Senior Music Camp

Camps, camps and more camps for kids. All well and good, but what about the rest of us? Particularly those no longer spry enough to pogo stick but not willing to go gently into that good night, either. Hmm, is that a mandolin I hear in the distance.

Each Wednesday in July and running through August, the Tisbury Senior Center is hosting a music camp for seniors. It’s a jam session, a sharing of tunes, and a class for beginners all rolled into one and hosted by instructor and conductor Sally Flood.

The Martial Art of Mixing It Up

This weekend at the Yard there’s a merging of the professional and the personal. The opening weekend at the dance colony in Chilmark features the H.T. Chen dancers, the Yard’s company in residence this summer, and the boys and girls next door. Say what?

The concept is this: Earlier the professional dancers visited Island schools to find local talent to take part in the show. Some young dancers will be hitting the boards for the first time.

Denzel Washington was a relative unknown when he scored the role of Trip, an escaped slave who joined one of the first black units fighting for the Union in the Civil War in the 1989 film Glory. The New York Times called it a “beautifully acted, pageantlike movie” that tells the story of the Massachusetts 54th. That legendary African American volunteer infantry was led by a young white Bostonian, Robert Gould Shaw, who is played by Matthew Broderick.

Plein Air, Plus Critique

On Thursday, June 30 at 6 p.m., oil painter Meg Mercier will give a brief gallery talk about her plein air paintings on view at the Old Sculpin Gallery in Edgartown.

The evening will also include a constructive critique by folk artist Brian Kirkpatrick for anyone who wishes to bring in a work in progress. Contact the gallery for more details at 508-627-4881, mvaa@verizon.netor or visit oldsculpingallery.org.

Did the Green Lantern, last week’s supposed Hollywood blockbuster, fail to light up your life? Don’t despair, there are others here on the Island who also hunger for something more fulfilling on screen. Indeed, the Vineyard in summer is a movie lover’s paradise with numerous festivals bringing narratives and documentaries from around the world just a stone’s throw from your front porch.

Summer Reading

School’s out so let the reading begin. The type of summer reading that can go on for hours and hours uninterrupted by anything except maybe a balmy breeze off the ocean.

But just because reading is a solitary affair there’s no need to do it alone. Head out to the West Tisbury Library this Saturday, June 25 to sign up for summer reading and learn how many books you get to read this summer to win a cool T-shirt. A double winner if there ever was one.

Oh, good grief. It is an Empidonax flycatcher. They all look the same, they are not very bright — drab greenish, as one bird field guide suggests. They all have whitish wing bars during nesting season and they all boast eyerings.

I received the AARP magazine in the mail. Now there is a publication I never thought I would receive, much less enjoy.

It was without a doubt the best Father’s Day bouquet that I had ever seen.

Elegant in its simplicity, this gift was clearly created with love and affection. It was made of found objects and plants collected in the yard. The vase was an empty Guinness beer can, well-rinsed and shined up, with the top of the can removed. A few flowers and grasses from the yard were cut and put into this special container. It was perfect.

Oak Bluffs will cover shortfalls in the current town budget with money from the town’s rainy day fund, after 100 people met Tuesday night for a special town meeting at the Oak Bluffs School.

Voters agreed to transfer $106,000 from the town’s stabilization fund to cover higher-than-budgeted health insurance costs for town employees.