Finding Martha's Vineyard

by Jill Nelson

  Being on the island, you always heard, “Oh, that’s Senator Brooke’s house, that’s Senator Boiling’s house,” and it never really dawned on me that this was a major thing, that a black senator lived next door to you or up the block. But when I compared that experience to other people in Brooklyn, I realized it was something special. I didn’t think there were white people up here, because our community in Oak Bluffs was all black. White people were people who came up for a week and rented: We were a community. Now, because people aren’t coming up and staying the whole summer, that sense of community is different. But then, for the people who started coming in the 1980s, ‘90s, or last year, they feel this is their culture now. What’s fascinating about the Vineyard is that everyone who comes here and loves it has a feeling of history and ownership defined by their experience on the island.

  At the same time, growing up there were a lot of negative physical values here. For me, because I didn’t have long wavy hair or green eyes, I felt that I wasn’t pretty, wasn’t anything exceptional, because black people made such a big deal over sandy hair, or wavy hair, or green eyes. I had a super extreme sense of what beauty is. The physical seemed to be even more important than what your father did for a living. I think there are a lot more brown people, just regular-looking black folks, here now. I think black people now are more accepting of the way they look, so the physical doesn’t have as much influence. It’s interesting now, because some of the same people that perpetuated that color and hair tyranny then now say, Oh, we always knew we were black, we were always active, in the civil rights movement or whatever, and they probably were. They just celebrated people who looked more like they were white than black.

  Brenda: Now, there are fewer people who can afford to come up here for the whole summer. If you have a two-parent household, both of them are working, who can take off the whole summer? And then have their children come up here and not work, or not want them to have the experience of working? It creates less of a shared experience. My children come up for three or four weeks. There are certain families they hopefully will overlap with who they know, and then they meet new people, but they don’t have an attachment because they don’t have that common experience every summer, that repetitive bond. We used to say, “Oh, I can’t wait to go up to the Vineyard and see so and so,” but they don’t have that, they may never see the young people they meet again. It’s not that people don’t want that experience, but it’s harder to afford. The price of houses, the price of land. At the time when our parents bought houses up here, your house came completely furnished. The island was relatively expensive then, but in the scheme of things it really wasn’t that expensive at all. People lived very differently then, too, more easygoing, not so tied into the world; it was kind of like a place of isolation. Now there are many more people, more tourism, and more elitism.

  Diane: There are two types of people who come here. People who are really into the earthy, natural stuff and they kind of gel together. Then there are people who are way into a superficial, Ebony magazine existence, the social organizations like the Jack and Jill and the Boule, and other things. Even at the beach, there are people who swim and spend their time in the water, and then there are people who go just to sit on the sand, socialize, and hang out. Maybe that’s a good thing, that everyone can find something they want to do when they’re here.

  Brenda: People who haven’t been here think the Vineyard is a monolith, that all the black people live in one place and do the same things, but it’s not. Whatever you are into doing on vacation, you can probably find it here. That’s what’s so wonderful about the island.

  DIANE’S MANGO MARGARITAS

  2 overripe mangoes

  1 or 2 scoops instant iced tea mix

  Herradura Añejo tequila

  5 or 6 ounces Triple Sec

  Juice of 3 limes, plus 1 lime, thinly sliced

  4 ounces peach schnapps

  ½ cup ice water

  1. Peel the mangoes and purée in a blender or food processor.

  2. Fill a 48-ounce jar with ice and add all the ingredients. Stir or put on lid and shake well.

  3. Sip at the Inkwell.

  What We Brought Here

  Come on, Jillo. Let’s see what went wrong with this sucker over the winter,” my mother says each year, her tone a mixture of anxiety, anticipation, and dramatic delivery. My mother’s voice is deep, throaty, unforgettable, the result of years of smoking cigarettes, drinking Jack Daniel’s, and the necessary raising of her voice that comes along with raising four children. It is also, I think, a tool she has developed to survive the world as a woman alone and a part of her personal mystique. At five foot three and 116

  My mother, joyous on the Vineyard, circa 1966

  pounds she is physically diminutive, could perhaps be easily overlooked. She has wisely cultivated a big voice and sharp wit to make dismissal, if not impossible, unlikely.

  It is always either late May or early June when my mother and I stand at the front door to her house in Oak Bluffs, on Martha’s Vineyard, about to turn the key in its swollen brass lock. The house crouches on the end of Ocean Park, a huge, nameless animal about to be roused from hibernation. We never know what mood it will be in when awakened, have no idea what has occurred during its long slumber, what changes the wind, ram, and snow of fall and winter might have wrought in its disposition. What internal changes have occurred over the months it has been closed, empty, cold, devoid of the warmth of summer sun, of voices, of laughter, the fragrant odors of good food cooking.

