Story Book Endings

There won't be any Yankees contending for Mr. October status this fall, but Andy Pettitte's final night on the mound had a story book ending.

Pitching in Houston with more than 50 members of his family in the stands and just miles from his boyhood home, Pettitte earned his 275th career victory, throwing 116 pitches in his first complete game since 2006.

According to The New York Times, the game was one for the record books:

"In his 438th start for the Yankees, which tied him with Whitey Ford for the most by a pitcher with the team, Pettitte matched Rivera’s magical moment from Thursday night with magic of his own. He threw his first complete game in seven years, a 116-pitch gem, to beat the Houston Astros, his former team, 2-1, and put a bow on his life as a baseball player.

"Now in the stretch, he gave his signature stare over his glove one last time and induced a ground ball to third base on his 116th pitch. Eduardo Nunez made the play, and Pettitte slapped his hands together, spun around with a huge smile and hugged catcher Chris Stewart.

“ 'It’s just another day that I’ll never forget,' Pettitte said.

"After he hugged each of his teammates, players on both teams came out of the dugouts and applauded as Pettitte waved to the crowd and then to them. He had evened his record to 11-11 and become the only pitcher with at least 15 seasons never to have a losing one, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. He improved his career record to 256-153, including 219-127 with the Yankees, and he earned his 275th win, including playoff games."

During his final post-game interview, Pettitte said, "I love to play the game. I love to pitch. It's a shame you get old."

Thinking back on his career, all the games we attended at the old and new stadiums, his role as one of the "core four" with Jeter, Posada and Rivera, and the five World Series championships, I felt enormous gratitude and shed some tears.

Harvest Moon Sail

A harvest moon sail out of Westport for 6.67 nautical miles averaging 4.29 knots.

Murmuration

Photo by Kristen Fauteux

Kristen Fauteux

Kristen Fauteux

Swallowed Up by Majesty of Migration

From the Sheriff's Meadow Foundation, with commentary by Adam Moore.

By the numberless thousands they descend. The birds arrive as a great host, flying from the northeast, following a sinuous path on invisible, atmospheric currents. The flock appears as a river of birds, curving through the air, with birds pouring forth in a flow that seems unceasing.
The great flocks of migrating tree swallows have arrived upon the plains of Quansoo and elsewhere on the shores of Martha’s Vineyard. By sunset at the end of a gray Labor Day, some hundreds of members of a flock of swallows had alighted on the branches of a black cherry tree and on the upper boughs of a neighboring eastern red cedar.
The swallows appeared restless. The birds would roost in the branches, all of them facing south, seemingly situated for the night. Yet after a moment or two, the birds would take flight en masse, wheel about in a choreographed spin, and then alight again. On the cherries, the swallows appeared to favor branches that terminated in dead, leafless twigs over those branches that bore leaves to the distal ends.
From a distance, the flocks of swallows appeared very much like swarms of bees. Tumbling, wheeling, circling, the swarms of swallows soared over the plains. Some pairs of swallows, separated from the flocks, dashed over the meadows, flying low, and skirting the tassels of switch grass as they snatched insects in flight. A few individual birds hovered in the air above, one perhaps 50 feet high, another 100 feet high, perhaps acting as sentinels for the rest of the flock.
Of the plants, the bayberry attracts the swallows. Along the margins of Black Point Pond, the bayberry shrubs now bear their waxy gray fruit in profusion. These bayberries can be gathered up, and when boiled in a large pot, the wax will separate from the fruit. The wax can then be skimmed off, allowed to cool, and used to make a bayberry candle. As someone who has attempted this, I can attest that one will have a very dark winter should one choose to rely on bayberry candles as a source of light. Fortunately for the swallows, they rely on bayberries not for illumination, but rather for sustenance. They find the bayberries a plentiful and valuable food source. The swallows stop at Quansoo or Katama or on the headlands of Cedar Tree Neck. On the bayberries they feast, before rising in a cyclonic swarm to cross the ocean on the next stretch of their migration.
These great hosts of swallows are, after all, migrating. What we witness here in September is a great wonder of nature, a scene of throngs of animals engaged in an annual migration. The flights of swallows do not equal the long lost flights of the passenger pigeon, so numerous that the flying birds darkened the sky and the roosting birds snapped limbs from trees, but the swallows do call such a migration to mind. The swarming swallows, the nonresident Canada geese flying in V-formation, the striped bass following cold waters back to Island beaches, the plovers scurrying from waves that lap the opening of the Tisbury Great Pond — all of these migrants pass the Island as summer turns to fall.
We recognize this change of the seasons. We, too, migrate, and change along with the changes in the light and the weather. The sassafras turns a speckled orange, and passengers by the thousands walk the gangways in Vineyard Haven and in Oak Bluffs and board the ferries, bound for the mainland. The sumac turns a bright red, and the school bus pulls up by the mailboxes. The seasons are changing and, sometimes, we take a moment to mark the changes in our own lives.
On the plains, the raindrops of a cloudy afternoon still cling to blades of grass. The little bluestem has turned a ruddy purple. Hazelnut bursts with fruit, its brown-tinged clusters of nuts splitting open. Goldenrod droops its yellow blossoms over the edges of the dirt road. The surf sounds in the distance, and above, and all around, a thousand tree swallows fly and dart and swarm and roost. The swallows are bound for a distant land, but for one September night, here they sleep.
- See more at: http://mvgazette.com/news/2013/09/09/swallowed-majesty-migration#sthash.v5FNKMBS.dpuf

