If you thought this was the start of Labor Day weekend, you are not the only one. But calendar watchers figured it out, and so did election monitors, aware that the primary is always on a Tuesday, and the Massachusetts election date is Sept. 1.
But for the rest of us, the good news/bad news is – we have an extra week of summer.
Among the good news was a weekend with a robust dump of rain. We are enjoying an August without brown lawns and dusty gardens.
There is an extra week of vacation for school teachers. An extra week of vacation for everyone who is on vacation.
And, so far, an August without detecting the ripples of wind and water in the Atlantic, just south of here, that imply the dawning of a hurricane.
The bad news is an extra week of vacation for those school children and their parents who can’t wait.
Then there is the population of local residents who work two or three jobs in the summer and who are ready to collapse by now. A progressively grumpy population wants their Island back: their roads, their homes, their routines.
Decades ago, we knew a couple who came to the Island every Sept. 1 for a month’s vacation. They arrived all eager to party and have a good time. We were not. It’s too bad we never knew them on a more even-handed timetable.
This sounds like it can’t be true, but the first year I lived here, 1974, we had weekend guests from New York who traveled by car and by ferry, on Labor Day Friday, without a boat reservation in either direction. They simply decided to come at the last minute, and so they did. Even back then, we were a little surprised that it was so easy. That does not mean I am advocating for a non-stop ferry schedule. Perish the thought.
I also remember looking both ways to cross State Road on July 4 itself, and there were no cars coming in either direction. Mirabile dictu.
This is probably the last week before Thanksgiving for multi-generation family visits. David Smith and Joan Apt have returned home after a trip to Beacon, N.Y. to be with their son Alex and his family.
Nancy Hoffman and Bob Schwartz of Crow Hollow have had a houseful of children and grandchildren visiting this past week.
Bea Whiting, her husband Patrick Ruel and their children, Asa and Nora, enjoyed a few days of hiking and camping at Crawford Notch, N.H.
Happy birthday on Monday, August 31, to Cleo Wild, Anna Edey, Gigi DeBase, Cheryl Lowe and Pat Mitchell. Birthday wishes go to Richard Burt and Tim Silva on Sept. 3.
Congratulations and happy wedding anniversary to Jim and Debbie Athearn on Sunday, August 30.
This article appears in August 28, 2026.