An esoteric case that has implications for the future of small parks in Oak Bluffs and throughout the commonwealth was argued at the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court on Monday.

A decision is expected sometime in the next three months.

On its surface the case is about three small wooded lots behind Crystal Lake on East Chop, and whether the current owners can build there, though the lots have been labeled as parks since they were set out in an original 1872 subdivision.

Almost four years ago, just after her 12th birthday, Jessica Rose
Seidman ordered a half dozen chicken eggs from a catalogue and built her
own incubator. One hatched. She named him Chickie and raised him as a
pet in her backyard coop.

A docile, tame and beautiful Rhode Island Red rooster, Chickie in
the time since has earned four first-place awards in Martha's
Vineyard Agricultural Society Livestock Show and Fair - three
times best in show.

When the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) broke ground on a community center building in the spring of 2004, tribal leaders envisioned it as an important gathering place, and said young members would be shooting hoops inside the new gymnasium by the end of the summer.

Three years later, the building is still unoccupied, sitting half-finished on tribal lands.

From his perch in Poole's Fish Market, which he ran for half a
century, Captain Everett H. Poole watched Menemsha harbor fade from
being one of the busiest fishing ports on the East Coast.