By the numberless thousands they descend. The birds arrive as a great host, flying from the northeast, following a sinuous path on invisible, atmospheric currents. The flock appears as a river of birds, curving through the air, with birds pouring forth in a flow that seems unceasing.
The great flocks of migrating tree swallows have arrived upon the plains of Quansoo and elsewhere on the shores of Martha’s Vineyard. By sunset at the end of a gray Labor Day, some hundreds of members of a flock of swallows had alighted on the branches of a black cherry tree and on the upper boughs of a neighboring eastern red cedar.
The swallows appeared restless. The birds would roost in the branches, all of them facing south, seemingly situated for the night. Yet after a moment or two, the birds would take flight en masse, wheel about in a choreographed spin, and then alight again. On the cherries, the swallows appeared to favor branches that terminated in dead, leafless twigs over those branches that bore leaves to the distal ends.
From a distance, the flocks of swallows appeared very much like swarms of bees. Tumbling, wheeling, circling, the swarms of swallows soared over the plains. Some pairs of swallows, separated from the flocks, dashed over the meadows, flying low, and skirting the tassels of switch grass as they snatched insects in flight. A few individual birds hovered in the air above, one perhaps 50 feet high, another 100 feet high, perhaps acting as sentinels for the rest of the flock.
Of the plants, the bayberry attracts the swallows. Along the margins of Black Point Pond, the bayberry shrubs now bear their waxy gray fruit in profusion. These bayberries can be gathered up, and when boiled in a large pot, the wax will separate from the fruit. The wax can then be skimmed off, allowed to cool, and used to make a bayberry candle. As someone who has attempted this, I can attest that one will have a very dark winter should one choose to rely on bayberry candles as a source of light. Fortunately for the swallows, they rely on bayberries not for illumination, but rather for sustenance. They find the bayberries a plentiful and valuable food source. The swallows stop at Quansoo or Katama or on the headlands of Cedar Tree Neck. On the bayberries they feast, before rising in a cyclonic swarm to cross the ocean on the next stretch of their migration.
These great hosts of swallows are, after all, migrating. What we witness here in September is a great wonder of nature, a scene of throngs of animals engaged in an annual migration. The flights of swallows do not equal the long lost flights of the passenger pigeon, so numerous that the flying birds darkened the sky and the roosting birds snapped limbs from trees, but the swallows do call such a migration to mind. The swarming swallows, the nonresident Canada geese flying in V-formation, the striped bass following cold waters back to Island beaches, the plovers scurrying from waves that lap the opening of the Tisbury Great Pond — all of these migrants pass the Island as summer turns to fall.
We recognize this change of the seasons. We, too, migrate, and change along with the changes in the light and the weather. The sassafras turns a speckled orange, and passengers by the thousands walk the gangways in Vineyard Haven and in Oak Bluffs and board the ferries, bound for the mainland. The sumac turns a bright red, and the school bus pulls up by the mailboxes. The seasons are changing and, sometimes, we take a moment to mark the changes in our own lives.
On the plains, the raindrops of a cloudy afternoon still cling to blades of grass. The little bluestem has turned a ruddy purple. Hazelnut bursts with fruit, its brown-tinged clusters of nuts splitting open. Goldenrod droops its yellow blossoms over the edges of the dirt road. The surf sounds in the distance, and above, and all around, a thousand tree swallows fly and dart and swarm and roost. The swallows are bound for a distant land, but for one September night, here they sleep.
- See more at: http://mvgazette.com/news/2013/09/09/swallowed-majesty-migration#sthash.v5FNKMBS.dpuf

