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There was a time when the tourist season on Martha's Vineyard pretty much began on the Fourth of July and ended on Labor Day. Increasingly, however, the shoulder seasons have expanded. People start coming down for weekends in April or even earlier, and the island doesn't really belong to islanders again until after New Year's, when, for two months, it's ours alone, and is very quiet.
Of the Vineyard's two shoulder seasons, the fall and winter shoulder is the busiest, what with childless couples staying to enjoy the autumn weather and off-island people returning for the annual Bass and Bluefish Derby, deer-hunting season, weddings, Columbus Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
January and February, the quiet months, are perplexities to off-islanders, who often ask, "What do you do down there during the winter?" and proclaim that being penned up on an island would drive them crazy from boredom. For Vineyarders, on the other hand, being penned up on the mainland would be much worse.
The difference between the two groups is that the off-islanders need to be able to travel about on the spur of the moment, whereas Vineyarders accept the fact that they must live by ferry schedules and reservation policies. If your psychic welfare depends upon instant mobility—going to the mall, the opera, the Kittery Trading Post, or wherever—you shouldn't live on an island.
Off-islanders also err in thinking that there's nothing to do on the Vineyard during the winter. In fact, there's so much to do that you can't begin to do it all. There are community chorus rehearsals and performances and other musical activities and presentations; there are reading groups, amateur theatrics, movies, learned lectures, and high school sporting events; you can ice fish or go frostbite sailing, hunting, ice boating, dancing, or partying. If you want to, you can be out every night, sopping up culture or just having a good time. If you're bored, it's probably because you are a bore.
Zee and I and the two kids attend some of these many events but in general prefer to stay at home with each other in our old but cozy onetime hunting-camp home. Nothing pleases me more than being inside with my family, warm in front of the glass-doored living room stove while the winter wind howls outside and snow splats against the windows.
We have all the entertainment we need right here: shelves of books, a good radio, the last black-and-white TV in the world, a stereo system for our tapes and CDs, and our recently purchased computer, which is mostly used by Joshua and Diana for their schoolwork and which has temporarily put a stop to their previously consistent pleas for a dog.
I know that when the new wears off the computer, the dog request will return with more of "But all our friends have dogs, Pa," and "We'd take care of it ourselves, Pa," and all the other pleas and promises. But I am not about to have a dog. No dogs! We have cats: Oliver Underfoot and Velcro.
Cats are quiet and independent, but dogs are yappy and born slaves who want nothing more than to serve their masters. In fact, of course, their owners are the real slaves, constantly walking, feeding, and cleaning up after their noisy, slobbering pets. I don't approve of slaves or slavery, so we're not going to have a dog if I have anything to say about it! Whenever I preach this sermon, Zee rolls her great dark eyes and shakes her beautiful head.
The trouble began in early December, during deer season, when the kids were still under the spell of the computer and we were all beginning to think Christmas thoughts.
In our house, we don't consider it proper to do anything Christmasy until after Thanksgiving, and we feel free to raise disapproving eyebrows when stores offer pre-Thanksgiving Christmas music or displays or sales of Christmas items.
"Do you think we're getting stuffier about this Christmas thing as we get older?" asked Zee, as we strolled Edgartown's Main Street.
'Absolutely not," I said. "It's like the Good Book says: for everything there is a season."
"This isn't a case of the devil quoting scripture, is it?"
"No comment."
"Do you approve of having deer-hunting season between Thanksgiving and Christmas? Does the Good Book have anything to say about that?"
I took her arm in mine. "You're just trying to start trouble."
"Who, me?"
There are a lot of deer on Martha's Vineyard and every year hunters kill several hundred of them. There's a season for shotguns, one for muzzle-loaders, and one for bows and arrows. Other deer are shot out of season by hunters who don't wait for state approval to ply their ancient art.
About the same number of deer are killed each year by cars, which raises the question of what sort of license you really need to bag your buck.
The island's most passionate opponents of hunters and hunting are members of VETA, Vineyarders for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which is the local version of a national organization, or perhaps it's an international organization, devoted to nonviolence to all creatures.
My friend Mimi Bettencourt Cortez belongs to VETA, although her views did not prevent her from marrying Ignacio "Nash" Cortez, who is as dedicated a hunter and fisherman as Mimi is a dedicated vegetarian. Mimi also has a sense of humor, which seems nonexistent in many of her VETA comrades.
Nash, in response to his wife's support of VETA, has created his own organization, VETFAV, Vineyarders for the Ethical Treatment of Fruits and Vegetables, which is dedicated to decrying the heart-less killing, mutilation, torture, and devouring of innocent plants. Nash's letters to the papers have gotten a lot of laughs from hunters and fishermen and even a few from Mimi, but the rest of the VETA people are not amused.
Excerpted from Vineyard Prey by Philip R. Craig All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