  My mothers words are a mantra or incantation meant to simultaneously anticipate surprises and ward them off, as if in foreseeing the worst she can also summon the best, trick the house into giving her what she wants by using reverse psychology. When it comes to summer homes, surprises are seldom pleasant. The best that can be hoped for is that absolutely nothing has occurred over months of absence and passive, benign neglect. Driving north on Interstate 95 from New York, our conversation is wide-ranging, intimate, full of laughter, yet it always returns to a verbal checklist of what was done to close and secure the house before we departed the previous fall. We do this to anticipate and, we hope, minimize surprises and to prepare ourselves for any unexpected damage and the resulting expense. Were the storm windows pulled down, all pipes thoroughly drained, electricity switch thrown, garden hoses wound and stored in the basement, signs announcing that “This house is patrolled by the Oak Bluffs Police Department” posted in doors and windows facing north, south, and east? Have we done what is required so that the house can sustain itself in our absence, turn inward as the light fades, the days grow shorter, the heat leaks from the walls, and chill takes its place? Will the house sleep peacefully until we return to once again take possession? My mother speaks these same words or a slight variation every spring when we return to Martha’s Vineyard after a winter spent hundreds of miles away. Returning to a familiar place, some of our excitement and anxiety is in the unknown, embedded in what we cannot control. We know that the house must be swept, dusted, windows washed, rugs beaten. What we do not know is what changes winter and any accidental carelessness closing up might have wrought: the body of a sparrow flown in through an open chimney flue and unable to escape, dead on the living room floor; a dark spreading stain on a ceiling telling us that strong northeasterly winds have blown away cedar shingles, created an opening for rain. Perhaps, as has happened more than once, a broken window lock, uncovered billiard table, and empty liquor cabinet will announce that someone has broken in, shot a few games of pool, finished off the odds and ends of a summer’s liquor supply left behind, the bottles not worth lugging home. This is the most minor of inconveniences, and my mother and I laugh at the thought that some poor souls likely made themselves sick finishing off the inch or less of vodka, bourbon, gin, vermouth purchased for the occasional martini drinker, left behind eight months earlier. Closing our house on Ocean Park is a ritual we share with other summer residents. We try to take care b
ut never know if that care is enough, understanding that this house is alive without us. We know that it shifts, creaks, sighs, and settles whether we are present or not, moves imperceptibly in the wind, huddles in on itself in the rain, expands on bright, sunny days. What we hope for is that the breathing and settling of the house is steady, consistent, absent the interruptions of severe weather. If we are lucky and the winter has been relatively mild, it is likely that there will be few surprises.

  Each year when we unlock the door it is as if we are opening a present for the first time, again. As if this house is a huge trunk in which beloved artifacts of our family’s lives are stored int he fall and then forgotten. Each spring when the house is unlocked the treasures spill out, reminding and reuniting us with a fundamental part of who we are, forgotten during winter months of work and cold. These are our roots, no matter that we spend most of our time someplace else, it is here that we are home.

  This house and everything in it bursts with memories, most of them joyous, but some of them painful. The jukebox we bought my mother for her seventieth birthday, half of it stocked with 45s of Dinah Washington, Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughn, Joe Williams, Miles, and Billie, the other with Bob Marley, Aretha, Sly, Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive,” a favorite of my mother’s. The glass porch on the northeast corner with its black wicker furniture is my mother’s favorite spot in the house. Sitting in one of the two wicker swings, she watches the ocean, the park, people pass by on foot, waves casually in greeting when a passing car honks, an easy backward fling of her forearm, even though as often as not she has no idea who is driving by. From this porch my mother presides over her summer and her slice of the island, sometimes alone, but more often in the company of friends who stop by throughout the day. When anyone in the house had parties, this porch was always a center of activity. In August, when the Oak Bluffs Fire Department sets up its annual fireworks display on the beach in front of Ocean Park, this porch, the wide steps that lead up to it, and the lawn in front are the best seats in town. Old friends, new friends, and occasionally a person we do not know gravitate to this porch on the night of the fireworks, without invitation.

  Just as I did when I was a child, and as my daughter did after me, children run through the yard in packs, shrieking at the loud explosions and brilliant bursts of light. Adults, no less captivated but more reserved, sit on one of the porches facing the water or on the steps, their faces upturned. Their voices fill the night air with oohs, ahs, and “Did you see that one?” as fireworks burst overhead.

  Across the narrow street, Ocean Park, the gazebo in the center of it, is blanketed with people. On fireworks day people from all over the island begin arriving at the park in the early afternoon, lugging blankets, coolers, and lawn chairs. These early arrivals stake out their spot for the evenings festivities, marking their location with a flag or kite or some other identifying sign for friends who will join them later. By the time the band concert in the gazebo commences, just before the fireworks begin right after dark, the grass of Ocean Park has become a vibrant mosaic of the island community. Full of prancing, giddy children twirling light sticks, clusters of teenagers simultaneously trying to appear indifferent and yet not miss a thing, parents and grandparents and single people, faces upturned in anticipation, all bound up in this annual island celebration.

  It is on this porch facing Ocean Park where we have spent days laughing, arguing, talking politics, drinking, entertaining friends, watching the people promenade by, or as often as not simply staring at the ever-changing ocean. It is the center of this house and our lives here. The light on the porch announces that we are here, for us the sum-mer has begun, and all are welcome.