By the numberless thousands they descend. The birds arrive as a great host, flying from the northeast, following a sinuous path on invisible, atmospheric currents. The flock appears as a river of birds, curving through the air, with birds pouring forth in a flow that seems unceasing.
The great flocks of migrating tree swallows have arrived upon the plains of Quansoo and elsewhere on the shores of Martha’s Vineyard. By sunset at the end of a gray Labor Day, some hundreds of members of a flock of swallows had alighted on the branches of a black cherry tree and on the upper boughs of a neighboring eastern red cedar.
The swallows appeared restless. The birds would roost in the branches, all of them facing south, seemingly situated for the night. Yet after a moment or two, the birds would take flight en masse, wheel about in a choreographed spin, and then alight again. On the cherries, the swallows appeared to favor branches that terminated in dead, leafless twigs over those branches that bore leaves to the distal ends.
From a distance, the flocks of swallows appeared very much like swarms of bees. Tumbling, wheeling, circling, the swarms of swallows soared over the plains. Some pairs of swallows, separated from the flocks, dashed over the meadows, flying low, and skirting the tassels of switch grass as they snatched insects in flight. A few individual birds hovered in the air above, one perhaps 50 feet high, another 100 feet high, perhaps acting as sentinels for the rest of the flock.
Of the plants, the bayberry attracts the swallows. Along the margins of Black Point Pond, the bayberry shrubs now bear their waxy gray fruit in profusion. These bayberries can be gathered up, and when boiled in a large pot, the wax will separate from the fruit. The wax can then be skimmed off, allowed to cool, and used to make a bayberry candle. As someone who has attempted this, I can attest that one will have a very dark winter should one choose to rely on bayberry candles as a source of light. Fortunately for the swallows, they rely on bayberries not for illumination, but rather for sustenance. They find the bayberries a plentiful and valuable food source. The swallows stop at Quansoo or Katama or on the headlands of Cedar Tree Neck. On the bayberries they feast, before rising in a cyclonic swarm to cross the ocean on the next stretch of their migration.
These great hosts of swallows are, after all, migrating. What we witness here in September is a great wonder of nature, a scene of throngs of animals engaged in an annual migration. The flights of swallows do not equal the long lost flights of the passenger pigeon, so numerous that the flying birds darkened the sky and the roosting birds snapped limbs from trees, but the swallows do call such a migration to mind. The swarming swallows, the nonresident Canada geese flying in V-formation, the striped bass following cold waters back to Island beaches, the plovers scurrying from waves that lap the opening of the Tisbury Great Pond — all of these migrants pass the Island as summer turns to fall.
We recognize this change of the seasons. We, too, migrate, and change along with the changes in the light and the weather. The sassafras turns a speckled orange, and passengers by the thousands walk the gangways in Vineyard Haven and in Oak Bluffs and board the ferries, bound for the mainland. The sumac turns a bright red, and the school bus pulls up by the mailboxes. The seasons are changing and, sometimes, we take a moment to mark the changes in our own lives.
On the plains, the raindrops of a cloudy afternoon still cling to blades of grass. The little bluestem has turned a ruddy purple. Hazelnut bursts with fruit, its brown-tinged clusters of nuts splitting open. Goldenrod droops its yellow blossoms over the edges of the dirt road. The surf sounds in the distance, and above, and all around, a thousand tree swallows fly and dart and swarm and roost. The swallows are bound for a distant land, but for one September night, here they sleep.
- See more at: http://mvgazette.com/news/2013/09/09/swallowed-majesty-migration#sthash.v5FNKMBS.dpuf

