Saturday of Thanksgiving weekend and the ferry Martha’s Vineyard was temporarily out of service. Crews were working to repair the problem. Meanwhile, with some trips cancelled, standby lines for cars began to grow in both Woods Hole and Vineyard Haven. The Steamship Authority handled the overflow with practiced efficiency. Lift decks on the ferry Island Home were used to take extra cars. The freight ferry Katama shuttled back and forth alongside the Island Home like a sturdy lieutenant, her open decks also packed with cars.

Like the Wizard of Oz

She’s the Ferry Godmother

Magically making

Boats to appear

Reserving and serving

All of the Island

Healing and dealing

With standby line fears

Like the Queen of the Celts

She’s a powerful presence

Not that she towers

She’s rather quite short

But like her namesake

She swings a long broadsword

Cleaving the channels

Between the two ports

I’d like to toast

Our Bridget Tobin

Mistress of magic

What do you do? This is the question we have been asked by family, friends and strangers alike for the past year ever since we became full-time Islanders or, rather, washashores.

I got a call last week from a friend who has been successfully battling cancer. She told me: “Marijuana tea and candy are the only things that helped my appetite. My weight had gone down to 98 pounds. I am now 112 pounds. And it let me sleep. I don’t think that I would be alive today without it.”

From the Dec. 4, 1964 edition of the Vineyard Gazette, by Joseph Chase Allen: Taking them full and by, as the old sailormen would have said, Martha’s Vineyard people have always been a neighborly sort, living at peace with each other for the most part through the generations.

I have lived on Lake Street in Vineyard Haven for 25 years. A few years ago, I went to pick up my mail at the cluster box under the power lines and saw a crew of workers with chainsaws taking down a lovely grove of small trees that shaded the boxes. I called NStar and was told that they have a mandate from the federal government to keep the rights of way free from vegetation lest something fall on the power lines. Since the power lines are at least 50 feet off the ground, this scenario seemed very unlikely, insofar as the trees were no taller than 12 feet.

The following letter was sent to the Martha’s Vineyard Commission:

On behalf of the Island Housing Trust, I would like to offer the following recommendations regarding Stop & Shop’s proposal in downtown Vineyard Haven. As a neighbor, the Island Housing Trust has the following concerns.

A week before Thanksgiving, I was walking my dog at the beautiful Trade Winds in Oak Bluffs. I’ve had so many positive experiences there with other dog owners and their dogs, but I never expected this one; an accident that happened so fast and the subsequent kindness of strangers.

Edgartown’s tax rate will increase slightly in 2014, with the town selectmen this week approving a tax rate of $3.70 for every $1,000 worth of property.

Welcome to the parlor of Cleaveland House in West Tisbury. For at least half a century, this cozy room has served as a salon of sorts for Island poets who gather to share and critique each others' work.