Aquinnah

Gay Head Community Baptist Church. Sunday worship services at 9 a.m. Tel. 508-693-1539.

Chilmark

Chilmark Community Church, United Methodist. 9 Menemsha Cross Road. Pastor: Rev. Arlene Bodge. Worship and Sunday School at 9 a.m. Tel. 508-645-3100; Web site, chilmarkchurch.org.

Edgartown

Double Visions

A two-person art exhibition, featuring the work of Wendy Weldon and James Langlois, is at the Chilmark Public Library from March 31 to April 29. An opening reception will be held at the library from 3 to 5 p.m. on Saturday, April 3. Ms. Weldon’s half of the show demonstrates the progression within her process, from informal sketches and studies on paper to large-scale acrylic paintings. Her work presents an unusual energy, fueled by her thoughtful use of color.

At this year’s Massachusetts High School Drama Guild Festival the students in Kate Murray’s Theatre II class presented a new work, the brainchild of a creative collaboration between teacher and students. And this weekend, they are bringing it home, with several productions for the Vineyard audiences slated at the high school’s performing arts center.

At 8:30 p.m. tomorrow, the Island will go dark. Lights will be turned off, the ambient hum of computers will go silent. Candles will be lit, and people will sit back to enjoy the blaze from the fireplace. For one hour, for the third year in a row, the Vineyard will join with some 800 cities across the globe in flipping the switch, suspending, if only for a short time, our ever-growing energy use.

By LYNNE IRONS

We’ve had more than our share of beastly weather recently, which put the brakes on both bird migration and birding activity. But with a run of exquisite spring days last week and into this past weekend, the birding season has bounded ahead. Grackles and red-winged blackbirds are ubiquitous around the Island; robins, song sparrows and Carolina wrens are in full voice; and in general, the world is growing rapidly birdier. This makes me happy.

On a visit to Martha’s Vineyard, Cinderella would do well to leave her glass slippers at home.

There is absolutely no need for that type of fancy footwear here — very few balls or parties swanky enough to warrant their wear. We tend to be a little more laid-back on-Island. Likely these delicate slippers would get ruined if she brought them here, with our limited number of sidewalks and many dirt trails.

An Island man arrested this week is facing several charges of rape and indecent assault and battery against a mentally retarded person.

Peter Duart, 41, a registered Level II sex offender as well as a former assistant coach of the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School football team, and an elected, currently serving member of the Tisbury planning board, was arrested by Massachusetts state police on Wednesday in Dartmouth after Oak Bluffs police issued a warrant for his arrest.

Tisbury town officials will discuss the beer and wine proposal that goes to vote once again in April, at a public hearing on Tuesday, March 23 at 5 p.m. at Katharine Cornell Theatre. Voters split evenly on the issue in the first count of the 2008 ballot, with no votes deciding the question in a recount.

The new proposal, as previously reported in the Gazette, authorizes the selectmen to grant up to 19 licenses to restaurants seating 30 people or more to sell alcohol with meals. The unusual number reflects the fact there are 19 eligible establishments in town.

Despite a shortage of money and qualified instructors to teach foreign languages, Vineyard schools officials expressed support at their meeting last Thursday for the goal of graduating students from the high school with fluency in a language other than English.