Yesterday felt like a bit of a low point for me. Doesn’t really matter why and it was nothing major. I just got down. Somehow, a dear friend, perhaps unknowingly, sensed this. He suggested Marshall and I head his way and he’d send us walking.

We met at a distance and he pointed out a few spots he liked to place his feet, one after the other, and said “go.”

Marshall tagged along but we parted ways and he did some metal detecting. He found an old spoon. It was broken, but I’m sure you’ll still hear about it.

I walked listening to pinkletinks and watching osprey. I felt the harsh abrasion of the sand as the wind blew it across me. I found the bottom of a boot and wondered why most of it was missing and whose foot it used to protect. I listened to the waves and watched the gulls hover above. I stood on a dune as sea clammer passed Noman’s. I watched until it was out of sight.

I wandered some more, hopping over boggy spots so I didn’t get my feet wet. I took my gloves and hat off and put them back on as my body temperature changed depending on the level of shade and wind I encountered. I stood tucked in the lee on a windward shoreline and watched the sun lower itself to just above the horizon.

I snapped a terrible selfie to document my first real moment of calm in weeks. Looking at it, I realized my eyes open to two very different levels. Although that makes me look unbalanced, I didn’t care.

I closed my eyes and felt the sea spray and thought of it as Mother Earth’s way of washing the day’s sadness from me. I tucked my phone back in my pocket, grabbed my buoy walking stick that I’d found an hour earlier, and wandered back to meet Marshall.

I began feeling a sense of true inner peace knowing the sunset was nearing completion behind me. I looked ahead and spotted the moon rising. It was big and bright with just a hint of pink. I breathed deep and said “wow” to myself, maybe in my head, maybe out loud in a whisper.

I reached the spot where Marshall and I had parted. We exchanged words about what a wonderful time we had together yet fully apart. I sent a quick thank you text to my dear friend who sent me walking. He, of course, responded with Check For Ticks, which made me both chuckle and feel loved at the same time.

As for today, there are sad moments, there are joyful moments, and there are just-getting-by moments.

Sadly, I share there is one less resident on Barton Way. Audrey Leaf, about half year shy of her 90th birthday bid the earth, her husband Carl and her family, farewell. Although I had the opportunity to extend my condolences to Carl in person it was hard knowing I couldn’t give him a much needed hug.

We lost another vibrant Island woman, this one to complications associated with Covid-19. Lee Fierro taught many Chilmark children how to swirl and dance joyfully around the MayPole each spring. She will be sorely missed by many, but remembered fondly by all.

Happily I share that fire chief Jeremy Bradshaw is offering drive-by birthday excitement for Chilmark kids and elders, with lights and sirens, a police escort and a bag of goodies distance delivered to your child as they celebrate sans friends. Birthday joy has been shared with Katy Kurth (mostly for the benefit of her two small children Latham and Gryphon), Hailey and Freya Mayhew, Talia Anthony, Westley Wlodyka and Brooks Carroll.

Email me at squidrow@vineyard.net to coordinate having jovial Jeremy and his sidekick, amiable Annie, spread the cherished Chilmark love.

I’ll leave you with this just-getting-by thought from an article I recently read: “If your son visits his girlfriend, and you later sneak over for coffee with a neighbor, your neighbor is now connected to the infected office worker that your son’s girlfriend’s mother shook hands with.”

Stay home. Stay safe.