~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ The tide was draining out of Madaket Harbor in the early afternoon under the incandescent winter sun. Safe in waders, six of us stood in the cold water that lapped around our waists. Aware of the present danger and recent past, we watched each …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ As you get older, your life becomes a lab experiment for doctors and nurses and a math problem for bureaucrats and insurance executives. I go off-island, from time to time, to confer with the young people who pick at me like a frog transfixed …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ Nantucket scars us. We are stewards to an island in the sea of time. The cobblestones remain as they always have, as do the moors and the gray buildings. The years seem to slide by us. History happens on the other side ot the …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ By September, Monday leans back, gives himself a scratch, and looks around the backyard for a few minutes. It has all the time it needs. Nothing presses it. The phone doesn’t ring, the e-mail only contains spam, and the coffee is ready by the …
~by Robert P. Barsanti ~ You know who you are in a storage locker. When you open the padlock and the shutter goes up, all is laid out in front of you at the cost of $125 a month. Every one that I never became is stacked and stored in …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ On Friday afternoon, just around quitting time, I stood in a line at Old South Liquors with a dozen cold beverages in my hands. It was a good time to quit; the air was warm, the fog distant, and the winds favorable. The men …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ I am trying to get my son to shave. Ever since he was in seventh grade, he has grown a phenomenal beard; a dense thicket of wiry red bristles. After eight hours, a shadow appears. In two days, a low growth spreads across his …
There are not many left. Certainly, not many left on an acre of oceanfront in Squam. It isn’t much. It had been a shack for fishermen to spend the weekend, then it became something you could bring the wife and kids to, then it became a place for the grandchildren …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ It’s a good summer to give up on watching TV. Most of the good shows have called it a season, and every sport, save baseball, has finally sent their players home to their families and their countries. Baseball rolls on, of course, but baseball …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ The rain continues to fall. Heavy rain does funny things to the island; there is no place for all of that freshwater to go, other than the ocean. But before it gets to the ocean, it puddles in the parking lots, cross streets, and …
~ by Robert P. Barsanti ~ At the corner of Pleasant and Main Street, near the Three Bricks and in the shadow of the Hadwen House, a Silver Yukon took the privilege of making an unsignalled right turn in front of me. I slammed on my brakes and touched the …