Rain fell softly and fog blew in from the ocean this week across a lush green Island after tinder-dry conditions so early in the season had weather watchers worried and firefighters on high alert. Everything has been early this year in the natural world. No winter at all to speak of, followed by a very early spring — the osprey arrived so long ago that thinking about it now, it almost seems like last year. Already bass and bluefish are running, and the squid fishing has been spectacular, attracting crowds of fishermen of all ages to State Beach in Oak Bluffs and Memorial Wharf in Edgartown at dusk every night.

And now Memorial Day weekend has arrived, the Vineyard’s coming out party and unofficial kickoff to summer. Ferries to the Island have been booked for many weeks, and for the first time in recent years, as all eyes turn to the season ahead, the mood is upbeat and positive in this place where the economy depends precariously on resort commerce for a scant ten weeks of the year. Vacation rentals are robust, many booking agents report. New open-for-business signs are popping up in every corner of the Island — Turkish rugs in Edgartown, a French bistro in Vineyard Haven and espresso coffee in Menemsha — the Island is a melting pot of summer entrepreneurs this year.

The weekend also marks the kickoff to the summer fundraising season, when a wide — some say dizzying — array of vital Island nonprofits hold events to raise money for their causes. It begins today with the Friends of Family Planning Art Show and Sale which will be staged at the Agricultural Hall through Sunday. Dozens of Island artists donate their work to this important fundraiser that helps to keep the Family Planning office open to serve the needs of Islanders throughout the year.

For many seasonal residents the weekend is a homecoming, a time to return to houses that have been shuttered for the winter, throw open the doors, sweep out the mouse nests and let the sunshine in. How was your winter? It’s the exchange most commonly heard on the streets and in fish markets and farm stands through the long holiday weekend.

For too many Islanders the answer to that question is still “hard.” Despite a winter that was easy on the heating bills, the number of needy year-round Islanders remains significant, a fact confirmed by the annual report from the Island Food Pantry a few weeks ago. This winter the food pantry assisted more than five hundred families representing nearly a thousand people on the Vineyard, including at least two hundred children. The steadily increasing presence of the Food Pantry is a testament to the fact that hunger does not discriminate and that the Island, for all its rich human and natural resources, is not immune from the social ills of the mainland.

Memorial Day also is, of course, a time to remember those who have died at war. Once known as Decoration Day, the holiday was originally conceived to commemorate the fallen Union soldiers of the Civil War. Later it was extended to honor all American men and women who died while serving in the United States armed forces. On Monday the Vineyard veterans of foreign wars will join the national celebration with a parade that steps off at nine thirty at the American Legion Hall in Vineyard Haven and ends at the Oak Grove cemetery, where more than four hundred flags will flutter in the late May breezes along the magnificent avenue of the flags. Following that, the annual Tisbury town picnic will be staged on the grassy banks sloping down to Lake Tashmoo, an event held by long tradition for the whole Island.

The ceremonies of remembrance begin early this afternoon when elementary school children in the down-Island towns stage their annual marches to the sea, the traditional start to Memorial Day weekend on the Vineyard. This year the grade schoolers will have no lilacs to carry to toss into the town harbors to commemorate those lost at sea during times of war; the lilacs went by weeks ago. Instead perhaps we will find the petals of pink and white clematis, bridal wreath and the first roses of the season swirling in the salty eddies around the waterfront.

A fitting a remembrance all the same.