Only hours away, not much sleep, kids away in Washington, D.C., on a school trip and soon I will be closing on my own brand new home. I just can’t believe it. Finally our very own home here on the Vineyard. Wow. I have worked so hard my entire life and raising the twins alone for the last nine and a half years has been very hard but rewarding.

FORGIVE BUT DON’T FORGET

Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

From the Vineyard Gazette editions of June, 1983

The three Steamship Authority governors, facing a battle with Vineyard commuters that may cost the boat line $25,000 in legal fees, are digging in for the fight.

The last hope for compromise died this week when commuters rejected an offer by the authority to reduce the number of tickets in each commuter book. Thus, the flap over increased commuter ticket prices entered its sixth month and both sides are preparing for a second Department of Public Utilities hearing.

The Edgartown tennis courts will host an adult tennis camp to be held on June 21 and 22. The camp will feature instruction from local tennis professionals and will be held from 9 a.m. to noon both days. The cost is $99. All ability levels are welcome.

More information is available by calling 508-560-0525 or e-mailing tennis5555@gmail.com.

VINEYARD CHILL. By Philip R. Craig. Scribner. New York, N.Y. 2008. 256 pages. $24, hardcover.

A popular young Island barmaid has gone missing. An old buddy turns up who invariably brings trouble like a perverse hostess gift. It’s winter on Martha’s Vineyard and all’s well with J.W. Jackson, wife Zee, and their two small children — if you overlook a murder or two, and a couple of thugs rolling off the ferry in a yellow Mercedes convertible in search of ill-gotten loot.

In one of the more exciting high school games in recent memory, the girls’ varsity lacrosse team scored two goals in the final two minutes to win yesterday’s quarterfinal game of the MIAA Division II South tournament by a final score of 13-12.

With the win, the fifth-seeded Vineyarders (14-4-1) advance to a semifinals game against eighth-seeded Duxbury (14-4-1). The game will be held on the Island Thursday at 4:30 p.m. at the regional high school main athletic field.

No artistic medium asks us, the audience, to bring our imagination to the table as much as a staged theatre reading. So when a work such as Kim and Delia is presented by Vineyard playwright and filmmaker Brian Ditchfield — on Saturday night, May 31, under the aegis of the popular Island Interludes program of New Works by Island Writers — and when the play itself is a homage to imagination and its infinite possibilities, well, the audience shares in the creation.

This serialized, real-time Vineyard novel, Moby Rich, began in last Friday’s Gazette and will continue every Friday, here on page two-A, for a year. For those of you who, in the happy hubbub of Memorial Day weekend, missed chapter one of Moby Rich, here is a synopsis: Our narrator (“Call me Becca”), a 40-something Vineyard native, has just returned home after decades in Manhattan.

A healthy breeze blew through the trees on a recent Tuesday morning at Featherstone Center for the Arts in Oak Bluffs. The various buildings strewn about the green glens and pasture land of the 6.5-acre campus were empty excepting the art studio, wherein a small group of friends were quietly assembling for what has become, for many artists, an integral part of their weekly schedule.

The Gazette begins its twice-weekly publication cycle on Tuesday, June 3. Look for the return of the award-winning interview series, Two of Us.