It looks like the Gazette’s cherry red 1955 Ford pickup may not be in the Fourth of July parade next year. We might slip in as antique car under the proposed new rules for entry. But we won’t be giving away commemorative printers’ caps, made of 100 per cent recyclable newsprint and specially designed by paper artist Jane McTeigue to feature the date on the front and stars and stripes inside. Photographer Mark Lovewell won’t be playing his concertina and singing patriotic songs from the truck bed, and webmaster Graham Smith won’t be dressed as an old-fashioned newsboy, yelling “Extra, Extra, Read All About It” to the cheering crowd.

Under the proposed new rules, the Vineyard Gazette fails to fall into any of the approved categories for entry. We are not a nonprofit, even though we are a newspaper attempting to survive in the 21st century. We aren’t a camp, a team or a family, though you might not realize it if you watched and listened as Jared Maciel, McKinley Sanders, Hilary Wall, Meaghan Nydam, Amy Kurth, Holly Pretsky and a procession of other interns, reporters, salespeople and office staff gathered to fold a thousand hats in the runup to the parade. Notwithstanding Mark, we are not a musical group. And we are certainly not a farm, a town or a military organization, though our coverage spans them all.

Nope, we guess the Vineyard Gazette won’t be in the parade next year. Sorry, kids.