  It is not until my mother dies that I begin to understand how profoundly she breathed life into this house, how deeply the force of her notions of family, friends, and community defined this physical space. A few days after her death on January 20, 2001, my daughter and I come to Martha’s Vineyard. We are stiff with grief, frozen, confused, looking for something, we do not know what, but something tells me to go to the Vineyard. The island, like my spirit, is cold, gray, shocked. Yet the moment I step inside the house I am literally and figuratively warmed. I see the hand of my mother in every room, faintly smell her scent, hear echoes of her voice. Inside this house that she loved and fought for, her spirit is alive, vibrant, real. I feel it welcome and envelop me, and I am deeply comforted. My daughter and I light a candle on the glass porch and leave it to burn for hours. After midnight, before going to sleep at the friend’s house where we are staying, my daughter and I go back to the house to extinguish the candle. Doing so, I laugh, maybe for the first time since my mother became ill right after Thanksgiving, when my daughter, mimicking my mother’s voice taking the Lord’s name in vain, remarks how angry she would be if, in tribute to her, we left the candle burning, and this house, which she so loved and left for us, burned down.

  In this house on this island, full of physical artifacts and bursting with memories, my mother’s spirit surrounds me. How many wonderful meals have been prepared and eaten in the wood-paneled kitchen at this big oak table? Stand still for a moment and I can smell my mother’s unbeatable baby back ribs, potato salad, spaghetti with clam sauce, lobsters cooked in seawater with new potatoes and corn, peach cobbler, yellow cake so light it makes you want to cry, hear the grind of ice and salt turning as she makes peach or strawberry or rum raisin ice cream, the latter so rich with alcohol that it never fully hardens and we eat it as custard.

  Everywhere there is the evidence of my mothers slim, always cool-to-the-touch hand, hands whose fingers and thick, unbreakable nails spanked, poked, prodded, and instructed over a lifetime, hands that would not take no for an answer and taught me to do the same.

  In this house there is no place that does not tell the story of a piece of our lives. It is all a reminder, not only of good times but of bad, too. The saving grace for the bad times implicit in the fact that we are still here, in this house, that very fact evidence that we have survived, changed but intact.

  When we open the house together, the key turns and my mother presses the full force of her small shoulder and knee into the heavy oak door, a miniature but fearless linebacker about to tackle something enormous. On brass hinges the door swings open and we are inside, we have finally arrived. We split up for a quick tour of the house, my mother taking the downstairs as I go up. If we are lucky, and we usually are, there is nothing new to worry about, no unanticipated leaks, breaks, or shocks, just the smell of salt and sand, so much space and light, the ocean right across the street, all so familiar. The truth is that anticipating disaster is part of the ritual my mother has developed over years of returning to the Vineyard. After her death I discover that it is also part of my legacy. Perhaps, too, it is a defense, since almost nothing real can possibly be as dire, or expensive to repair or replace, as what can be imagined.

  On the Vineyard my mother seems indifferent to the weather, basically content with whatever comes her way in this beautiful place. On the mainland she listens out for news of bad weather in New England and tracks storms on the Weather Channel. At least once a year she predicts that a nor’easter will blow in the five-foot-wide glass windows on the front porch and create a vortex that will suck all her furniture and personal belongings into its whirlwind, eventually dumping them in the Atlantic Ocean. She calls me to share these visions and bemoan the fact that she did not board the porch. For years I envision this as the East Coast resort equivalent of the tornado that descended upon Kansas, swept up Dorothy and Toto, and dropped them in Oz, except my tornado is made up of lawn chairs, Weber grills, lobster carcasses, and beach towels.

  My mother, who takes no comfort in my reminder that for almost a century her house has survived on this corner, relaxes only when hurricane season has passed. Anticipating disaster requires that you can always imagine yourself as the star of “the first time.”

  When my mother is alive I let her do the worrying about whether or n
ot the house will blow away, be sucked up by evil winds, or simply leak to death. Born and raised in New York City, in apartments, I know nothing about how buildings go up, so cannot begin to imagine what makes them come down. Mostly, I dismiss my mother’s concerns as paranoia, boredom, a negative attitude, or, as time goes on, just getting old. Yet not long after she passes in the winter of 2001 I begin to dream of the house in Martha’s Vineyard and weather-related disasters. Most frequently I dream that a tidal wave sweeps the house from its foundation and it floats away, an ark with weathered gray shingles and white trim, watertight, porch windows intact. I find myself watching the New England report on the Weather Channel and tracking storms, too, worrying.

  When she is alive I am not immune from concern, and together my mother and I worry about the flower beds and blooming bushes that we have planted along each side of the house. Knowing nothing, we seek to transform ourselves into summer gardeners because we love flowers. Over three decades we spend so much money with Michigan Bulb, Burpee’s, and assorted plant centers on the island that my mother jokes that if we’d bought stock we would have made ourselves rich. That didn’t mean that we were surrounded by flowers though.