Althea Freeman-Miller
looks to plants to describe her journey as an artist. A morning glory represents her childhood on the Vineyard, a black-eyed Susan the person she was in college, and a tree her future.

Metaphor extends to her family, too, but it isn’t confined to botany. An iris and an anchor symbolize her mother, and a bird with a heart as a body captures her father. Her inner purpose is a beaming candle.

The weather has been so nice. The temperature is warm, the sky is blue, the leaves are starting to show their bright colors and everyone is happy. Brides who have been planning their weddings have been very happy and the fishermen have been happy. Now, I hate to spoil all the happiness but we need rain. So lets hope in the near future we see some rain for our gardens and ponds.

Will it ever rain again? It’s been over a month without anything amounting to much. Don’t get me wrong. The days could not be more perfect. Clear and crisp in the mornings with abundant sunshine all day certainly raises the spirits.

The weather continues to be in the 60s and 70s, with beautiful calm autumn days. Many people are still swimming at the beaches while dodging day-time derby fishermen. We all wish the weather will hold like this for awhile.

Chilmark is gliding seamlessly through this unseasonable fall weather. No wind, lots of sun and still very few fall colors in the greenery. The sides of the road are full of yellow and purple wild flowers, lush green growth and the usual flocks of turkeys, always on their way to the other side of the road.

A warbler seen in the Phillips Preserve and a thrush spotted in the Gay Head Moraine are members of groups of birds I have always had trouble distinguishing between. The Connecticut warbler is one of three warblers that are tough to separate. The other two are the Nashville warbler and the mourning warbler. The MacGillivray’s warbler is also a look-alike, but is a western species never seen on the Vineyard and, to my knowledge, only five times in Massachusetts. The last time was in 2009 in Boston.

It would be difficult to create a better superhero.

The green darner dragonfly should have its own comic strip, book and movie deal. Its qualities are similar to those of all of the best crusaders: speed, size, strength and a dash of mystery.

Big news week here! In deference to the federal government’s recent shut-down, Chappy has also suspended all government activities. All employees have been furloughed until further notice. This will hit the seagulls particularly hard as they depend on their weekly paycheck for dropping mollusks on the hoods of Mercedes.

As I joined the line waiting to enter the meeting room, I greeted and joked with some of the oyster growers in a manner customary among close friends. Like old friends coming together at a funeral, our jolly small talk denied the seriousness of the occasion.

In the days and weeks following the president’s assassination, Jacqueline Kennedy received more than 800,000 condolence letters from all over the world. On Wednesday, Oct. 9, at 7:30 p.m. the Martha’s Vineyard Film Center in Vineyard Haven will screen a documentary that includes actors reading 20 of these letters accompanied by archival footage and Kennedy home movies recently made available. The event and documentary commemorates the 50th anniversary of the assassination, which took place on Nov. 22, 1963.