There is no better time of year than winter to visit the islands off the southern New England coast, because in the winter you can experience their natural beauty and better imagine what it must have been like to be among the first people to call these islands home.
Block Island
For this series - called Winter Islands - I travelled to Block Island, Rhode Island, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket off Cape Cod in Massachusetts. I stayed two days in each location with no preconceived notions of what I would find or come away with in terms of photography or the general experience.
I did find three very different but interconnected places. Each island has its own culture and history. All three are loosely held together by the sea that surrounds them and the people with the spirit, the dream, or the drive to live off the mainland in all four seasons.
Martha's Vineyard
Block Island is the smallest of the three. Martha's Vineyard the largest. I found Nantucket to be historically, the most unique, with its place in history best preserved.
Island Lights: U and LL Nantucket, LR Vineyard
In all three cases, I experienced almost everything nature had to offer someone committed to island life. The weather was changeable to say the least. The only thing missing was snow.
I arrived on Block Island in mid-January to enjoy a day of temperatures in the mid-50s, but was forced to leave several hours early because of approaching gale force winds. I got to Martha's Vineyard in February alongside power crews dispatched in an advance of a nor'easter. By the time I reached Nantucket in March, spring was in the air, and even though the thermometer said it was in the mid-40s, the direct sunlight reflecting off the empty beach made it feel much warmer.
Nantucket
I met a college student at Cisco Beach on Nantucket. She sat on a short cliff's edge looking out to sea enjoying the sun on her face and the sound of waves coming ashore.
Her post graduation future ahead of her - just over the horizon. She planned to spend the summer working on the island and seemed to be seriously contemplating staying well after that. She was taken in by the beauty and had fallen in love.
Contemplating life and what to do with yours is something most of us struggle with daily. What better place to ponder the question than on an island. Out at sea. Away from everything. Life reduced to its essence. Here you can ask yourself, what is really important? Is there anything on the mainland worth having? Is there anything back there I can't live without?
As we watched the waves journey rhythmically toward shore, I asked the young woman on the beach if she planned to make a life for herself on Nantucket, once she graduated. I asked from the perspective of someone forty years older who was hoping she would answer, "yes" so that I would know that there was someone out there living her dream without regret.
She smiled, and said, "I don't know." An honest answer with a hint of hope. The best I could hope for from a stranger.
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© Dean Pagani 2022
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© Dean Pagani 2022