 |
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
|
||
 |
 |
|
||
|
||||
 |
|
|||
|
||||
|
||||
The Glorious FifthJuly 05, 2008 Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun, fools rush in where angels fear to tread -- and it takes a crazy islander to drive into town on Fourth of July weekend. An overcast and rainy Fourth of July weekend, no less: if you've survived a summer on Martha's Vineyard, you know that you only go into town on good beach days; on lousy days everyone who would otherwise be at the beach is (duh) in town. So it was a lousy beach day on Fourth of July weekend, when the island's population peaks for the summer, and I drove into not just one down-island town but two: Vineyard Haven and Oak Bluffs. Vineyard Haven wasn't too bad. I was woolgathering when I drove by the cemetery and singing along with the radio when I passed John's Fish Market -- these being the best back ways into town when traffic is bad -- but when I closed in on the tail end of the cars backed up State Road, there was still time to hang a left on Look Street, which I did. I found a parking place on Center Street, behind the town hall. Not bad. Travvy and I headed down Center Street toward Main, in the general direction of Mosher's, where I had film to drop off. I already knew that Cafe Moxie, a restaurant at the corner of Center and Main, had burned down Friday morning, but I wasn't prepared for how burned down it was. A shell of the kitchen area in the back still stood, but the dining room was a heap of charred planks. Looming above the wreckage was the startlingly white outside wall of Bunch of Grapes bookstore, with a scorch hole in the second story. I'd heard that part too, that the bookstore's second floor had been heavily damaged, but not been able to visualize how that happened. Now it was easy. What was hard to imagine now was how the firefighters managed to keep the whole block from burning. The police lines were still up. The air reeked of smoke. The bookstore was dark. Even if most of the damage was on the second floor, the first must have sustained a major hit from smoke and water. How many of the books are still readable, never mind sellable? Travvy attracted much attention and many compliments, I dropped off the film -- Mosher's is now charging a $3 deposit because so many pictures are never picked up -- and we returned to the truck. My brain was finally in gear: rather than crawl down State Road and through Five Corners, I took the long way around to Oak Bluffs, by way of the blinker light. My objectives in OB were beer at Our Market and salad fixings and dog biscuits at Reliable. The beer was the most pressing: I was out of it. Maybe driving into OB in search of beer on Fourth of July weekend should be one of the warning signs of alcoholism? Nah -- no halfway competent alcoholic would have run out of beer on Fourth of July weekend; she would protected the source of supply by stocking up on Thursday. The Our Market lot was chaotic (you definitely don't want to negotiate it, or most other Vineyard parking lots, with faculties impaired), but I found a parking place. As I stashed two six-packs of Sam Adams Boston Ale and a twelve-pack of Beck's into the back of the cab, two of the Our Market guys were surveying the lot: "Where are all these people? There are only three people in the store." That was a slight exaggeration, but I could see his point. I was sh*t outta luck finding a parking place at Reliable or anywhere close, and I cruised all the way around Ocean Park. Didn't see any good license plates either. By then it was raining. No way was I going to try Circuit Ave. Salad stuff could wait, and we had enough biscuits to get through the weekend. I headed down Dukes County Ave., hung a right on Wing Road, and went to the barn. When I left the barn, it was only 5:15; Reliable's open till 6, so I figured I'd try again. No luck on the second pass either. We went home.
|
|
|||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
 |
|
|||
 |
|
|||
Home - Writing - Editing - About Susanna - Bloggery - Articles - Poems - Contact Copyright ©
Susanna J. Sturgis. All rights reserved. |
||||