devil laughs and says, “Okay God, but where are you going to get a lawyer?”

So wherever Joe is now, I’m sure that they are happy to have him.

Last week the Edgartown Firemen’s Association held its monthly meeting at the Chappy fire station. The Chappy firemen provided the dinner. Instead of the traditional lasagna, the firefighters were served ribs and shrimp from the barbeque. They also enjoyed their yearly treat of Chappy Waldorf salad (the secret ingredient being lots of mayonnaise), South Dakota mashed potatoes (10 per cent butter by weight) and strawberry shortcake.

That night the firemen’s association awarded scholarships of $1,500 each to eight graduating Vineyard high school seniors.

A couple of Sundays back you may have noticed huge billows of smoke rising from the west shore of Edgartown Great Pond. The Nature Conservancy was performing a prescribed burn on 40 acres of Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation land adjacent to the new state forest annex at Pohogonot. The purpose of prescribed burning is generally to restore habitat. But it also serves to reduce the volume of flammable materials in the woods. In the event of a forest fire, the intensity of the fire is greatly reduced and can be more easily extinguished.

In my role as captain of the Chappaquiddick branch of the Edgartown fire department, I am concerned with the increasing threat of wildfire on Chappy. As the woods here age, more and more flammable material accumulates. Many of our houses are nestled right in the woods. A fire in the woods has the potential to set houses on fire and vice versa.

To get first hand experience with wildfire behavior I have been training with The Nature Conservancy and participating in their prescribed burns. I have had an opportunity to see what happens when wildfire is allowed to burn. Since the fire department is in the habit of quickly putting out any fire that we encounter, we can only guess what would have happened if we had not extinguished it. Don’t get me wrong, The Nature Conservancy is very capable of putting out fires but they are also very good at encouraging combustion. I have really enjoyed my time with the burn crew. They have such a positive attitude toward their work. When I’m with them I get what I can only describe as a national park feeling.

I strongly encourage homeowners to google “FireWise” on the Internet. The FireWise Web site suggests many simple things that you can do to help to protect your home from wildfire.

If you haven’t been attending the Chappy potlucks, you are definitely missing out. You have to make dinner anyway. So make a big batch of just one dish. It can be a casserole, a side dish, a salad or a desert, whatever you want. Bring it to the Chappy Community Center next Wednesday, May 16, at 6 p.m. and share in the variety of foods that your neighbors bring. The hosts for the evening are newly returned Judith Buss and Paul Cardello. Even though we don’t plan ahead, we always seem to have well balanced meals, except for that time that everyone brought desserts. I remember being a little dizzy and pretty sticky at the end of that evening.

Chris Kennedy thanks everyone who helped with the Mytoi Garden spring cleanup last Saturday. He says the brook is now running and the whole place looks wonderful!

Liz Villard is at last satisfied with her research into Chappy graveyards. She leaves no stone unturned when doing her homework. How’s that for a pun? The tour is scheduled for Saturday, May 19. Meet at the Community Center at 10 a.m. to carpool. The idea for the tour came from a Chappy column reader. I think that our lives are richer when we know the details of our neighborhood and keep in mind those who were here before us.

Sunday is Mother’s Day. Don’t say that I didn’t remind you. Do you remember the purser on the ferry Islander who had the high pitched midwestern twang? That was Bernie Holzer. At end of the voyage his distinctive voice would crackle out of the public address speakers telling us to make sure to gather up all of our belongings before leaving. On Mother’s Day he would also announce that he expected us to call our mothers. “It will only take up a few minutes of your time and it will mean the world to her”.