By the numberless thousands they descend. The birds arrive as a great host, flying from the northeast, following a sinuous path on invisible, atmospheric currents. The flock appears as a river of birds, curving through the air, with birds pouring forth in a flow that seems unceasing.
The great flocks of migrating tree swallows have arrived upon the plains of Quansoo and elsewhere on the shores of Martha’s Vineyard. By sunset at the end of a gray Labor Day, some hundreds of members of a flock of swallows had alighted on the branches of a black cherry tree and on the upper boughs of a neighboring eastern red cedar.
The swallows appeared restless. The birds would roost in the branches, all of them facing south, seemingly situated for the night. Yet after a moment or two, the birds would take flight en masse, wheel about in a choreographed spin, and then alight again. On the cherries, the swallows appeared to favor branches that terminated in dead, leafless twigs over those branches that bore leaves to the distal ends.
From a distance, the flocks of swallows appeared very much like swarms of bees. Tumbling, wheeling, circling, the swarms of swallows soared over the plains. Some pairs of swallows, separated from the flocks, dashed over the meadows, flying low, and skirting the tassels of switch grass as they snatched insects in flight. A few individual birds hovered in the air above, one perhaps 50 feet high, another 100 feet high, perhaps acting as sentinels for the rest of the flock.
Of the plants, the bayberry attracts the swallows. Along the margins of Black Point Pond, the bayberry shrubs now bear their waxy gray fruit in profusion. These bayberries can be gathered up, and when boiled in a large pot, the wax will separate from the fruit. The wax can then be skimmed off, allowed to cool, and used to make a bayberry candle. As someone who has attempted this, I can attest that one will have a very dark winter should one choose to rely on bayberry candles as a source of light. Fortunately for the swallows, they rely on bayberries not for illumination, but rather for sustenance. They find the bayberries a plentiful and valuable food source. The swallows stop at Quansoo or Katama or on the headlands of Cedar Tree Neck. On the bayberries they feast, before rising in a cyclonic swarm to cross the ocean on the next stretch of their migration.
These great hosts of swallows are, after all, migrating. What we witness here in September is a great wonder of nature, a scene of throngs of animals engaged in an annual migration. The flights of swallows do not equal the long lost flights of the passenger pigeon, so numerous that the flying birds darkened the sky and the roosting birds snapped limbs from trees, but the swallows do call such a migration to mind. The swarming swallows, the nonresident Canada geese flying in V-formation, the striped bass following cold waters back to Island beaches, the plovers scurrying from waves that lap the opening of the Tisbury Great Pond — all of these migrants pass the Island as summer turns to fall.
We recognize this change of the seasons. We, too, migrate, and change along with the changes in the light and the weather. The sassafras turns a speckled orange, and passengers by the thousands walk the gangways in Vineyard Haven and in Oak Bluffs and board the ferries, bound for the mainland. The sumac turns a bright red, and the school bus pulls up by the mailboxes. The seasons are changing and, sometimes, we take a moment to mark the changes in our own lives.
On the plains, the raindrops of a cloudy afternoon still cling to blades of grass. The little bluestem has turned a ruddy purple. Hazelnut bursts with fruit, its brown-tinged clusters of nuts splitting open. Goldenrod droops its yellow blossoms over the edges of the dirt road. The surf sounds in the distance, and above, and all around, a thousand tree swallows fly and dart and swarm and roost. The swallows are bound for a distant land, but for one September night, here they sleep.
- See more at: http://mvgazette.com/news/2013/09/09/swallowed-majesty-migration#sthash.v5FNKMBS.dpuf

Go out and play

Barbara Smaller ~ The New Yorker

I wish.