Under the Milky Way Tonight

Labor Day, 2005

On Sunday night I stood on the shore at South Cape Beach. Vineyard Sound was calm, the small waves breaking right-to-left along the shore, each coaxing a murmur of rolling shells and pebbles as it receded. A few fisherman were spaced along the beach, respectful distances apart, silent, their eyes and flashlights trained on the tips of the surfcasting rods propped upright in their sand spikes.

The moon was new, or had not risen. Looking out over the water and to the right , I could see the lights of Oak Bluffs on Martha’s Vineyard, eight miles away. A bit to the left was a more nebulous glow, Edgartown. Still further to the left, out of the starry blackness, an even softer glow was barely perceptible--Nantucket, 22 miles at sea. Above, constellations with names unknown to me shimmered against the ineffable, awe-inspiring backdrop of the Milky Way.

Behind me, the Big Dipper hung in the northern sky as clearly as I’ve ever seen it. As ever, it pointed out the coldly constant North Star; closer to the horizon gleamed a planet that some primal voice whispered was Jupiter. The night was warm, but something in the breeze carried the inevitability of autumn.

Monday afternoon found me on a boating mission, picking up family friends who had spent two weeks in a rented gingerbread cottage in the Methodist Campgrounds in Oak Bluffs. As we left Oak Bluffs Harbor, it was apparent that Vineyard Sound was prepared to show a different personality. The eight mile fetch from the mainland gave the North wind time and space to work up frothing seas, and much of this return trip would be spent pounding through them.

A half mile from Oak Bluffs, we approached a huge cruise ship at anchor, the Enchantment of the Seas out of Nassau. For a moment, a sleek Pacific Seacraft ketch, bound for Nantucket on a broad reach, was outlined against the white hull of the ship, and I realized I had missed the opportunity for a breathtaking photograph. Passengers on both the ship, unperturbed by the moderate seas, and the ketch, gliding with the ocean instead of fighting through it, were much more comfortable than we. The ride, however, was exhilarating, and we arrived back in Waquoit, sound and dry.

These are the things I love to do, and the places I love to be. But since Hurricane Katrina, I realize that the sky, the wind, the waves, carry now for me almost subliminal reminders of the malevolent fury that they can achieve. For now, and perhaps always, the respect I have always felt for the natural world will be tinged by the tiniest fear.