Days remain

A lot has happened. I'm sorry to inform you almost none of it has to do with Obama's visit.

I have three days left on Martha's Vineyard.

I decided last weekend that moving to New York is the best decision, regardless of job prospects. The day after the decision, I had my third interview with GQ and was told, "We'd love to have you aboard." The next day, I was officially offered the internship. I'll be an unpaid intern on the internet side of GQ, which is especially exciting as it means more writing opportunities (for web-exclusive content, mostly, I'm sure) and being able to be part of the company while they launch a brand-new website in mid-October. I'll be living in Brooklyn with two friends from Maine, which will be a huge breath of fresh air after living with 11 strangers in Oak Bluffs and making few real friends over the summer. Much more to come in a new blog after the move to the city.

Yesterday my coworker Gilbert, the 60-something-year-old French waiter at Mediterranean I've deemed the best friend I've made on Martha's Vineyard, knowing it might have been my last day at the restaurant, gave me -- GAVE me!! -- his original "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" record as a parting gift and a souvenir of the summer. He said he listened to it the day before and it still sounds great. After a summer of hitting my stride as a Beatles fanatic and listening to their albums around the clock (halfway through disc two of "The White Album" as I write this, and no, I'm not exaggerating, I've hardly listened to anything but the Beatles and one new EELS album since June) and talking endlessly about the Beatles history, trivia, songs and styles with Gilbert, I was close to tears at this gesture. Incredibly kind and generous. Gilbert, who spent years in New York in the '60s and '70s, is soon to become my pen pal once I settle down in the city.

Okay, you want that Obama news. The most entertaining part of his visit came in the form of brief stories from the New York Times. He was in my neck of the woods a few times, but I never saw him. He ate at The Sweet Life on my street, but I was at work. He got takeout from Nancy's, not far off my street, but I wasn't around. He golfed at Mink Meadows, a course I was assigned to write about this week for the newspaper, on the same day I'd planned to go and interview some folks there. I lost my motivation to bike over and found out within an hour that Obama was golfing there. Other than that, the only other sign Obama was here for a week was an influx of satellite-dished news trucks, congestion on Circuit Avenue and the high point of the Obama merchandise zeitgeist. I originally had a photo blog planned for just this, but the New York Times beat me to the punch with an article a couple weeks ago. A few photos showing the zanier side of the Presidential preparation below.

The new aquarium on Circuit Ave welcomes the Obamas, later paints offer for free admission for Sasha and Malia.

Sharky's has been, without a doubt, the most ardent dreamer for an in-house Obama visit.

Scores of T-shirts like this are everywhere.

Front page of the Obama-themed Vineyard Gazette from Friday, Aug. 21, two days before the First Family flew in.

Every ad in the front section of the newspaper was geared toward the President.

Back from the dead

That's me, hopefully. This week, after a cripplingly short visit to Maine for "The Kings," I've been paralyzed with lack of motivation, lack of a social life in Martha's Vineyard, stress for the future, and a champion's penchant for napping (i.e. totally wasting my time). Some combination of these factors and others have led to a sour grapes between the Vineyard and I, so I'm hashing some of this out to enlighten you who might be wondering where the exciting travelogues and entries of discovery, self- and island-, have been.

I'm going to New York from Wednesday to Friday of next week. The only full day, Thursday, will serve the purpose of an interview at GQ for a full-time, unpaid fall internship. I'll also start scoping out Brooklyn apartments, even the cheapest of which may take a 90% bite of my meager summer savings. So be it -- an internship at a magazine as solid as GQ is an investment I'm prepared to go through hell (financial, personal, sleepwise) for. When you know there's one thing you can do (write) and you have a destination in mind (have since I was at least 15, reading a videogame magazine cover to cover every month on my bed), you don't have much of a choice but to go for it. Plus, being in New York will not be any kind of hell for me -- I've been wanting to try life there since I first visited at the young age of however old, and being with a few timeless friends from Maine will make all the difference after this lonely island summer, no matter how many hours I'm putting in or how few I'm sleeping. I have a dream, to be a self-respecting writer doing what I was born to do, and when I arrive, the view will be sweet.

I'm ready to be done with Martha's Vineyard. Something about living in a hotbed of summery people enjoying their leisure time and drinking on their boats while I scrape together money for rent, food, and Silas Marner-like saving to move to the apocalyptically expensive New York has not boded well with my system. See also: Swindler's Vineyard, the taste of which never faded from my mouth but rather worsened with the more people I met. See also: Not meeting anyone I'll leave this island considering more than an amiable co-worker, a far cry from the lifelong friends I made abroad and even in a short last year at college. A bonus "see also" would be increasing bitterness over not seeing any celebrities while my friends ring them up at general stores, pass them on the streets and wait on them in restaurants. (Steve Carell! Come on!)

On the up side, I'm focusing on what I need to do to knock 'em dead at GQ and working up the motivation to look at other internships and jobs, trying to write a novel (one handwritten legal pad complete, moving on to the next with gusto), finalizing a new piece of short fiction, continuing to write for my internship, the wedding magazine, and the Morning Sentinel. I also vow to make some fun, blog- and photo-worthy excursions like a trip to Aquinnah on a nice day or deep into Chilmark and West Tisbury on my bike. Maybe I'll see Obama, who'll be holing up in a Chilmark farm, according to the Vineyard Gazette. Lucky him -- the more he can enjoy himself and avoid the ruckus in Oak Bluffs, the better.

Last thing: Switched from my UMaine e-mail to zachdionne@gmail.com. I'll still receive your e-mails if you send 'em to my old address. Just filling you in. Thanks for reading.

Unrelated photo to leave you smiling or mildly amused: Cool rabbit who camps outside my bookstore.

The Beginning of the Beginning

I joined the Dharma Initiative and moved to The Island yesterday.


I graduated college. I came to Martha's Vineyard for an internship at a weekly newspaper. I'll spend the next four months writing arts and entertainment, features, and stuff-to-do stories for This Week on Martha's Vineyard [Web site isn't up yet] and working -- see: hopefully getting crazy mad insane wicked good tips -- at Mediterranean Restaurant.

My new pad is at 37 Circuit Avenue -- a main street in the island's most hoppin' town, Oak Bluffs. I live above a Black Dog store, the LL Bean of Martha's Vineyard, where all the schwag with the black pooch is sold. Incidentally, I've seen a bunch of real-life, tongue-waggin' dags that resemble the MV icon already.

I'm living with -- wait for it -- 9 girls and two guys. My friend Kiwi asked if Hillary Duff will be my roommate and Steve Martin will be my dad. Ha. Ha. Ha. Here's hoping it's more like my living situation in Wales than a sorority -- or a homeless shelter. Regardless, I don't plan to waste much time stagnating indoors, although I do have a desk in a little corner nook of my bedroom (like, ahem, my main man Stephen King) that I'm looking forward to writing at.

I'll keep this blog as fast, furious and as far as possible from my everything-I-write-has-to-be-epic-length tendencies, so as to stay encouraged and motivated to update many times a week. I'm titling it Chapter One since this summer on MV is my first step in the REAL real world, after college. I'm not sure what Chapter Two will be yet, but no worries -- I'm just going to chronicle my life, exploration, and writing experiences on this island as thoroughly as possible in this blog. Stick around -- it's going to be fun.