A Cape Cod Notebook

People thought Luther Crowell was insane, but he wasn’t. He was the greatest inventor in Cape Cod history.

Nantucket in winter is unrelenting in its sameness. Gray skies loom, unbroken for weeks. The sun is an unfamiliar object. You start to wonder just who thought it was a great idea to shingle every structure in cedar, once bright, now weathered to silver.

This week Bob concludes his account of the stranding of a large fishing boat on the Outer Beach last month.

Today Bob relates the first of a two-part account of the stranding of a New Bedford fishing boat on the Outer Beach last month.

If you live on Cape Cod, you likely have sand in your car. And if you live on Cape Cod and don’t have sand in your car, I might question if you are really living life to its fullest.

I’ve never thought of any beach before as my beach. Maybe that’s because all those other beaches already had names. I thought this beach was nameless, marked only by it’s “Emergency Beach Location 21” sign.

I’ve often thought that writers in general make poor candidates for psychiatric therapy. This isn’t primarily because most writers I know are skeptical, but rather because the goals of writers and therapists are diametrically opposed.

A few weeks ago, I had the occasion to visit my daughter and her family in Portland, Maine. I decided to go by train and booked a seat on Amtrak’s “Downeaster,” from Boston to Portland.

Not included in the blockbuster J. Robert Oppenheimer movie is how a Cape Cod connection played a crucial role in Oppenheimer’s early life, including his eventual move to Los Alamos to build a bomb that can destroy the world.

Beginning a new year in the middle of winter has always seemed ridiculous to me. But then no one asked me. I know, I know: it was Caesar’s doing, 4,000 years ago, to honor Janus, the god of new beginnings.