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SeptemberSeptember 03, 2007 Having got some practice in at the end of August, September has arrived. I'm waking up later and later (after 7 a.m.). Before the sun has cleared the trees, drops of water are meandering down my skylights, making rivulets through the condensation. The play of light and mist and occasional fog in the oak woods outside my east-facing windows is gorgeous. I observed the first of September by doing laundry. An empty hamper is immensely satisfying, even if it only stays that way for a few hours. Ditto a drawer stuffed full of clean underwear and socks: for a few days I can imagine they'll replenish themselves and never run out. T-shirts and saddle blankets and towels sway brightly on the line; with the bright sun, fresh breeze, and dry air, even my cutoffs were dry in a few hours. With clean but unhung laundry in two canvas carryalls, I drove into town -- Oak Bluffs, in this case -- for some serious grocery shopping. For a sunny Saturday on Labor Day weekend, the traffic seemed positively light. Barely had to pause at the blinker before continuing on Barnes Road: there were no vehicles waiting at two of the four stop signs. Parking was easy. Laundry hamper (almost) empty; refrigerator full. Doesn't get much better than that. Yesterday my neighbors gave me a bunch of tomatoes from their garden, and some extra produce from their CSA (community-supported agriculture) allotment. Zucchini and green beans I know what to do with; fennel I'm going to have to look up. It's herby at one end with stalks at the other that resemble celery, only white. Herrmann's Royal Lippizaner troupe has been performing here this weekend. I worked security (not arduous) yesterday and got to see the show for free. They spend their summers in Vermont and their winters in Florida and perform up and then down the East Coast on their semiannual journey from one place to the other. They first came to the Vineyard in 2001. I volunteered then too -- saw three of the four shows and fantasized running away with the circus. Imagine traveling with a dozen people and fifteen or eighteen horses! They love the stabling in the Ag Hall barn, and local horse people are uniformly amazed by how well behaved the horses are. They're all stallions, but they're quiet, curious, and mannerly stabled in alternate stalls without high walls or grills between them. The show includes info about the Lippizaner breed and its history as well as demonstrations of training methods and "airs above the ground." Courbettes and caprioles and levades, in hand and under saddle, are probably the big draw for many people, but what I love watching especially is the long-lining: the horses performing upper-level dressage movements cued by handlers on the ground. It's like a cross between longeing and driving. Gabriella (Gaby) Herrmann, now the leader of the troupe, long-lines one horse while riding another. That's impressive! Anyway, September's here and with it an amorphous but familiar pressure. On Martha's Vineyard, starting around mid-May, everything starts getting deferred till fall, till summer's over, till September. Now September's here, and from experience I've learned that the rest of the year usually passes like a ball rolling down a steepening hill. If your projects aren't completed, or at least well started, by Thanksgiving (U.S. version: last Thursday in November), you've pretty much blown your opportunity and better start making New Year's resolutions.
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